7 Rio 2016 Olympic events to watch: Saturday, August 6

The first full day of Olympic competition is upon us! With so many sports and athletes in competition, we’ve decided to make things easy for you, the television viewer.

Every day during the Rio 2016 Olympics we’ll highlight what to watch, and what time it comes on. Olympics coverage will be on CBC, TSN, Sportsnet, and online at Olympics.cbc.ca.

Here’s the first edition!

1. Women’s Rugby Sevens

• Canada vs Japan: 8:30 am PT (11:30 am ET)
• Canada vs Brazil: 1:30 pm PT (4:30 pm ET)

Rugby Sevens debuts as an Olympic sport on Saturday and the Canadian women are a medal favourite. Canada is currently third in the series standings and finished second behind New Zealand last season.

2. Women’s Basketball

• Canada vs China: 10:30 am PT (1:30 pm ET)

Kia Nurse and the Canadian women’s national basketball team will have a tough test against world #8 China right off the bat. The ninth-ranked Canadians will need to finish in the top-four of their six-team pool if to advance to the quarter-finals. A win against China would be a great place to start.

It might be their most important game of the preliminary round.

3. Swimming

• Men’s 400 m individual medley final: 6:03 pm PT (9:03 pm ET)
• Men’s 400 m freestyle swimming final: 6:30 pm PT (9:30 pm ET)

Victoria’s Ryan Cochrane is a medal threat again, as the Olympic medal winner in 2008 and 2012. He won those medals in the 1500 metre race, but he’s had success at this distance also. The 27-year-old was the bronze medal winner in this distance at last year’s World Championships.

• Women’s 400 m individual medley final: 6:49 pm PT (9:49 pm ET)
• Women’s 4×100 m freestyle relay final: 7:24 pm PT (10:24 pm ET)

Penny Oleksiak, Chantal Van Landeghem, Sandrine Mainville, and Michelle Williams will try to bring home a medal for Canada in the pool on Saturday. This group finished 5th in this event at the World Championships last year, setting a national record in the process.

4. Men’s Beach Volleyball

• Josh Binstock and Samuel Schachter (Canada) vs Alison Cerutti and Bruno Oscar Schmidt (Brazil): 7 am PT (10 am ET)

The 22nd ranked duo from Canada face the #1 ranked team from the host country.

5. Women’s Soccer

• Canada vs Zimbabwe: 11 am PT (2 pm ET)

After a thrilling win against Australia in their tournament opener on Wednesday, Canada should have a relatively easy time with Zimbabwe. Or at least that’s what we expect.

6. Tennis

• Genie Bouchard (Canada) vs Sloane Stephens (USA): approx. 11:30 am PT (2:30 pm ET)

• Vasek Pospisil (Canada) vs Gael Monfils (France): 4:30 pm PT (7:30 pm ET)

Milos Raonic didn’t make the trip to Rio, but Genie Bouchard and Vasek Pospisil did. Bouchard (ranked 39th in the world) is up against world #22 Sloane Stephens. Pospisil (#100) has a tough test against Gael Monfils (#11).

7. Men’s Field Hockey

• Canada vs Germany: 2 pm PT (5 pm ET)

Canada’s other men’s hockey team could get a rough welcome to the Olympics against Germany. The Germans have won the last two Olympic gold medals in this event and are currently the #3 ranked team in the world behind Australia and the Netherlands. This match will show us how ready Canada is for top competition.