2012 london olympics.com

2012 London Olympics| Sore Loser

Abrahamian threw his bronze medal away because he was so upset with the wrestling decision that claimed the gold medal he should have won. This happened at the Beijing Olympic Games. Controversial refereeing decisions will always be around unless we turn more and more to technology for the answers.

Rugby and cricket have started to turn more and more to video replays. In rugby, the video referee can go back a few plays to see if fouls have been committed. I think it is the best thing ever as it is going to keep the players honest. It is also going to ensure that the best team wins by playing fairly and not cheating.

I am sure nobody wants to deliberately make a mistake but it happens. It is these types of errors that can rob an athlete of what is rightfully theirs.

In the early days, with swimming, it was up to the time-keepers to see who finished the race first. Then they developed electronic pads to ensure that errors could not be made.

So how should we react if we are robbed with a poor decision?  This is a very difficult one, especially if an athlete has prepared for years for their day of glory and has that taken away because of human error. It must be heart breaking.

I think that sport should still triumph and that the athletes behave in the correct manner and do not bring disrepute to their sport because they are angry. Sportsmanship must be at the top of the agenda.

Let us hope that at the 2012 London Olympics our athletes place sportsmanship first.

2012 London Olympics| Drugs

I am quite fed up with the athletes who think the public are stupid. A good example is the American sprinter Marion Jones who was stripped of her medals for taking steroids. She has just completed a 6 month jail sentence for lying in court. She said "Never knowingly did I take performance enhancing drugs."

That is such rubbish. There is so much information available on the internet. Top athletes have nutritionists and coaches who are fully aware of the banned substances. There is something very wrong if they do not know. They should not be involved in sport if they do not know their industry.

All athletes who are preparing for the 2012 London Olympics will already be on a strict programme for they type of training they need to be doing. They will be taking supplements and they will be on special eating plans. To say they do not know what a banned substance is would be a lie.

I really hope that our athletes that are preparing for the 2012 London Olympics will do things the right way. If you are going to win, win fairly and because of ability. That is what makes a true winner. Not a cheat. I know it is very tempting to want to get the slight edge over competitors but stay away from drugs.

2012 London Olympics| Coaching

I am considered a coach in the business world. I do not consider myself as a coach but more as a mentor. I teach from personal experience and not from what I have read or studied. I do use other people’s information, but mostly use my own. I know many of our athletes are currently being coached by people who have never been Olympic gold medallists. That does not make them any less a great coach. A lot of the coaches boast fantastic records of achievement for their athletes, but I personally think for the 2012 Olympic Games we should have a bit more -make use of past medallists. The mental preparation is as important, if not more important, than the actual training. I know there are a number of sports psychologist’s working with the athletes, but for me, it is a bit like have someone counsel you on panic attacks when they have never experienced them. They are doing it out of a text book, and what they have learned from someone who has had them. It is just not good enough.

Learning first hand from someone who has been there and got the T shirt is far more powerful and believable. I really hope our coaches take this into account and have the athletes properly prepared for the 2012 London Olympics. I am talking about mental preparation - physically they will stack up against anyone in the world.

2012 London Olympics| Swimming

Grant Hackett, the current world record holder for the 1,500-metres, has decided to retire. He set the record at 14 minutes 34.56 seconds in the 2001 world championships at Fukuoka in Japan.  He has been a dominant force in this event for the past decade.

At the Australia Swimming awards dinner Grant said "I have been doing this for a long time and just make the most of every opportunity," "Now it is all just a memory for me."

He is a powerful swimmer and also holds the world record in the 800.  In 1999 he held the world record for 200 freestyle which has since been beaten by Australian Ian Thorpe. At 28 years of age, he is probably feeling he is over the hill and it is time to give up. The decision was also prompted because at Beijing he was beaten by Oussama Mellouli of Tunisia.

I really hope he now gives back to the future swimmers and helps them for the coming 2012 London Olympics. Experience is hard to beat, and you can learn a lot from a coach on how to train and how to tactically win races, but experience is much more. Information from a former great is more valuable than all the coaching in the world.

I hope for our British swimmers that they will use past champions to help mentally prepare and get in shape for the 2012 London Olympics.

2012 London Olympics| Depression

There is a lot of news right now about this world wide depression. I decided to give this a bit of thought. The question I asked myself was - 

What is a depression ?

The answer - it is a state that people feel they have absolutely no control over.

I then asked myself "can you give someone poverty on a plate or can you give them prosperity on a plate ?" and the answer is no to both.

I then realised that in good times people go bankrupt - and so do they go bankrupt in the bad times.

A lot of the current situation is more a state of mind that is being perpetuated by the media. Money has not been burned or confiscated. It is still around and might be worth a bit less but a Pound is still worth something.

It would be an absolute shame if all our 2012 Olympic athletes believed that all is lost, and there is no chance of winning a medal. They have to be absolutely positive that they are taking the right action to win medals in 2012 London Olympics.

We need to be doing the same in our everyday lives, regardless of the media. They need to spell doom and gloom because it sells papers.

It is time for the whole nation to take a positive approach to the circumstances. This, hopefully, will rub off onto our athletes, and this way they will put in the right preparation for those all important 2012 London Olympics.

2012 London Olympics| Aquatic Centre

The new Aquatics Centre looks like it is going to be an amazing new facility for swimmers and spectators alike. It is understood that it is going to take care of the swimming events, as well as diving, synchronised swimming and the water polo events. The 2012 Paralympic Swimming competition will also be held here.

They are obviously expecting quite a large following for our 2012 London Olympic Water Athletes. The main pool area for swimming and diving will seat around 17,500 people and 5,000 seats for the Water Polo.

A lot of planning has gone into this unit so that it can be used for many future events. Seating can be removed and replaced when required. This centre will be available for local clubs and schools to use it which is fantastic for the sport. Let us hope the presence of this fantastic building will inspire our swimmers to train with both heart and soul to make this 2012 London Olympics one to be remembered for a long time to come.

2012 London Olympics| Marathon

The proposed route for the 2012 London Olympic marathon is going to be something quite special. The marathon route will start at Tower Bridge and pass the British Airways London Eye, Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, St Paul's Cathedral and other great landmarks to finish in the new Olympic Stadium in Stratford, east London.

This route will certainly show off the beauty and history of London. Olympic sports will never be the same again with such a setting.

It is believed the Olympic marathon runners will complete three laps of a central London course before heading for the new high tech Olympic Park stadium in east London where the race will finish.

The London Marathon course was designed by London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games organisers in conjunction with London Marathon organisers and UK Athletics.

London 2012 Chairman, Sebastian Coe, commented that London has famous sights which will make the London 2102 Marathon an unforgettable Olympic experience for both spectators and athletes.

"We wanted to design a course that will create lasting memories and moments for the runners, spectators, television audiences and the Olympic Movement; a course that will inspire a new generation of athletes and runners," said Coe

A number of other top runners have commented on how great this London 2012 marathon will be. Paul Tergat, the Kenyan world record holder said the British people are fantastic and so welcoming.

Haile Gebrselassie, one of the greatest long distance runners of all time also commented that London is very special to him. He said when you run in London it feels like the whole city has come to run with you. The British public are truly fantastic and are going to contribute to an amazing 2012 Olympic games in London.

Photo credit - Dail Mail

2012 London Olympics| Where to now - with the Credit Crunch ?

The media is spreading doom and gloom all over the world. I see them interviewing families and encouraging people to tell their sad tales to every one. If our athletes do the same thing, then this great event of the 2012 London Olympics is doomed before it even starts. We will all be reflecting on how bad it is, and how we are going to fail. The athletes would be better off not even to try.

It is sad that banks are going under. How does it affect me ? Well...only if I have invested in them, or if they give me money to live, is it a problem. Otherwise it is life and I need to focus on the good.

What good can you do today? There is a big push to get the nation fit with the coming 2012 London Olympics. Let us not only get our bodies fit, but our minds. This will certainly help our sportsmen and woman to have dreams and hope. The Olympics can be used to change the way we think - from this negative situation to a positive one.

2012 London Olympics| Olympic rings

The five Olympic rings represent the five continents and were designed in 1913, adopted in 1914 and debuted at the Games at Antwerp, 1920.

The rings symbolize the whole of the Olympics. Those five interlocking rings, coloured blue, yellow, black, green, and red on a white field were originally designed by Baron Pierre de Coubertin in 1912.  He is the founder of the modern Olympic Games. The rings stand for passion, faith, victory, work ethic, and sportsmanship. The emblem was chosen to illustrate and represent the world Congress of 1914 ...: five intertwined rings in different colors - blue, yellow, black, green, red - are placed on the white field of the paper. These five rings represent the five parts of the world which now are won over to Olympism and willing to accept healthy competition. According to De Coubertin the ring colors stand for those colors that appeared on all the national flags of the world at that time.

The 1914 Congress had to be suspended due to the outbreak of World War I, but the symbol (and flag) were later adopted. They would first officially debut at the VIIth Olympiad in Antwerp, Belgium in 1920.

The symbol's popularity and widespread use began during the lead-up to the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. Carl Diem, president of the Organizing Committee of the 1936 Summer Olympics, wanted to hold a torchbearers' ceremony in the stadium at Delphi, site of the famous oracle, where the Pythian Games were also held. For this reason he ordered construction of a milestone with the Olympic rings carved in the sides, and that a torchbearer should carry the flame along with an escort of three others from there to Berlin. The ceremony was celebrated but the stone was never removed. Later, two British authors Lynn and Gray Poole, when visiting Delphi in the late 1950s, saw the stone and reported in their "History of the Ancient Games" that the Olympic rings design came from ancient Greece. This has become known as "Carl Diem's Stone". This created a myth that the symbol had an ancient Greek origin. The rings would subsequently be featured prominently in Nazi images in 1936 as part of an effort to glorify the Third Reich.

The current view of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is that the symbol "reinforces the idea" that the Olympic Movement is international and welcomes all countries of the world to join. As can be read in the Olympic Charter, the Olympic symbol represents the union of the five continents and the meeting of athletes from throughout the world at the Olympic Games. However, no continent is represented by any specific ring. Though colorful explanations about the symbolism of the colored rings exist (for example, it is said that the five Olympic rings are blue, yellow, black, green, and red because at least one of these colors appears on every national flag), the only connection between the rings and the continents is that the number five refers to the number of continents. In this scheme, the Americas are viewed as a single continent, and Antarctica is omitted. The current 5 continents are Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Oceania.

The black ring may be substituted by a white ring if the symbol is placed on a dark-colored background.

After all those years it was only a thought and an idea from  Pierre de Coubertin that has created history;  a history that lives on to the present and on to the London Olympics in 2012.

Information from Wikipedia.

2012 London Olympics| Amateurs and Professionals

It has always been said that a healthy body is a healthy mind. I can see how this works. If you feel good about how you look, you tend to think differently. I know from my own past, the times I have been overweight I felt bad, both in mind and body. 

There has always been the idea that a professional has an unfair advantage over an amateur because the amateur is doing the sport as a hobby. The exclusion of professionals has caused several controversies throughout the history of the modern Olympics. 1912 Olympic pentathlon and decathlon champion, Jim Thorpe, was stripped of his medals when it was discovered that he played semi–professional baseball prior to winning his medals. He was restored as champion on compassionate grounds by the IOC in 1983. Swiss and Austrian skiers boycotted the 1936 Winter Olympics in support of their skiing teachers, who were not allowed to compete because they earned money for their sport and were considered professionals.

As of 2004, the only sports in which no professionals compete is boxing (even this requires a definition of amateurism based on fight rules rather than on payment, as some boxers receive cash prizes from their National Olympic Committees); in men's football (soccer), the number of players over 23 years of age is limited to 3 per team.

Most athletes who win or do well get some form of remuneration for their efforts, even if it is in the line of sponsorship.

I think sport is sport, and as long as drugs are not used, and everyone abides by the same rules, let the best win. What do we want for the 2012 London Olympics ? A fair and competitive Games.