Canoe Redux

Back in Windsor this morning for the finals of the Canoe Sprints. It's a muggy morning that feels as though could turn stormy, and the storm comes in the shape of a huge Hungarian contingent determined to blow their countrymen - and women - to glory.

We're here to support defending champion Tim Brabants in his K1 class, but more so for the four British girls in the K4. Brabants can only manage eight in his final, before  we see a German and then a Hungarian pair delight their fans with a couple of golds.

The final race of the day is the K4. It's only as the British team race past me that it hits me that this is the most impressive thing I've seen done by anyone I've actually met.

The Brits' final result is a fifth place, behind a quartet of extremely strong boats. The Polish team qualified for the final with a world best time which would have won them gold today, but finish fourth. Victory in front of a home crowd would have been sensational, but with one of the youngest crews in the race, GB have laid some exciting foundations for Rio. Huge congratulations to Louisa and the rest of her team.

Hockey at the Riverbank Arena

When China lose 1-0 to Japan yesterday afternoon, the British and Dutch women's hockey teams are assured of a place in the semi finals of the tournament.  They meet in the evening to play for the top spot in their group, however, and the atmosphere is one of the best I've seen at these games.  The Dutch turn up on a grand scale, almost outnumbering the home support, and sing throughout.  By some amazing luck we've got incredible seats in the accessible walkway, where we can choose our own spot and move chairs around to the end the British are attacking in each half.  There's nothing between us and the team benches except the walkway to the changing rooms.  Best seats in the house.

There's some great skill on show in the first half, and the GB fans get a boost when their side take the lead from a penalty corner.  Immediately afterwards the Dutch win one of their own, but Reading's Beth Storry produces the first of a trio of brilliant saves to ensure Britain lead at half time.  When the away team set up to take a penalty, the sound system plays tension-mounting music and the opportunity is squandered.  In the second, however, the top-ranked Dutch really show their class.  They win an early penalty - this time accompanied by something far more uplifting - and respond in kind by levelling the scores.  Sadly for GB the play is all Dutch from here, the Brits reduced to long ball attacks and unable to build any possession.  The Netherlands score again and finish 2-1 winners, but GB can look forward to a semi final on Wednesday.

At the end of the contest both teams walk right around the crowd, clapping their support and taking their own applause.  This is just one of the many touches that make me feel a lot of people who don't think they like sport would have a fantastic evening here.  There's none of the cynicism of football, for instance, and the pace of play is kept up with quickly taken free hits and restarts.  Unlike footballers, hockey players can take a free hit to themselves, choosing to dribble the ball forward rather than playing a pass, and this immediately speeds up play.

In the second game of the night, Australia and Argentina face off for the right to meet Team GB on Wednesday.  The sport is huge in these countries, and the players can achieve real celebrity status.  the Australians attack and defend in packs, the Argentinians make quick breaks from defence to attack.  Neither team looks particularly used to the wet, chilly conditions which have developed, but there's total commitment and some great dribbling skill on show, particularly from the Argentinian attackers.

The match is goalless with five minutes to play, and Australia need a win to qualify.  In another great moment, the Aussies substitute their goalkeeper for an outfield player in a desperate final push, but they can't break down their South American opponents, and the 1996 and 2000 winners bow out at the group stage.

Eton Success

The Duke of Wellington is famously claimed to have said that the Battle of Waterloo 'was won on the playing fields of Eton'.  While this may or may not be the case, twenty six gold medals will be won on the boating lake of Eton this summer.  Dorney Lake, host to the rowing and canoe sprint events, is, astonishingly, completely owned by the college and hired by the games this summer.  At least there's no issue over legacy here.

Getting crowds of twenty thousand people out to the Windsor venue is a massive logistical challenge, but an army of shuttle busses from local stations manage to deliver nearly a capacity crowd for the very start of the morning's racing.  They've come to see Tim Brabants, gold medal winner in Beijing, start the defence of his K1 100m title in the first heat of the day.  Brabants, now 35, took eighteen months out of the sport to pursue his career as an Accident & Emergency doctor after winning gold.  He's a youngster compared to the oldest competitor in the regatta, mind - the astonishing Josefa Idem of Italy is competing in her eighth olympics, having won a bronze medal her debut in Los Angeles in 1983 (and has qualified for the K1 final again this year)!

The powerhouses in Canoe Sprint are Hungary and Germany, but while European nations dominate alongside a few paddlers from North America and Australia, there are also representatives from countries as diverse as Samoa and Angola racing this morning.  The crowd give them great support, encouraged by the sound system which has shunned the usual Olympic soundtrack for a light helping of dance tunes and even some drum'n'bass.

Surprisingly, several racers use the 1000m event as race practice for the 200m competition, working hard for that distance and then cruising the rest of the way.  There is even one bizarre heat in which five boats compete for five qualifying spots.  Unsurprisingly, a couple take it very easy indeed.  In an Olympics where we've seen competitors disqualified from both Badminton and Athletics for taking tactical decisions not to give their full effort, I have to say I don't like this, and find it very strange that the Canoe Sprint authorities allow it to continue.

When the racing is good though, it's compelling.  The precise coordination needed by pairs and quartets to match each others timing and technique is shaded only by the balance of the 'C' class racers, who kneel in their canoe and manage to keep themselves upright while pushing back water with incredible force.

Brabants makes his final, and the British K4 team (powered on by Louisa Sawers, who I spoke to yesterday) only just miss out on automatic qualification.  They look good in their semi final though, and the crowd was delighted to see them into their final in the very last action of the day.  Massive congratulations to the girls, who race after Brabants tomorrow morning.

Inside Team GB - Louisa Sawers

Last week at Lee Valley, to the North of London, British canoeing delighted in a fantastic gold and silver in the men's C2 race. On the other side of town GB's rowers were topping their medal table with nine medals, four of which were gold. In the second week of the games the spotlight will fall on the sprint canoe team, whose sport lies somewhere between the two. I spoke to Louisa Sawers, who will race for Great Britain in the K2 and K4 boats, about the long wait for the start of competition.

'The slalom guys did an awesome job', she begins. 'We have different training programmes and train in different locations, but we know them all and they came to our apartment before we went into the opening ceremony. They are all such lovely lads and we were so happy when we found out they had got gold and silver!'. A double triumph worth celebrating.

Then there's the rowers, who have been staying at the same hotel in Windsor. 'It was so cool seeing Katherine Grainger at breakfast!' Grainger, the 36 year old team captain who won gold on Friday after three Olympic silvers is one of Louisa's sporting heroes and has had great advice to offer: 'She told us the crowds are there to support you and the number of GB flags is incredible, so use it as it will only come round once in our sporting careers!'

Louisa sat in the grandstand at Dorney on Friday, watching first hand as Grainger finally strike gold. 'It was so emotional being in the crowds at the medal ceremony. You could see how much it meant to her'. That must whet the appetite for next week? 'I can't wait to race', Louisa says. Having gone as a team to get a feel for what that home roar will really sound like, you can feel their hunger for the start line.

The K4 (a kayak, as opposed to a canoe, has racers seated and propelling the boat with a double-ended paddle, while the number denotes how many are in the boat) is Louisa's main event. With Rachel Cawthorn and Jess Walker she won European Championship bronze, and the trio are joined this year by Angela Hannah. The boat took fourth place in the last World Championships in Hungary, and missed a silver medal by less than half a second. They were the first British boat to qualify for the Olympics, and hopes are high this time round.

Since winning the World Junior Championship with Walker, Louisa has seldom raced in the two-woman event, the K2, but relishes the chance to take on a second event in London. 'It's a good opportunity to get out there and do what we do...RACE! We have nothing to lose as we have no international ranking...  watching other Team GB athlete achieve medals and some amazing results just makes you believe anything is possible'.

It's great to know our girls are so looking forward to getting out on the water, and they must be champing at the bit having been made to wait so long since the games opened last Friday night. Louisa and her team-mates were in the Olympic Stadium to witness Danny Boyle's spectacular... or some of it, at least. 'I can't believe I missed Mr Bean! I love him!' Still, the night was once-in-a-lifetime stuff. 'Everyone behind the barriers leading into stadium was British and just shouting at us wishing us good luck'. That theme of home support again. It makes a real differnce, and Louisa wants to keep hold of the feeling - 'I have now downloaded David Bowie, Heroes on iTunes as it reminds me of walking into stadium feeling massively proud to be British and seeing all the flags waving at us!'

After the ceremony the team set up camp in Oakley Court, a hotel just two miles upriver from the competition lake. No special Olympic lane is needed here - the team paddle to work. 'The facilities are brilliant. The athlete's lounge is very comfy with TV covering the action of the other sports. The food here is very good and healthy with lots of flavours'. Louisa, a true foodie, has been spending some of her free time helping out Oakley's top class pastry chef.

'Rooms have had the Team GB stamp with mugs, drinks bottles, flags, the GB lion and we got a gift - a dog tag with our individual number of when you got selected.' Hers is 238/542; number 1 is owned by the now four-time gold medalist Ben Ainslie.

For all the facilities and activites, the last week has been a long wait for the young star. While Grainger and the rest of the GB team have been competing - her housemate Nicola White scored for our table-topping hockey team in their 5-3 win over Korea - the canoers have been training, though at this point the work is down to one session a day on the water as they prepare for competition.  Sometimes there will be another session of some core work, or stretching to keep their bodies in peak condition, but the hard yards have been put in already this year, at training camps in the heat of Seville and South Africa. The aim of every session now is 'to get off the water feeling good and ready to race'.

That aim will be realised this morning, as the K4 girls start their competition at 10.39 this morning. They've been drawn in middle of the first heat next to World Champions Hungary, and will be hoping to show the Hungarians what home advantage - and years of hard work - can achieve.  Good luck to them, and the rest of team GB's canoers!

About Last Night...

I'm trying to put this in some sort of context, and it isn't easy.  For sport in this country I can think of only two nights better, and each ended with a world cup being lifted.  Both were won in the name of England, though.  For Britain?  Individual achievement, Sir Steve Redgrave.  Team success, there was the night in the Laoshan velodrome when Britain won three gold medals (and a silver and a bronze!) in the men's sprint, women's sprint and team sprint.  But those dramas played out on foreign fields, witnessed in person by only a lucky few of their fellow countrymen.  Roger Bannister's iconic mile gripped the nation, but the stage was many times smaller than this.  Eighty thousand were privileged - honoured - to share this night with their trio of heroes.  Seventeen million more looked on at home.

"It's been one hundred and four years since a British competitor last won an athletics gold medal in London.  Tonight you might even see two."


The American stadium announcer began the evening with what sounded like a hopeful statement but ended up looking like pessimism.  I remember thinking 'hang on, what about the boys in the long jump?' but knew they had qualified only fourth and fifth.

Then the evening got off to the worst possible start.  When the stories of tonight are told, few will include the semi finals of the 400 metres hurdles, when World, European and Commonwealth champion Dai Greene appeared to miss the final of his event by finishing fourth in his semi final (there were three).  Greene lay motionless in horror on the track two full minutes.  The next British runner hit the third hurdle and collapsed injured.  A third struggled home well out of the places.  I was watching from behind a block of approximately one thousand empty seats.  Then things changed.

We heard that Greene's time had been enough for him to make the final after all.  The crowd trapped behind the empty seats were brought down into prime viewing position.  The long jump finalists were introduced, with double British hopes.  Christine Ohurugou looked strong in her 400m semi final.  The giant laughing Pole who won last night's shot put competition came out for his medal ceremony looking like a roadie for Pantera.  Greg Rutherford took the lead in the long jump, with fellow Brit Chris Tomlinson in third place.  Everything started to roll.

When Jessica Ennis stepped out onto the track for the final event of the heptathlon, she needed only to finish within ten seconds of her challengers.  She went out strong and led until 600 metres, when a couple of her rivals passed her.  That was when the first roar happened.  It didn't seem to come from outside my head.  The entire crowd turned a force of will into a sea of sound, and Ennis kicked for home.  She didn't need to cross the line first, but she did.  The heptathletes took their wonderful group lap of honour, and Jess Ennis took the hearts of the nation.  Rutherford took to the runway almost immediately and the crowd made that noise again.  Carried by 80,000 pleas, he extended his lead to a decisive 8.31.

Photo: Alistair Scott

At the moment Mo Farah was introduced to the crowd I actually pinched myself.  It sounds absurd, but it was the only response my mind could find.  The ovation for the start of the men's 10,000 metres was so great that, sadly, Tomlinson was called away from the runway where he had been preparing to make his last attempt in the long jump.  It cost him his composure, and a final effort at a medal.

With five laps remaining in the race, the roar began again.  Farah was being followed around the track by the world's slowest Mexican wave, every spectator rising to their feet as the men kicked past.  Then, on the last bend of the last lap, they took it to a level I have never heard.  I was screaming in a voice I never knew I had.  'Please, Mo.  Please'.

When the stadium had roared for Ennis, they did so in celebration.  Her position before the last race made victory a near certainty.  For Rutherford they roared in surprise and delight.  When Mo Farah kicked onto the back straight of the most important race of his life, the crowd roared to help him. Farah was shadowed by the fastest sprinters in distance running, the outcome was in very real doubt.  They roared and they roared, begging him down the straight.  That was what made that moment the most special thing I have ever seen.

After the race the show was stolen by Farah's family, his wife two months removed from giving birth to twins, and his daughter dancing around the stadium.  When it was time for her to leave the track, she ran fifty metres in a single lane, imitating her dad and the rest of the athletes she saw tonight.  'Inspiring a Generation', the games promised.  This was like the first raindrop of a monsoon.

Once this dreamlike hour had passed, we watched the final of the women's 100m final, and the medal ceremony for the women's discus, after which the gold medalist threw her bouquet of flowers into the crowd with such force that she missed the entire first section.  Old habits die hard.  The stadium announcer terrified us with the news that the result of the heptathlon was under protest and appeal, then brought the house down with the explanation that Ennis' position was not in question.  Paul McCartney appeared and led the stadium in a singalong of 'All You Need Is Love'.  Seb Coe himself put the medal around Jess' neck.  Are you kidding me?  This night cannot really be happening.  Am I really there?  The next morning I find a photo that I have no memory of posing for.  Seems I really was.

Chariots of Farah

If you like underdog stories, you should stop what you're doing at 9.15 this evening, and support this man.


If you like British champions breaking new ground, you should support him.

If you have ever been frustrated by a generalisation about immigrants, asylum seekers, or kids who arrive in the English school system without being able to speak a word of English; if you were angered by the Daily Mail's insane claim that it would be "a challenge for the organisers [of the opening ceremony] to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family"; if you believe that nationality can be about more than the accident of birth, you need to watch Mo Farah race in the men's 10,000m tonight.

Born in Somalia in the mid eighties, Farah arrived in London in 1992 via Djibouti, granted residence by virtue of his father's joint English/Somali citizenship.  He was not, as has been reported, a refugee - that story belongs to Great Britain basketball captain Luol Deng, and is certainly worth reading, if you're looking for it.  He struggled at school in London, though, because of his lack of English.


"Kids would wind him up by getting him to try out English words that maybe he shouldn’t have been saying in lessons.  It was also a fairly combative school and, being Mo, he would never back down so he got himself into a couple of fights in his first year. So he did test the patience of one or two members of staff.” - Mo's best friend and best man gave an interview about the track star's early years in this country to the Telegraph last year.


Thanks to the observant eye and perseverance of his PE teacher at Felton Academy, he was persuaded to channel that competitive instinct into sport.  He wanted to become a footballer, but was coaxed into trying cross-country running and the fit was perfect.  Mo rose quickly through the ranks of schoolboy success to the verge of an international team, winning five national schoolboy championships against boys as many as five years older than him.  As his young career progressed, though, he struggled to make training sessions at his club in Windsor, but world champion Paula Radcliffe believed in his talent and paid for him to have driving lessons so that he could eventually get himself there.  Paula's own dream of competing in a home Olympics may have been derailed by injury, but her mentoring influence on Mo's young career means that her presence will be felt on the track after all.


Mo and his wife Tania are expecting twins this September.  She will be in the stadium tonight - Farah jokes that if his race triggers an early labour she would at least be in a stadium full of doctors.  Tania is well used to the impact of her husband's career.  Farah ran every day of their honeymoon in Zanzibar.


A recent song about Mo became a hit in Somalia, with the lyric "You are English, but we are proud to be a part of you. England is proud of you, and we are proud of you too”.  The games are partly about the joy of representing your country, but the real Olympic spirit goes beyond that.


In Sebastian Coe's address to the IOC in 2005, when he persuaded them to entrust their games to London, he promised that the most multicultural city in the would could offer home support to every athlete taking part.  This is the real joy of the London games, and there are no better symbols of this than Farah and Deng, While the basketball star is likely to find his chances of success limited by a struggling home tam, Mo Farah has a real chance to write his name into the record books and become the poster boy for a diverse, integrated Britain either this evening, or next weekend when he goes in the 5,000m.  Last year in Daegu he won that event to become the first British man ever to win a long-distance gold at a world championship.


If you can see why this story matters, why sport can change a life, why education can't exist without empathy, why Farah can be an example for a generation and a demographic that stretches far beyond the lucky few with athletic ability, then you should make sure you watch him run tonight.  And you should cheer him to the rooftops.

Home Advantage

I enter the sunken bowl of the Olympic Stadium on the first morning of track and field competition to the slightly unexpected sight of Joanna Lumley on the big screens, telling us that she would make speed knitting an Olympic event, given the choice. My seat looks like the last one added in the whole stadium – a lone one tacked onto the end of an accessible seating section where another wheelchair couldn't be accommodated. Feel over the moon at that tiny design fault.

Meanwhile, the shot putters are warming up at my end of the Stadium (the North). They are vast men. I have to say that the build-up and commentary here is excellent, streets ahead of what I've seen at any other venue. I still don't like that Muse song, mind. Sit replaying some of my favourite Olympics track and field memories in my head. Linford in Barcelona. Jonathan Edwards in Sydney. That magical 4x100metre relay gold for Britain in Athens. The is the seat I've wanted since I was seven.

At 9.55 we're led in a countdown. To what? Nothing happens. Events start five minutes later. Oh well, it woke the crowd up. Then at five past 10, we have the start of the women's heptathlon (the title is tautological, in fact, since the men compete in a decathlon). The crowd makes an incredible noise when Jess Ennis wins her heat in a heptathlon record, national record time – one which would have won the gold medal in Beijing, astoundingly. For a multi-event girl to have that standard of performance in a single event is almost unprecedented. Top runners are setting personal bests in early heats – this is potentially a very quick track. How fast can Usain go on it? The Americans are in an all red strip, which I love. It reminds me of the kit Carl Lewis wore when he equalled Jesse Owen's record of four golds in Los Angeles 28 years ago.

There is a new round in the women's 100m, a preliminary where athletes from smaller nations compete against one another for the right to take on the big guns later on. One from Yemen races in a headscarf. Later in the 400m we see the lone female athlete at the games from Somalia, ZamZam Farah, who shares her name with another runner born in Somalia, Mo. I'm reminded that it's been almost fifteen minutes since I pictured the naturalised Englishman taking gold in one of the long-distance races next week, and shredding every prejudiced generalisation about asylum seekers in Britain. More of this later.

There crowd gives a big roar to every home athlete, and it seems to visibly lift several. Yamile Aldama races through her triple jump qualifier to become the second finalist. After World, European and Commonwealth champion 400m hurdler Dai Greene opens his bid for a full set with a comfortable win, his near namesake Jack Green is pulled from from sixth to second place down the final straight by a mighty ovation. Christine Ohurugou is defending an Olympic title in the home borough of her home city. Could she ever have dreamed this as a young athlete?

The failures are even more affecting than the successes. A young girl pulls up barely twenty metres into her games in the 100m. A Japanese hurdler finishes a race while painfully injured, reminding me of Derek Redmond's inspiring moment in Barcelona. The back-marker in a steeplechase heat is given a tremendous cheer as he clears the final water jump, but he falls at the final hurdle and lies injured 50 metres from the end of his race. As he leaves the track on a wheelchair, it's impossible not to feel devastated for the man.

Suddenly the skies open and a very British summer monsoon arrives. Those top price seats aren't so desirable now – they're exposed and flooded. People take refuge behind in cheap seats at the back.

The heptathlon high jump is at the far South of the stadium. It's miles away, but the South grandstand make sure we know exactly how the three Brits are progressing. The men are also throwing the hammer from that end. One of the most technically and physically demanding field events, it's totally different seeing it from underneath the flight of the hammer rather than the TV view. The best job of any volunteer at the games might be to drive the remote control cars that shuttle across the stadium, collecting hammers and bringing them back to the throwing end to be used again.

When it's dry there can't be a bad seat anywhere in this stadium, it is superb in every respect. The crowd is close to the action, the top deck banks steeply, the iconic pyramids of floodlights look fantastic. The crowd are kept invested and informed by fantastic commentary. Exactly how an Olympic event should be presented. Hardly a spectator leaves a seat through the whole four hour session. This is how it's meant to be. A morning that I've imagined as long as I can remember has, improbably, lived up to all my hopes.

[A word of unofficial advice to anyone travelling to the Olympic Park for one of the athletics sessions from North London – there were huge queues in St Pancras, so I took the underground to Liverpool Street and walked straight through onto a Stratford train. That may not be everyone's experience, but it was mine this morning. I have to praise the security personnel at the games, who despite the vast crowds had the entry into the park as smooth as it was on my first visit. My other top tip is to use the WCs and water taps before crossing the bridges into the main stadium, rather than afterwards!]

BBC Analysts, and A Word About Basketball

The stars of the BBC commentary team are the greats John McEnroe and Michael Johnson.  Both men combine superb technical analysis with a very uncompromising honesty in assessing performance.  I wanted to give a couple of words of praise for two other members of the stable.

In the aquatics centre, Australian legend Ian Thorpe is becoming one of the most likeable men on television.  He doesn't tend to dwell on the minutae of technique as his American colleagues do, but his tremendous charm and perspective on the human side of the sport could make him as big a success in front of the camera as he was in the pool.

Thorpe and BBC commentary colleague Mark Foster

The most under-appreciated member of the team, for me, is Matthew Syed.  The former British table tennis number one is a student of sport at the highest level.  Fiercely intelligent, he nonetheless analyses in a straightforward manner.  What makes him stand out for me is his honesty.  Asked on tonight's late magazine programme to give an opinion on a cycling ruling, Syed's reply was first that one of the great elements of the Olympics was that nobody was an expert on every sport, and that he'd love to hear a perspective from the cycling world.  Only then did he reveal his gut reaction, as essentially a layman.  So many analysts will bluff their way through a mediocre answer rather than admit a lack of expertise, Syed is a breath of fresh air.

A final note, off topic - amid a glorious day for the British team,  many people will miss the significance of the British basketball losing to Spain by a single point.  This is an absolutely fantastic performance by the home side.  Spain are the only team in the tournament with any serious pretensions to challenge the American 'dream team', and a clear number two in the world.  Going into the final quarter, Britain trailed 61-49, but rocked the Spanish with a stunning run led by captain and NBA all-star Luol Deng, who scored 26 points as GB eventually fell short, 79-78.

Mini diary

This afternoon is the first of the games where I've not been at an event.  I'm envious as hell of those lucky enough to squeeze into the velodrome, or to have been at that superb canoeing triumph, but if I'm honest it's actually quite nice to sit in front of the TV for a session.

As soon as I'm in I catch an interview on BBC3 with the British pairs who've won gold and silver in the C2 slalom canoe.  Without realising that it's being shown off-tape on BBC1, I manage to spoil the surprise for everyone.  Once we've all got back on the same page and watched Gemma Gibbons' brave silver medal in the 78kg judo, it's cycling time.  This is where the games are meant to really take off to the home competitors, and with the day already having delivered double gold and a clutch of other British medals, I think it's time to try my hand at something more like a live blog for a couple of hours...

16:16 - Monstrous effort from Pendleton to make up that first-half deficit in the team sprint.  World Record!  Then the Chinese break it in the next race.  Spoilsports.  Jess Varnish is going to have to start faster than that against the Chinese

16:25 - New Zealand have one guy who can post a sub-WR split in the team sprint, and two who are so far behind him they're almost disqualified.  Not sure why being too far back from your team-mate gets you a DQ - surely it's only a disadvantage to lose the slipstream?

16:35 - Empty seats don't make me angrier anywhere than at the velodrome.  That's a six thousand seat arena with the biggest demand for any event except Athletics and Swimming.

16:37 - Nightmare for the Brits as Philip Hindes' bike falls to bits out of the start gate in their qualifier against the Germans.  They get a do-over though.  Will this rattle the Brits or Germans more?

16:42 - The German team look about as German as three men in lycra on bikes can do.  Which is extremely German.

16:43 - Gary Lineker once said that football was a game where twenty two men chase a ball round a field and at the end the Germans win.  Well, cycling's a sport where you go round the track for three laps and Britain does.  The time is an Olympic record.  This track looks fast.

16:46 - Jamie Staff, a member of the GB sprint team who won gold in Beijing, reckons Hindes had no mechanical issue but just, basically, fell off.  Apparently if you wobble at the start you're better off falling off because then you get to try starting again!  What a surreal rule.

16:49 - The 'ssshhhhhhh' noise they play over the PA at the velodrome before races start is really creepy.  Wondering whether they could use the technology in libraries, quiet carriages and cinemas.  It would scare you silent every time.

16:55 - The British women have made the team sprint final, but suddenly things are looking very bad for the women's team.  A technical infringement may have occurred in the change from Varnish to Pendleton.  Possible relegation to the bronze medal race, or even disqualification.  Cycling supremo Dave Brailsford looks concerned.

17:04 - The debate is still going on.  Mark Cavendish tries to explain the situation, then realises he's sitting next to a man who won gold in this event last games!  Over to Staff.

17:05 - Not looking good.  Brailsford has given reporters a 'DQ' gesture.

17:10 - While waiting for news at the velodrome, I'm checking out the post-competition interview of Peter Wilson, the shooter who won a home golf in the double trap.  The moment at the end where he breaks off with a shout of 'Dad' is superb.

17:17 - Pendleton gives a very dejected interview as the girls have heard they're definitely out.  'Now and again rubbish things happen, and this is just one of those days.  We've had a wonderful run.'  She's pleased that she set the fastest second lap of her career, which bodes well for her individual sprint effort, but bitterly disappointed for Varnish whose Olympics are over.  The youngster must be devastated - she'll be back in Rio, but this is a unique moment passed.  If there's any consolation for the fans, it's that the Chinese looked pretty untouchable in their semi-final win.  Scant, though.

17:20 - "Four years ago in Beijing, every [British] cyclist on the track left with a medal" Jake Humphries begins, in the studio.  Sitting next to him is Mark Cavendish, the lone exception to that rule.  Cav looks pretty annoyed for a second, then Humphries contines "...except you, Mark.".  Nice one, son.  Putting the offensive in charm offensive.    "I found it more hard the questions getting asked" says the Manxman, a little curtly.  Zing.

17:26 - Chris Boardman has just told Jake that the GB team are using 'hot pants'!  The footage cuts to a VT of Vicky Pendleton, and starts to pan downwards... sadly for the collected male viewership this turns out to be a pair of warmed-up trousers that keep heat in competitor's muscles between their warm-up and race, just like tyre-warmers on a Formula 1 car.  Where can I get me one of those for the chilly winter mornings?


I've found some live-blogging software, so might have a crack at that one of the days I'm not at the Games at all next week.

First Gold!

On the way to ExCel for some boxing I meet the three guys I'm going with outside a pub in Custom House station. Realise the women's pair must be racing right now, but for some reason judo is on! Have a word with the manager, and the pub gets the last 500 metres of Helen Glover and Heather Stanning's amazing row to gold.

You just shouldn't be able to win an Olympic final by that margin. It was as devastating as an Usain Bolt run, they controlled it from the start and only went further away. The crowd were amazing, and the ultimate prize in sport must have been tenfold in front of a home crowd. Let's hope this ripples through the whole team.

Another wonderful story at Eton Dorney, where Greg Searle completes his comeback to the sport with a bronze in the Men's Eight. Seeing Searle win gold in Barcelona with brother Jonny and cox Gary Herbert – twenty years ago now – was one of my very first Olympic memories. It's amazing to note that Searle's medal-winning career now spans a longer time than even Sir Steve Redgrave's.

A quick look at some other prospects in this strong British rowing squad:

Katherine Grainger is surely destined to avenge twelve years of hurt after three successive silver medals. The home crowd will roar themselves hoarse in support of Grainger and partner Anna Watkins in the women's double sculls at 10.30 on Friday morning.  The pair demolished the Olympics record by six huge seconds in their heat, and qualified fastest by almost four.

The men's lightweight four race qualified fastest for their final, at 10.00 tomorrow.  Double world champion Richard Chambers and Chris Bartley join Richard and Peter Chambers of Northern Ireland.  The Chambers boys would become the first British brothers to take a gold since the Searles in Barcelona.

The men's four.  Formerly the domain of the greats Redgrave and Pinsent, Britain's strongest rowers have moved again to this boat, avoiding the seemingly unbeatable New Zealand pair in the two man boat.  Team GB has won three successive golds here, and the quartet of Pete Reed, Andy Triggs Hodge, Tom James and Alex Gregory will not want the mantle to slip away on their watch.  They race for gold on Saturday at 10.30.

George Nash and William Sash won their semi final of the men's pair, but have a huge mountain to climb against the dominant New Zealanders.

The Best of The Best

While watching the tail end of the boxing this afternoon, I realise that the men's cycling Time Trial must be approaching its conclusion.  One weakness in this games is how hard it is to see one sport while at another's venue, and there was no television or screen in the ExCel centre to gather around and give some national support.  I think I imagined that the Olympic park, and smaller venues, might have small televisions showing footage from all manner of other events.  It would have lent the games more of a unified atmosphere, more of a single festival of sport than a series of independent events.

No Englishman, as you may have heard, had ever won the Tour de France. This Summer, Bradley Wiggins did that. Nobody of any nationality has ever won an Olympic track cycling gold medal, and gone on to win the Tour de France. This Summer, he did that too. Then, for an encore, Bradley Wiggins rode the cyclist's 'race of truth' – the Time Trial – and became the only man in history to win the Tour De France and Olympic gold in the same year.

The Tour is something you leave halfway through if you want to chase Olympic glory, conventional wisdom says. A normal human body cannot ride for 2,200 miles, then two weeks later sustain speeds of 35mph for 28 miles. Bradley Wiggins is certainly not a normal human. He hardly seems human at all. The pre-race favourite today, Fabian Cancellara, had flown out of the French race as soon as the Tour hit serious climbs. Wiggins stayed on the climbs. He won out on the climbs. He came home and in the finest lap of honour any sportsman could take, circled this corner of his home city in front of a vast adoring crowd before his final curtain call on the podium.

This would be an incredible racing career if Wiggins were French, or Spanish, Italian, Belgian or even American. That he was able to achieve it as a member of the first generation of British cyclists ever to matter on any stage outside of the track and occasional prologues is nothing short of unbelievable. Like Boardman and those before him, he conquered that, but then he mastered the road for an encore, as if it were the logical progression rather than a staggering, unprecedented achievement.

Arise Sir Bradley, cries the nation as one. I'd like to see the great man given the chance to finish his astonishing career without that label, but the day he hangs up his riding shoes is the day he can write himself whatever title he chooses.

Five Rings - 1/8

First lie-in of the games for me today, as I'm 'only'at the boxing today.  Have had a couple of great things passed my way already, so a quick run trough the rings before I head to ExCel:


Blue - Stuart Harvey pointed me towards this video on Deadspin.  Wasn't watching the swimming last night, so missed this wonderful interview with Bert Le Clos, father of Chad - who had just beaten Michael Phelps in the 200m butterfly.  You'll never find a more heartwarmingly proud parent.

Black - Can Bradley Wiggins become the first man in history to win the Tour De France and Olympic Gold in the same year?  The man the French lovingly call Le Gentleman will be racing the streets of London in the men's Time Trial from exactly seven and a half minutes past three this afternoon.  Tune in, or better yet get down to the course and give the best pair of sideburns in sport some encouragement.

Red - This gem of a clipping was sent by Fionn Napier.  The Croatian fans in full voice are somthing to see:

Gold - Rower Dana Feletic hopes to celebrate her 35 birthay in golden fashion today.  The Australian goes in the final of the Women's Quadruple Sculls at Eton Dorney this morning.  I'm rooting for the British boat of Melanie Wilson, Frances Houghton, Beth Rodford and Debbie Flood, but I'm biased as hell.

Green - According to actor Andy Venning, 'The first person to use the phrase 'Olympian Games' was the humble Elizabethan playwright Mr W Shakespeare in Henry VI part 3'.  Mr Venning is currently appearning in the Oxford Shakespeare Company's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, so he ought to know.

Volleyball

Spent the evening at Earls Court, the only venue to have hosted events at London's last Olympics, in 1948.  Then it saw gymnastics, weightlifting, boxing and wrestling; this year the grandfather of the games is a specialist volleyball arena.  It's got a 15,000 capacity, and every single seat has an amazing view.  Even on the top deck you feel involved in the action, thanks in part to the best stadium announcer I've seen at the games.

There are warm-up presenters at every venue, tasked with getting the crowd buzzing and then keeping them there.  It helps the atmosphere in the venue, and makes for better TV.  But where many disappointing MCs ask the audience to applaud themselves for no apparent reason, or worse, to break the glass marked Mexican wave, this guy had an arsenal of tricks from the spectacular Bongo Cam to a mass karaoke session.  And rather than thanking ourselves for making it here, we applauded the volunteers on court.

The first order was an Ashes clash - a sadly brief affair in which the more experienced Australians were troubled only in the final of their three sets.  The British team grew in confidence throughout, however, and improved in each, led by a fine performance from Mark McGivern, who plays professionally in the French league for Avignon.  There is a hard road ahead though, and Team GB must face Italy, Poland and Argentina, each of whom sit in the top 8 of the world rankings.

Top billing went to Brazil, who were bent but never broken by an intimidating Russian team.  The Samba Boys were able to leave all-time great Giba on their bench and still dispatch the team ranked their closest competitor by governing body FIBA in three sets.  Each was tight until the end, when the stakes rose and so did the Brazilian hitters Murilo and Leandro, notching 40 points between them.  The young families who had come to watch the home team may have drifted away by the end, but in the premium seats downstairs the huge Brazilian crowd created a carnival throughout.  The final appearance of the Bongo Cam was for triumph, not for effort.

Swimming

From the outside, Zaha Hadid's Aquatic Centre is beautiful. From within it's a little bit compromised by its own aesthetics. Even the rows of seats midway up the enormous stands have virtually no view of any of the spectators on the opposite side of the pool, which detracts from the atmosphere terribly. The sightlines, even from the nosebleeds, are better than advertised, but the acoustics are not. Very hard to hear anything at all from the PA system, and harder still to make out what is being said. They seem to have borrowed a tannoy from Kings Cross. The seats are roomy and comfortable, at least.

Watching my first swim meet was an odd experience. After muffled exertions to 'make some noise' for half an hour before the swimmers emerged, they competed with very little fanfare. The organisation was impeccable – almost no time between races, and the ballet of synchronised volunteers ferrying kit and boxes around was oddly compelling when viewed from above.

There would be more atmosphere with some process that allowed impartial spectators to choose someone to support. As it is, faced with the early round of qualifying that contain competitors from the likes of Kuwait and Andorra, you pick on a hunch and never have any sense of anyone else's allegiances, which makes for a curiously detached experience. The Kuwaiti and Andorran are their nations' sole representatives in the swimming, which sounds like it must make for a slightly lonely experience. I hope they bond with each other, at least.

Being in the venue makes you think about a whole raft of human angles that you never consider at home. The swimmer who finishes seventeenth on a list of sixteen qualifiers, the journeys to get to that point cut short by a few fractions of a second.

Michael Phelps certainly doesn't give any indication of being The Greatest Olympian Of All Time. He's beaten into third in his heat, but it's hard to get a sense of how much he worked for it. There was a stretch when he kicked up a gear, and then he seemed to be able to exit the water faster and further on his butterfly stroke than anyone else in the field. Bowie comes on the tannoy talking about wanting to swim like the dolphins can swim. Apt. In this event, the seventeenth swimmer is a Brit. Four years is a long time to think about missing a qualification, but when it's the only sout you'll ever get at a home one it must be agony.

The slightly quiet centre suddenly buzzes to life late on. The noisiest sets of visiting fans are the Hungarians and Americans. There's one of each up against a British girl in the medley relay. Now it feels like a final. The American wins and the ubiquitous U-S-A chant fills the bleachers.

At the close of the session I manage to sneak into the prime seats poolside for a look around. The perspective is totally different, like seeing an airport from the runway after you've flown into it. Actually it's more like stepping off your plane – the temperature is different, the smell of chlorine is suddenly present. Oh to be able to afford to sit here on a finals night, to see the eyes of the competitors as the file out and take their marks... and after the race. Down here you're watching people swim, upstairs it's more like being in the war room, seeing small blocks moved around a table, aware of their significance but disconnected from it.

Outside the crowds leave and groups of star-spangled Americans gravitate to TV cameras like magnets, hoping to prove to those back home that they really are in London. They have a great knack for it - so I leave them to it and instead revive l'entente cordiale with the French.

New Adventures in Handball

On my way into the Copper Box handball stadium I was asked for an interview by an American journalist who wanted to know why handball had never taken off in the UK, and whether it stood a chance on the back of these games. At the time I couldn't really explain it, and having seen my first match am even further at a loss. It's a terrific game, easy to stage and looks great fun to play. It's also surprisingly physical. Unlike basketball, for instance, plenty of contact is within the rules. I think it would suit school facilities well and – not insignificantly in Britain – played indoors!

That was what cost the young British team against the experienced Russians, who ran out comfortable winners. They were older, more organised, but above all much much bigger. The Brits countered with some impressive agility from the small but speedy Lyn Byl, who scored five, and goalkeeper Sarah Hargreaves held the Russian team at bay with a string of fantastic saves at the start of the second half, but the British girls didn't have the speed and decisiveness to hit their opponents on the break, and were contained easily in a half-court set for most of the game. The rangy Russian girls were able to break out from defence and attack at speed time and again, while the only physical force on the home side came from Eva Palies, who scored a fine brace in limited time on court and gave giant Russian defender Murauyeta a great tussle.

In lulls in play the crowd were amply entertained by the Russian coach, a beast of a man who never stopped screaming instructions at his charges. The average age was the youngest I've seen at any event so far, and perhaps in a few Olympics time there'll be no need for a piece on why the British don't follow handball.

The second game is Spain against France. A much more competitive game with the tenacious Spanish defenders never letting France get a clean shot away. They lead 10-7 at half time having held Les Bleus to almost a one in four shots ratio. Even GB did better against the Russians. The Spanish girls picked up a trio of early yellow cards, but the tactic has worked so far, helped by a solid performance from keeper Navarro.

Five Rings 29/7

Blue - The first weekend of the games has been a quiet one for the hosts on the medal table - just one gold and one silver so far.  The Chinese top the table early on, but best opening weekend for me goes to Italy, who have already notched 2 golds and a total of 7 medals.  Forza Italia!  Full table is found here.

Black - A great performance from Becky Adlington to win bronze in her weaker event.  Expectations were high after her gold in the 400m four years ago, but this time was always likely to be a more difficult task.  Adlington's time for bronze, in a modern fabric swimsuit, was over 0.2 seconds faster than the time she swam for gold in Beijing - when she was in the now-outlawed hi-tech swimsuits which saw records fall at an unbelievable rate.

The only disappointment for me was Radio 5 Live's commentary.  With the girls on the final length of the race, commentator Bob Ballard gave up his main responsibility entirely, declaring 'We don't care' about the battle between France's Camille Muffat and America's Alison Schmitt for their event's highest honour, because he only wanted to talk about Adlington finishing third.  An understandable lapse of any pretence of neutrality, but a bad one, and disrespectful not just to the swimmers fighting for gold, but to any French or American listeners.  We had to wait almost twenty seconds after the race finished before Ballard bothered to mention who had won.

The BBC's coverage of the games has excellent depth to the main and most televisual events, but from what I've seen and heard so far, there's a lot of discussion about those select few at the expense of actual coverage of some of the lower-profile competitions.

Red -  It turns out Spain's footballers aren't completely invincible.  They may have won three major titles in a row, but the Spanish Olympic football journey is over after just two games - slipping to defeats against Japan and, tonight, Honduras!  Joder.

Gold - After having removed baseball and softball from the Olympic programme for these games, the IOC replaced them on the list of their sports with rugby sevens and golf.  Sadly, rather than get them in for this Olympics, in the country which invented both games, they did not introduce the new arrivals until the 2016 competition, which will take place in that hot-bed of rugby and golf, Brazil.  Not the best timing.

Green - If you think I'm an Olympic addict, check out the curious case of Louisa Thomas from American sports site Grantland.  She confesses to a complete addiction.  I admit that however much I love the games, I have never asked for my ashes to be scattered at the IOC headquarters in Lausanne.

Five Rings 28/7

Blue - Cav Cav Cav... we just didn't give him a chance.  Gutted for the guy, the tactics were not got right and that's more galling somehow than missing on ability alone.  Horrible to see drug-monkey Vinokourov take gold.  Don't like to see Cavendish criticising other teams (like Australia) for their tactics though.  The Brits should not have put themselves in a position where they needed to rely on outside help.

Black - Great day for our gymnasts.  Louis Smith tweets: -

On the way back from the competition, 3 apparatus finals, team final and 2 all-round finals..  so proud to be a part of this team http://twitter.com/LouisSmith1989

Britain's men were only out-qualified by super powers Russia and the USA.  Huge achievement.

Red - I have to give a massive thumbs up to the guys who are already looking like the unseen MVPs of the games, the massive corps of volunteers.  From Wimbledon station to the AELTC, 20 minutes up the road, I don't think I was ever more than a hundred metres away from a patient and invariably cheery guide to make sure I didn't lose the way.  Once at the club, packs of volunteer ballboys and girls could be seen swarming around the club from court to court.  Every one a massive credit to London and the games.  Thanks guys!

Gold - Tomorrow the British women get a chance to succeed where their male counterparts failed.  Can defending champion Nicole Cook and co marshal their resources to deliver her successor as team leader Lizzie Armitstead to gold?  We also get our first sights of Ben Ainslie, the US basketball team and Rebecca Adlington will try to cling on to the 400m crown she won so narrowly four years ago.

Green - Look ma, I'm on the computer!  http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/19033887  (5 minutes in)