Grassmarket

The ,ost famous case was the Miracle on Ice Hockey game in 1980. It actually took place mid-afternoon in upstate New York & went out live on a local channel. But the whole US media kept the secret until it was shown hours later.

And the other thing was: Chambers never complained. He never said it was anyone else's fault. After his ban he happily turned out for Team GB in all those low prestige relays like the European Cup, qualifying races etc and always put in a good job. Also: he played an extremely useful role every year at the UK trials. Year after year we would get all these over-praised young 100m runners with big egos. At the vital part of the season they would come up against an angry motivated Dwain at the UK trials and every single year he would slice them down & win the title. In fact, he still turns out at the trials, although he doesn't win anymore!

In US Athletics there is no single powerful governing body, there are only rival groups of athletes. So when Salazar / Nike are accused of doping, it is the Adidas, Reebok & New Balance groups who are the most eager to see them banned. This is not the way in Russia.

Thing about Dwain was that he was actually punished far more harshly than any other athlete of his own or this era. He had to pay back all his winnings, had all his medals annulled, was forbidden from all Diamond League meets for life & served a full two year ban. After his ban he was only allowed to run in Championship races for which he had qualified through the British trials. When does that ever happen now? No-one ever pays back their winnings, only results from one year are cancelled, medals from previous years still stand & the Diamond League & other commercial circuits welcome all dopers back with open arms and full wallets.

It very likely was. The same thing was going to happen in the second heat, but the athletes themselves realised the officials had got it wrong and rushed back into the correct position just as the incoming runners were approaching.

I think most people could work out that swimmer Siobhan Haughey has Irish origins, but I did not know that she is actually related to the former Irish Prime Minister* Charles Haughey - her great uncle. *Yes, I know, but let's keep things simple

Shot putters are notoriously bad at replying to their emails.

Impossible to tell. Some heats raced it out, some didn’t.

There’s tons on the World Archery channel on YouTube, all live during the season.

Slovenskoczechia, i think you mean.

What happened in the rowing is just as we thought. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-9842525/Jurgen-Grobler-accused-destroying-Team-GB-athletes-former-oarsmen-Josh-Bugajski.html

Has been a great morning & afternoon already. We’re up to 24 medals now plus a further three minimum from the boxing, so I reckon the minimum of 45 looks well attainable. Also building a handy lead over the other major European nations, which is one of my personal targets. Three golds down on , but they are probably front-loaded with rowing & swimming up early.

Like the Norwegian triathlete, but with more appropriate clothes.

BMX has been a long trail of tears for at the Olympics until the last ten minutes.

We are leading the 4th place category like one of those old school pacemakers who gets a 250m lead, decides to stay in after all & ends up winning the race.

Tough luck if you have ended up with Tuvalu.

Some unexpected last minute changes of nationality in the High Jump qualifiers.

The Finn really threw a hand grenade.

Yeah, but the viscosity of the water obviously suits the New Zealand paddling style.

Incidentally, there are dedicated streams for many, if not all, of the field events.

No, sorry my TV signal has noise.

Runner with the name-badge Temporary! Scicluna of Malta! Someone messed up!

Also handy round-up of Islamic dress codes, should you fancy a holiday post-COVID.

This is where we test your knowledge of the three letter country codes.

It's the Singapore way, baby!