Tim’s SoS
Olympics so far? I have loved every minute of it.
It seems a life time ago the cauldron was lit at the Opening ceremony, so much has happened since.
It’s hard to know where to start, but if I could be an Olympian I would want to be a gymnast. This is the real wow event of the games and can you believe our men got Bronze? For 10 minutes we even had the Silver until the Japanese team appealed about their last routine. The last time we got a medal in men’s gymnastics was 100 years ago when we got a bronze. Bearing in mind we were 23rd in the world only 9 years ago, this is quite frankly outstanding! What these guys can do with their bodies is incredible. They are my heroes.
Our girls have also been making us proud. Like the whole nation I felt so sorry for Mark Cavendish and the GB men’s Road race team, so it was wonderful to see Lizzie Armitstead get silver the following day. Also who can’t love Rebecca Adlington? She’s one of my favourite Olympians. She comes across so well. She’s got a Bronze in the 400 metres freestyle which isn’t her favourite event, so fingers crossed for Gold in the 800 metres.
During the last few days I have watched everything from table tennis to Equestrian. The only two events I’ve not really got into are the football and the tennis, not that I have anything against them being in the Olympics, but I’m enjoying watching sports I don’t normally see. I’m actually glad they’re both in the shadow of smaller sports for two weeks.
Obviously being the host nation we get entry to events where we might not normally qualify. This will hopefully be good for developing those sports, but can give a false impression we’re not doing that well at these games when we lose.
I went to see the Team GB men’s team play handball in the Copper Box at the Olympic Park. They were playing France who I’m told are one of the best teams in the World. I don’t think our team would disagree with me if I said France were playing at a totally different level.
As I understand it, the GB Handball programme has only been up and running for 6 years. I thought our boys were great, but we took a bit of a hammering 44-15. The match after saw a much tighter affair where Denmark beat Hungary in the last few minutes 27-25.
Let’s hope the exposure from these Games gives these sports the helping hand needed to establish them here. It’s definitely converted me to a handball fan! I would have loved to have played it as a kid.
The only thing I would say about being at the Olympic Park is even though it’s amazing place to be, I did miss sitting in front of my TV able to watch ‘everything’ going on. At the moment I would say I’m up for the Bronze medal for watching the Olympics, but there’s a long way to go and I think I’ll have that Gold round my neck by the end of the two weeks!
Another medal which needs to be handed out is to Clare Balding, who has made the Aquatic centre her own. Her partner by the pool, Mark Foster, has also been excellent. Though the biggest BBC star for me so far is Jake Humphrey. He really is a top notch broadcaster; I think he’s the new Des Lynam, don’t you?
Over the next few days I’m looking forward to watching Water Polo, Weight Lifting, Rowing, Judo, Fencing, Gymnastics and definitely more handball. If you’ve not watched it yet, you must.
I’ll be back soon when hopefully we have more medals.
Tim
