Originally posted by OaklandA's
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London Olympics
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Originally posted by OaklandA's View PostNope, all free, and good quality. NBC also has free apps for phones and iPads that stream every event live.
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Originally posted by eldiablo505I can't wait to watch the track and field events. As a former track athlete, watching it on TV really brings me back to my days of competition. I can't even imagine how tough it would be to try and high jump with thousands of people watching, though.
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What events did you do? I used to do the short sprints ... had bags of raw speed, but no endurance. The macho sports teachers used to get very annoyed every year when their "athletes" came in a distant second in the sprint (60-80m ... don't think it was ever a full 100m). Was hopeless at the field events ... anything that involved upper body strength was beyond me. I reckon I probably would have enjoyed the Triple Jump, but that would have involved interacting with the teachers ... not that they had a clue anyway.
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When I started learning to high jump, Fosbury had not won in Mexico. We were still jumping into sawdust pits, so a flop would have been suicide.
(The guys here who have met me, like Bhob, Byron, RC, etc., probably wouldn't believe I was ever a high jumper, but this was not long after the Depression.)
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Originally posted by eldiablo505Well I got a track (and soccer) scholarship to college to compete in the high jump and long jump. I wasn't quite good enough at either for college level competition. Back in high school I ran the 200 and 400 and did high/long jump. I dabbled in triple jump and even did pole vault for a little while. I vaulted 14', which I thought was pretty cool (but sucks overall). I high jumped 6'9", which is 6" taller than I am. I never got much past that mark that I achieved in high school, though. In college everyone jumps 7' or more.
The two girls who won our first Gold today are an example of this ... one is a soldier funded by the Army, and the other is a girl who was watching the Beijing Olympics and became inspired to enroll for a program looking for "athletic girls of a certain height to try out for rowing, handball and cycling" ... 4 years later she is a Gold medalist.
It's a great human interest story, but also a sad indictment of our school system which does NOTHING to identify talent. We could never identify and produce a young talent like Missy Franklyn or a Michael Phelps ... and even if they did manage to find their way into a private club, they will never achieve their full potential. It has taken private bodies and lottery funding to turn around our Olympic sports ... the system is a disaster ... I laughed at the opening ceremony when Jacques Rogge praised the UK school system as the first in history to include sport in the curriculum ... this was of course private schools in the 19th century ... now it is a disgrace.
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"I dabbled in triple jump and even did pole vault for a little while. I vaulted 14', which I thought was pretty cool (but sucks overall)."
My nephew, who was a good athlete in HS (main sport was varsity soccer, made it as soph), did no better than 13 feet - and that was a lot better than most, it seemed. Pole vault is very tough to master, especially in high school, due to upper body strength and leg strength needed, it seemed. 14 feet is a good number.finished 10th in this 37th yr in 11-team-only NL 5x5
own picks 1, 2, 5, 6, 9 in April 2022 1st-rd farmhand draft
won in 2017 15 07 05 04 02 93 90 84
SP SGray 16, TWalker 10, AWood 10, Price 3, KH Kim 2, Corbin 10
RP Bednar 10, Bender 10, Graterol 2
C Stallings 2, Casali 1
1B Votto 10, 3B ERios 2, 1B Zimmerman 2, 2S Chisholm 5, 2B Hoerner 5, 2B Solano 2, 2B LGarcia 10, SS Gregorius 17
OF Cain 14, Bader 1, Daza 1
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Originally posted by Judge Jude View Post"I dabbled in triple jump and even did pole vault for a little while. I vaulted 14', which I thought was pretty cool (but sucks overall)."
My nephew, who was a good athlete in HS (main sport was varsity soccer, made it as soph), did no better than 13 feet - and that was a lot better than most, it seemed. Pole vault is very tough to master, especially in high school, due to upper body strength and leg strength needed, it seemed. 14 feet is a good number.
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Not exactly on a field of velvet - theirs was the only high school in the county with a respectable coach who knew the pole vault at all, and he grabbed up several athletes from different sports and did enough to get them a county-best, team-wise. I heard no Olympic music in the background of that school, lol
My high school didn't have (American) football, and no soccer either til I was a freshman. And no band.
My university didn't have football (or a band), either.
Kind of narrowed the pecking order - neither extreme jocks nor extreme dorks had official outlets.
#heynowfinished 10th in this 37th yr in 11-team-only NL 5x5
own picks 1, 2, 5, 6, 9 in April 2022 1st-rd farmhand draft
won in 2017 15 07 05 04 02 93 90 84
SP SGray 16, TWalker 10, AWood 10, Price 3, KH Kim 2, Corbin 10
RP Bednar 10, Bender 10, Graterol 2
C Stallings 2, Casali 1
1B Votto 10, 3B ERios 2, 1B Zimmerman 2, 2S Chisholm 5, 2B Hoerner 5, 2B Solano 2, 2B LGarcia 10, SS Gregorius 17
OF Cain 14, Bader 1, Daza 1
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Originally posted by eldiablo505Yeah, I was good at pole vault but there was another guy on my team who was better and I was already doing well in several other events. Gimmicks, if you will.
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Here's me bitching about sport in schools, and the next day ...
"It's one of the worst statistics in British sport," said Moynihan. "It is wholly unacceptable that over 50% of our medallists in Beijing came from the private sector. It tells you that 50% of the medals came from seven per cent of the population.
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Originally posted by johnnya24 View PostHere's me bitching about sport in schools, and the next day ...
Won't make any difference though ... we sold a huge % of our school playing fields to developers over the years.
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Originally posted by B-Fly View PostIt would seem we've got the opposite problem here -- too much emphasis on and resources dedicated to sports in our public universities.
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