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DAILY NEWS 10.8M YOUNG ARE INSPIRED The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games has announced in the week of SportAccord Convention that International Inspiration, its international legacy programme, has reached 10.8 million children and young people around the world. Lord Coe, Chair of LOCOG, said: “I am thrilled to announce that the International Inspiration programme has reached over 10 million children and young people. This is a fantastic achievement and means that more than 15 months out from the London 2012 Games we are well on our way to achieving our vision to reach 12 million children and young people in 20 countries. ”I have been lucky enough to meet some of the young people being reached through International Inspiration and to have seen how the programme is providing them with more opportunities in life. Sport can be a real change for good and I'm very proud that London 2012 is enabling this to happen to millions of young people around the world.” International Inspiration is bringing to life the promise made by the London 2012 bid team, which pledged to reach young people all around the world and connect them to the inspirational power of the Games so they are moved to choose sport. The programme works with local communities, teachers, coaches and governments to improve children’s lives and give them the chance to take part in sport and play. Through sport, young people learn how to become leaders, be positive role models and inspire their peers. ■
LONDON CALLING... As the countdown to the 2012 London Olympics nears the one-year mark, the emphasis is now strongly on operational planning, says the London Organising Committee (LOCOG). It is focused on the massive operational challenge of finalising and putting in place the many pieces of planning involved in venue operations and all the other core programmes for the delivery of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Operational planning has moved to the next stage following confirmation of the venue masterplan, accommodation allocation plan and especially the sports competition schedule by the IOC Executive Board earlier this year. Several key programmes have been launched, including ticket sales. The ticketing programme represents the single biggest slice of revenue still available to LOCOG. The Olympic Park, the centrepiece for the Games, is now more than 80 per cent complete. The Velodrome is finished, along with the showpiece Olympic Stadium, while construction of the remaining permanent new venues, including the Aquatics Centre, will be completed over the spring and summer. The Olympic Village, the single biggest construction project, is due for completion early next year. The Olympic Games in numbers: 26 sports, 39 disciplines 34 venues 8.8 million tickets 10,500 athletes 302 medal events 21,000 media and broadcasters 3,000 technical officials 205 National Olympic Committees 7,500 team officials. Paralympic Games in numbers: 20 sports, 21 disciplines 17 venues plus road courses 2 million tickets 4,200 athletes 500 medal events 6,500 media and broadcasters
1,200 technical officials 170 National Paralympic Committees 2,300 team officials The Olympic Park: •The Olympic Park is the size of 357 football pitches • 80,000 – seat capacity at the Olympic Stadium (reducing to 25,000 postGames) • 200-plus – km of electrical cables installed in two 6km tunnels built under the Park • 300,000 plants being added to the Olympic Park’s wetlands areas • 8.35km – total length of waterways within or close to the Olympic Park, much of which is being restored
• 90% – proportion of material reclaimed from demolition within the Olympic Park that can be reused or recycled • 338km – length of the power cable contained within the Olympic Stadium • 11 – number of residential blocks within the Olympic Village, containing 17,000 beds • 10,000m2 – the size of the new lake at Broxbourne White Water Canoe Centre • 1.3 million – tonnes of soil washed to get rid of contamination • 10,000 – number of temporary toilets • 200,000 – number of temporary seats • 220,000 – m2 of temporary tents • 400 – number of temporary generators required ■
PLAY UP! AND PLAY THE GAME (BUT INVENT IT FIRST) I had the peculiar distinction of having invented a hitherto unknown form of the game of cricket. You will have heard of Twenty20 cricket: this was Fifty20. Three hours of cricket in 50 degrees centigrade, followed by 20 pints of cold beer. The Old Emersonians Cricket Club (named after Emerson, head barman of our local alehouse in Dubai) brought together a score of veteran cricket enthusiasts from a dozen countries. We played on any patch of ground whose owners would have us (not that many, in truth). No doubt the International Cricket Council, headquartered in Dubai, would have frowned upon the irregular nature of the Fifty20 game. The British Medical Association would have disapproved on health and safety grounds. It was a game unlikely to be found in the pages of cricketing “Bible” Wisden, but possibly in the annals of the Journal of Mental Illness Manifest. It is safe to say that this was one game invented by the English that will not be embraced by others around the world, or even around the corner. Unlike most of the great sports like
by Mike Martin cricket, rugby and, above all, soccer that are such a passion around the world and which bear the legend “Made in England.” It remains a mystery why the denizens of our island should have been responsible for inventing the classic games that inform the lives of so many. Alas, the origins are lost in the mists of time. In the case of cricket, the odd ancient linguistic reference has led some to claim that the game was a French invention. The evidence is against it. It is not a game played today in France and a 40minute lunch break would never be acceptable in the land of gastronomie. Lord Mancroft said: “Cricket is a game which the English, not being a spiritual people, have invented in order to give themselves some conception of eternity.” Proof positive, perhaps. The modern Olympic Games is a far cry from the original. But the modern sports fan would probably not be that interested in a lot of oiled and naked Greek athletes doing a spot of running, wrestling and discus throwing (and not a
woman allowed in the stadium). So it is with the great sports invented in England. We have a habit of inventing them and then allowing others to turn them into something grand. If the invention of the wheel had occurred in England, there is a chance that it would have been triangular and required others to perfect it. Only recently the Twenty20 form of the game emerged from this land, only to be whisked off to India, where it has been taken to a stratospheric form. And the
medieval lads who long ago kicked a stuffed sheep’s bladder around in the original form of soccer would have gazed in wonder at the majestic form of today’s game as found in Latin America. We are an island nation, with a sometimes insular disposition, given to creating sporting diversions for ourselves. We are then disposed to let others around the world realise the potential of our inventions. Gosh, I think we may have invented globalisation as well. ■