INterestingly, in our best Olympics in 1908, the odds were slightly skewed in our favour. With a lot less countries competing, something like a third of all competitors were from Britain. There were also a lot of events such as Tug of War and Motor boating which we won.
I'm all in favour of bringing back motorboating and combining it with beach volley ball into a single event ...
.... oh, it wasn't that sort of motorboating. Damn it.
Having people automatically qualify has little or no bearing on getting medals. Team GB have been outstanding - don't belittle their amazing accomplishments.
Absolutely agree. These people are real role models.
I don't necessarily agree with all the calls for extra funding for sports in schools, there are other things that are higher priority that are suffering cuts. Though I'm all for the lottery funding a sporting revolution in this country, something for everyone which will make decent levels of sports coaching avaialable to all promising athletes, instead of funding elitist things such as the National Opera.
We also need to get rid of this stupid notion that kids shouldn't play to win and have real competition back in our schools.
I also don't mind the athletes making a bit of wonga after the effort most of them put in.
