Olympian1010

? Lord Coe will hear you.

I will say this current update is a nightmare for phone users. I think that will be fixed as tweak the design, but it’s confusing as hell to navigate the forum right now. It wasn’t nearly as bad on my tablet. My only complaint would be page layout. Some things take way to much space or have to much prominence, while others take too little space and are barely noticeable.

As you know, I’m not very fond of the Democratic Party at the moment. My ideology doesn’t seem to line up with the leaderships at the moment. That said, I have been incredibly heartened by this weeks Democratic National Convention. We have seen powerful speakers line up one after another to make the case for voting for Joe Biden in November. The Democratic Party has framed this vote as a moral choice, and as a vote to save the soul of the country. I’ll be honest in saying that argument has won me over. I’m not biggest fan of Joe Biden. Our politics just simply don’t match on some key issues, but I have come to the decision that I must support his candidacy. Despite what I think about his political ideology and voting record, it has become increasingly clear that he is the right choice. I came to this conclusion after seeing the affect he has had on others. Unlike Trump, he leaves people feeling loved, noticed, and empowered. He is famous for taking public transport to work because he wants to live like a normal American. He has a moral character I can respect, despite his shortcomings and pitfalls. The Democratic Party officially nominated him tonight, and while I’m sure his speech was great; I wanted to share a different speech from tonight. The convention has been dominated by Americans having down-to-Earth speeches about how they have been empowered. We’ve seen a dad with ALS campaign for healthcare, a family immigrants share their story of bravery with us, a daughter share with how the decisions Trump made during this pandemic killed her father, we’ve seen a security officer talk about how one positive interaction can make you feel noticed and dignified, we’ve had Billie Eillsh share a message of hope and unity while keeping moral high with her new song, etc. Tonight we were blessed with this speech. As someone who was outcasted in school for their differences, as someone who studies and lives public speaking, and as someone who values the dignity of every life; this was a truly amazing speech to see on national television. It’s absolutely worth a watch in my opinion. It can’t imagine doing a speech like this at that age, while having to deal with a predisposed disadvantage in speech. Here’s the speech.

This stupid idiot opened his mouth again. He’s once again rambling on about stupid shit like “rake the forests to stop fires.” How about he gets his ass out here to see the fires in person. How about he visits our lovely forests every spring to rake the leaves. Or better yet, how about he shuts up and stays the fuck out of our beautiful state. We don’t need Nazis telling us how to fight wildfires.

When I was archiving results recently, I came across a database set up by the IPC to document the results from all of the editions of the Paralympic Games. It reminds me lot of a Olympedia actually. It’s pretty user friendly, and not too difficult to navigate. Here’s a link for those interested: https://db.ipc-services.org/sdms/hira I’ve really enjoyed reading through the results of the earlier editions. The most surprising result I’ve seen so far is Jamaica’s silver medal in Women’s Wheelchair Basketball in 1972.

This is so awesome. I’m so ready for this film. The visuals I’ve seen in the advertising are stunning. Rising Phoenix releases on August 26th on Netflix. From what I can tell, and how it’s been billed, this might be the first documentary to take a real deep dive into the world of Paralympics. Trailer:

And Belarus’

Jumpers have been irate on Twitter about the format.

We lost a firefighter in NorCal today

We’re having another smoke-in/thunderstorm mix in my town today. It’s easily some of the craziest and worst weather I’ve seen in my life.

That would change one of the most basic rules of the game. I don’t think anyone would like that. I’m not a huge fan of baseball, but I think a rule like that would have a negative impact on the game. We’d get super-short innings followed by marathon innings. Players rhythm would be destroyed, and spectators would lose interest. It’s fun reading everyone’s ideas on this though.

Today, it was 110 F, raining, and smoky outside all at the same time. There’s a bunch of wildfires burning throughout the state. Many people are still without much needed electricity because of the heatwave. I’m really sad for my state right now. I’m just hoping we can all pull together and get through 2020.

Why do people put up with Slovan’s crap when it seems to go so much against the morals of the rest of Slovakia?

Hottest debate in American sports today: the unwritten rules of baseball.

They had to travel to Austria and stay at a resort for a week to film some of the snow events. I remember they had issues with the weather and equipment while they were there too.

Phew, this one’s a lot to process. It’s a fun documentary, especially if you want to learn a little bit about American culture and politics. I’ll put my thoughts in a spoiler, so I don’t ruin it for anyone who watches to watch it.

First night of the 2020 Democratic National Convention tonight. The national convention is where Joe Biden will be officially chosen as the candidate for the Democratic Party. However, there will be a lot of speeches in support of him before. Republicans, Independents, and Moderates have all been lined up to speak in support of him. Notably, the inner war continues between moderates, liberals, and progressives within the Democratic Party. Sanders was the only progressive of note invited to speak over four days, even though progressive candidates have been demolishing moderates in the US House and Senate primaries this year. Not too many true liberals will be speaking either. Biden has made it very clear that he’s running as a center-center candidate. I think that strategy will work this time around, but the battle over the ideological future of the party is just beginning. The convention started with the national anthem as always. I generally dislike our national anthem, but this rendition is beautiful. This was easily the strongest speech tonight.

https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1097418/british-paralympic-boccia-jacob-thomas

Hopefully Para Bobsleigh will be added to the 2026 Winter Paralympics. It was originally supposed to debut in 2022, but the IPC decided some criteria for inclusion weren’t met. https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1097429/para-bobsleigh-2026-winter-paralympics

Latvia has officially threatened to withdraw as host if Belarus is not stripped of the right to co-host. Latvia want the IHHF to allow them to select a new co-host. This is a little silly since we all knew Lukashenko was a dictator when Latvia threw their lot in with Belarus. While I understand the situation has dramatically changed since then, one could say that if Latvia was fine laying in bed with a dictator then; there shouldn’t be much difference now. Of course, I’m happy they’re standing up for human rights/democracy now. I’m just saying they could have done a better job of asserting their beliefs by not choosing Belarus in the first place. However, I realize the importance sports can play in uniting divided cultures/governing systems, so I can understand how this was a complicated decision for them. Rene Fasel/IHHF isn’t completely innocent here either. Fasel made some poorly worded statements about the situation in Belarus, and I think those ultimately helped push the Latvian government to this extreme.

Nile Wilson has become the newest high profile athlete to make allegations of abuse. He claims UK Sport/UK Gymnastics has perpetrated a culture of abuse. Having followed his journey since Rio (he’s a vlogger on YouTube), and some of the dark parts of his career, it wouldn’t shock me to know that there is an abusive culture at UK Gymnastics. Unfortunately, I think almost every NF has these issues, and it comes down to the culture of the sport. People inside gymnastics will have to be willing to change their behavior, or we’ll just see this cycle repeat once more.