Asafa Powell, a retired Jamaican sprinting legend, has expressed doubts over the International Olympic Committee’s decision to utilise “anti-sex beds” constructed of cardboard for the next Olympic Games in Paris. The purpose of these mattresses, which were manufactured by the Japanese business Airweave and were utilised during the Tokyo 2020 Games, was to deter athletes from having personal relationships, particularly in the “City of Love.” Recycled cardboard is used to make the mattresses, which Airweave founder Motokuni Takaoka demonstrated last year by jumping on one and saying it “can support several people on top.” In the recently constructed village complex next to the main sports stadium in northern Paris, athletes will share rooms and sleep on single beds.
Powell likened the circumstance to being in a tight high school setting during a conversation with his Jamaican girlfriend Junelle Bromfield and wife, fellow sprinter Noah Lyles, on their podcast, The Powells. Considering the average athlete’s lack of maturity, he questioned the need and relevance of such measures. “We’re not in high school here. We are grownups now. Powell remarked, “There are folks there who are thirty years old and in their forties. Although there may be the occasional 16-year-old, most people are adults. Why are you training them against doing what they want to do? One of the first things you see even as you enter the Championships (Village) is a room filled with condoms. It seems as though they are urging you to proceed. Which mattress will prevent you from carrying it out? That is, unless the beds are spiked. Why would your finest athletes, who prepare for four years to compete for gold medals, find it pleasant to sleep on cardboard boxes? It sounds really strange.