Inhale. Exhale. Inhale.
Exhale. Ok...
When I set up the concept of this Blog, I envisaged that, at
some point, I’d add a patriotic post, promoting the efforts of Team GB. That post would, typically, have arisen in
the event that we had won, maybe, 2 Gold Medals in one session, or 3 Gold
Medals in one day.
What I have witnessed over the past 3 days, both in person
and on the TV, has dwarfed that initial expectation. Dwarfed to the extent that I’ve got too much
information to fit into one Blog post. I’ll
try to fit everything into two posts, although prepare for some Tolstoy-like
reading.
So, Friday... I went to the Velodrome, which was the only Olympic
Park venue I’d previously attended prior to The Games. Consistent with my memories from my Test Event cisit, it is a closely packed venue, with all
spectators positioned closer to the action, to generate a deafening noise.
For many years, Great Britain was not renowned as an elite
Track Cycling country. I remember the turning point in this history – the Barcelona Olympics of 1992 – when Chris
Boardman rode his revolutionary Lotus bike to a Gold Medal in the individual
pursuit. In the ensuing two decades, the
performance of GB in this sport has progressively improved, to the point of
being universally recognised as the foremost country in the Track Cycling
world.
The catalyst for the current domination is Dave Brailsford –
the Performance Director of British Cycling.
In my opinion, Brailsford’s leadership is as strong as, if not better
than, any coach in the history of British sport. He is in the same class as leaders such as
Alf Ramsay, Alex Ferguson and Clive Woodward.
My expectations upon arriving at the Velodrome on Friday
were still, however, driven by caution.
There had been a GB disqualification the previous day for a technical infringement,
and for all the ideals of practice, practice, practice, surely some element of
sporting luck was needed to attain success.
The first event on track was the preliminary round of the
Women’s Team Pursuit. The purpose of
this round was to reduce the 10 participating countries down to 8, in readiness
for the following day’s action, so this was unlikely to be the most thrilling of events. When Team GB took
to the track, however, they delivered a spirited ride, to break the World Record
for the event.
Here are the spectators, providing a Mexican Wave, in unison
with the cyclists:
Next up was the first medal race of the day, the Men’s Team
Pursuit. Here
is a video which I shot, of the closing stages of that race, as Team GB surged to a Gold Medal – the video is best viewed
with the volume turned up to the maximum:
Lastly, it was the inaugural Olympic Women’s Keirin. For all of Victoria Pendleton’s achievements
in Sprint competitions, her Keirin record is comparatively modest – just the
one World Championship Gold Medal, from 5 years ago. I remember being present at this event at the
same venue during the Olympic Test event, and Vicky finished outside of the places
on that occasion.
Vicky is, quite rightly, a very popular athlete with the British public, and has battled many personal demons to get to where she is today. The atmosphere for this event, therefore, unsurprisingly surpassed what was
heard during the previous races. Vicky
took the lead with over a lap to go, and proceeded to ride around the final lap
in first position, to a cacophony of noise from the fans. As you will have seen from the front pages of
the newspapers the following morning, Queen Vic completed a perfect session for
GB...
Also a word for the performances of the GB Rowers at Eton Dorney
on Saturday morning... I wasn’t present to see the two Gold Medals, but again,
this was the perfect storm of technical ability plus an inspirational crowd. The one blip in that session was Mark Hunter
& Zac Purchase, being beaten into 2nd place, having led for most of their
final. Their BBC interview after that
race was heartbreaking to watch.
There was an Athletics session contested yesterday as well,
don't you know (to be continued)............
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