Rich

Reeves clearly spent too much time watching Keely etc and not enough time watching hockey and other relative disappointments.

Reeves clearly spent too much time watching Keely etc and not enough time watching hockey and other relative disappointments.

The UK won't be building new pools sadly. It would be nice if local government, underfunded by central government in massive debt, stopped closing them. This is an article from 2023:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/mar/12/england-has-lost-almost-400-swimming-pools-since-2010
 

Today definitely falls into the "bad luck" argument for me.
 
We lose a potential gold medal hope to illness, we lose 2 minor medal hopes to crashes in front of them, and we get a bronze in an event where there's not an unreasonable chance that had she been on the other side of the draw it might have been silver.
 
The only real disappointment today is the selection of Evans, who looks hopelessly off form.
 
Thanks to Emma and Emily we get through the Games winning a medal every day, which is a first for us that I know about, at least in the modern era.
 
 
 
 
Overall, a good games for me. Not a great games, the drop in gold clearly prevents that. I've no doubt that it will be seen as worse in public perception than it actually was, because of that drop in gold.
 
We increase our total medal tally from Tokyo, as well as our top 8 finishes (as things stand; please no drugs failures taking things away!). We match the tally from Tokyo of medalling in 18 different sports, including 2 new ones (artistic swimming and climbing). That to me shows that our sports are generally in a good place.
 
Clearly I'm sure there will be serious conversations happening, as there should be.
 
But - for me at least - it's easier to have those conversation when you have some silverware to back it up. It shows a system that is mostly working but needs tweaking, rather than a system that needs ripping out and starting again.

Some of you need to be lovers not Hayters in this thread.

Some of you need to be lovers not Hayters in this thread.

Sorry, but this is an absolutely ridiculous comment. Hayter absolutely rode his balls off in an excellent Team Pursuit performance, and is still well in contention in the Omnium.

Fingers crossed for a fun day! How sweet will a gold be if we get one? And maybe that's the point? Highs and lows creating the extreme emotions that wake us all up, not just coasting along feeling smug.
 
Either way, I'm determined to enjoy the ride today. The Olympics come but once a (4) year(s) and feeling glum is just not the way to savour them.

That's not really the press having a go. Nobody has been called a flop of a turnip. I've seen four back pages and it's words like 'pipped'. They reflect frustration not anger.

Sure, but it's also a target that you can't really hold anybody accountable for. If each governing body has met their target then what you going to do.
 
The rest of the world had raised its game. And just like we learnt from the Aussies post 96 so, in turn, others have learnt from us - the Aussies themselves to some extent but also the Dutch and others I'm sure.

Gutted for Matt. Love watching him. Same with Josh and Molly. But there's no divine right and I'm sure the two men would take their performance over Molly's. I'm equally sure both would have good words for her - they've lived through their own athletic disappointments.
 
The silvers are frustrating when so close, no question. But there is a reason that the target is about medals not golds and it's because GB success has been built on controlling the controllables. Sometimes, like tonight and yesterday, no matter what you do to prepare, no matter how extraordinarily fast you run, no matter how much you want it, somebody else is just better.  Medals not golds allows for that uncontrollable.

Gutted for Matt. Love watching him. Same with Josh and Molly. But there's no divine right and I'm sure the two men would take their performance over Molly's. I'm equally sure both would have good words for her - they've lived through their own athletic disappointments.
 
The silvers are frustrating when so close, no question. But there is a reason that the target is about medals not golds and it's because GB success has been built on controlling the controllables. Sometimes, like tonight and yesterday, no matter what you do to prepare, no matter how extraordinarily fast you run, no matter how much you want it, somebody else is just better.  Medals not golds allows for that uncontrollable.

Gutted for Matt. Love watching him. Same with Josh and Molly. But there's no divine right and I'm sure the two men would take their performance over Molly's. I'm equally sure both would have good words for her - they've lived through their own athletic disappointments.
 
The silvers are frustrating when so close, no question. But there is a reason that the target is about medals not golds and it's because GB success has been built on controlling the controllables. Sometimes, like tonight and yesterday, no matter what you do to prepare, no matter how extraordinarily fast you run, no matter how much you want it, somebody else is just better.  Medals not golds allows for that uncontrollable.

Oh god, it's frustrating for sure! But I don't think it warrants gnashing of teeth and rending of garments to quite the extent that some maybe do. And it's certainly not a sign that a) we're victims of terrible luck, or b) individual athletes are irredeemable failures because they just missed out on gold. 

Most of 'the media" isn't worth the paper that it is written on, so I don't frankly care what they think. Or what 'the general public' thinks if they agree with it. As a wise man once said, people like Coldplay and voted for the Nazis; you can't trust people.
 
There's always frustrations in an event like this. The only ones I'm upset about are the shooting mistake, the boxing judging and the sailing wind fiasco. The others are just sporting incidents.
 
I mean, this TP was almost certainly Ethan being on the ragged edge and expending every ounce of energy. At that level, even the slightest mistake can be fatal to your chances. Fair play to the Aussies for putting us under that stress, in my opinion.

I agree. They would have fixed the problems with the combinations and pitter patter shots if they had wanted to but they wanted in on the money and prestige of professional boxing and so set up their weird in-between boxing league and made loads of changes. Professional boxing is too dangerous for the Olympics and they need to move away from it again.

A beautifully made point, @mpjmcevoy but I would say the 'nobility' of such moments often comes from their clarity. Yes, sometimes it's a context dependent clarity, but the most timeless of sporting moments aren't. Kelly running through the line (almost every kid knows what it is to race), Redmond and his dad hobbling down the track. Gemma Gibbons looking to the sky and whispering to her mum. Forgive my British bias.
 
Kayak X may well produce these, but when events become too harum-scarum then that clarity can be lost in the seemingly random and faintly comical.
 
I just think it needs a bit of evolution. A bit more space. To give a 'cross' example, the greatest snowboard cross moment was Lindsey Jacobellis falling on her face, which only happened because the course was long enough for it to happen. If Kayak X is doing its best to encourage incident every single second then the great moments might be drowned in incidents. Stephen Bradbury might disagree with me but, for all the chaos of short track, it is, essentially, just a race.
 

Watching the womens 3x3 basketball and the Australians had a near identical team to the one that played in the 2022 commonwealth games, and came 5th. England beat those Australians, feels like a missed qualification opportunity.

That was an awesome lap three.

How exciting is this race?!

How exciting is this race?!

Says a lot that i have golf on one screen and dressage on another, not a lot going on right now
 
The golf looks like being an utter bun fight though

51.61. Not as quick as Joe's split in the mixed medley heat (51.37) but quicker than his split in the men's heat (51.67). Obviously both quicker than Jimmy, even with a rolling start to be taken into account for Joe/Duncan.
 
Not sure there's a definitive best answer. Duncan was very much in the wash in the mixed medley, which shouldn't happen in the men's to the same extent and might make his split better. So that might influence it. But I don't think it will matter that much. A bronze is within reach but probably still unlikely.

Well done to him! A poor Olympics for Britain's boxing team but sports will have ups and downs and the funding (dare I say the F word 🤣) needs to reflect that.
 
 I hope the sport is reformed (seems to have lost its way in every way since it tried to be more like the professional sport) and stays part of the Olympics because it has produced many a great moment down the years (and many a controversy to be fair). 

Richardson saves the boxing team's blushes by winning his QF and collects at least bronze.