My Views On The Olympics So Far...

Seating

I saw a bit of the table tennis the other night. I know that they have been having problems with the seating for the main stadium but I didn't know that it affected other venues. The table tennis referee seemed to be seated in a baby's high chair. I can understand that the ump needs to be positioned just above the net but in a high chair?

Watching the Olympics on TV

If you wanna watch the Olympics - watch SBS.
If you wanna watch the Aussies in Athens - watch Channel 7.

Big Family Impact

I don't know if they are related or not but I have noticed three Hamm members of the US team. Two brothers in the gymnastics and Mia Hamm in the "football". But, I hear you say, my surname is spelt "Ham". Well, going back in our family tree many moons ago there was one particular member of the family who had eight kids and I believe that all of them were given variant spellings of the surname. So who's to say that they aren't related?

Iranian Olympic Committee Shame

The Iranian Olympic Committee should be suspended for allowing the Iranian government to interfere and compel their athletes not to compete against Israelis. I believe it was an Iranian Judo world champion who refused to fight an Israeli opponent. He managed to disqualify himself by failing to make weight at the weigh-in. The Olympics are supposed to be apolitical and actually not about your country but about competing. It seems to have been lost somewhat, the Olympic ideals that is.

We Need Our Own Sport

I see that the Japanese are cleaning up the medals in the Judo. They invented it and following its introduction as a medal sport I would guess that the Japanese are climbing up the medal tally rapidly due to their dominance of the sport.

It is time we introduced some of our own sports so that we can win more gold medals.
For Example:

Vegemite sandwich eating
Beer keg rolling
Two-up
Kangaroo boxing

We couldn't help but win more medals. I need to start lobbying the Australian Olympic Committee for their support.

Nationalities

Some of our commentators need to brush up on their pronunciations. I heard a boser last night referred to as a "Kazakhstani". I believe the term should be "Kazakh".

Gutsy Sporting Effort

I am not usually interested in Judo but made an exception last night. Saw a match between a guy from Azerbaijan and Dmitri Nossov from Russia. It was for a place in the gold medal match. Right at the end of the bout Nossov had his arm hurt and looked in very bad shape. Let's remember that these bouts have been going all day and the competitors have very little breathing space in between bouts. He had to back up for the bronze medal match and I thought that he wouldn't be capable of putting up an effective fight.

Talk about guts. He could barely move his left elbow in the previous bout, but managed to throw his opponent and gained a Waza-Ari, the second highest scoring manoeuvre, and was pleading for an Ippon, much like a knockout in boxing. He didn't get it and had to battle it out for the whole five minutes. It was incredible the way he fought through the pain barrier for his bronze medal. I dips my lid to him.