Many sports fans are trying their best to fill the void of no sports during the pandemic by watching old games on TV.
However, Dennis Kariuki, an avid sports fan himself, felt that was not enough.
So, the former Nipissing University Student decided to create the Isolation Olympics on YouTube.
"I like sports and that is gone, can we find something that is fun and maybe goofy that can take that spot of live entertainment but also hopefully with the purpose of making people laugh and bring people together," Kariuki said.
He has started with a competition between USport athletes on both the men's and women's side. For the women, the competition was the most burpees to be completed in a minute where Nipissing University student-athlete Andrea Young set the Isolation Olympics burpee standard.
"We have two competitors and we match them up," explained Kariuki.
"Right now we are doing Canadian universities. We send them a competition, they film themselves doing that competition, we match them up with the other person with the two videos beside each other and then we decide a winner from that and the winner moves onto the next round where there could be a different competition in the same sort of style."
Kariuki, who is now attending Queen's University taking the Innovation and Entrepreneurship program, is hoping to build his audience and is offering to create competitions for other athletes as well.
"People really like it and they are coming up with some cool ideas for different competitions," Kariuki noting a North Bay-Sudbury athlete competition would be ideal.
"I have gotten a lot of people who want to participate. They are finding out it is something different but entertaining and works in this time."
Anyone interested in setting up a competition can contact Dennis via email at [email protected]
See the competition involving Nipissing University soccer player Andrea Young competing against Alexanne Lefebvre, a female hockey player from Concordia:
