Commonwealth Games Creativity – part 3 of 3

I inadvertently titled this post Commonwealth Games Creativity because within this transmutational group we have been discussing how to ring some changes to our blogs …

Dragons who can read long posts!

I could start with 'there be dragons', or more appropriately this be long! …

At and after the London Olympics one of the calls to the populace has been “Get Inspired” … the Commonwealth utilised the same ideas … there was the sport, but there were festivals, art exhibitions; the city had museums, parks, buskers … lots of interesting ideas and places to keep all amused …

I’ll share some of the inspirational stories that came from the Games, along with a couple of other posts that have appeared on my radar …

I wrote about the Cultural Olympiad being held during the London Olympics in 2012 which gave an overview of the Olympics and the Greek Olympiad … reminding us that originally the Greek Olympics were the “Pentathlon of the Muses” … and why the cultural element is an essential addition to a sporting games.  Hence think beyond sport … and what else can be learnt …

“Get Inspired” is the slogan the BBC used at the Olympics and has continued on with other sporting events … however this article and particularly the title by-line made me sit up and realise it was so applicable to us …

“Maybe you’re great and you just don’t realise.  Maybe there’s a painter buried deep inside. A pianist? A pilot? A poet?” …. Stephen Way was a smokin’ and drinkin’ man – now he’s a marathon runner – and a good one … he’s also a healthy one … you can read his story here on the Get-Inspired post … he came 10^th in the Commonwealth Games marathon.

Note – the story-post could be used for our ‘get-on-with-it’ nudges … but it also highlights seven people who were late developers … it’s worth a read (I think) from many aspects.

Creativity was needed in a city that did not have an international athletics track and stadium … what to do? 

‘The Glasgow Solution’ – an out of the box thought … adapt one of the football stadia, where all the facilities were in situ … this solution is now being evaluated  as a way to deliver track and field sports events in other countries.

The surface was raised 1.9m (6’ 3”) on a bed of 6,000 structural steel stilts, flat-bedded, then covered with stone, followed by asphalt before the track and grass were laid … problem solved! 

Full article here Joseph Ash Galvanising write up …

Some views of the village can be seen here courtesy of “Insidethe Games” – sustainability was key for the organisers … some of the London Olympics fixtures and fittings were recycled …

Overcoming handicaps and rising to the occasion …

An article on para sports with the emphasis on the Commonwealth Games can be found here.

An iphone copy

The Scottish man of steel – Micky Yule lost his legs in Afghanistan … but he competed in the Power Lifting – he came fourth, but as he said … there are other fixtures ahead to keep him focused and positive … and help him through the operations he continues to need (after 45 already) …

Another local heroine – Erraid Davies (13), a bronze medal winner in the Para 100m breaststroke, is the youngest ever medal winner … she struggled to walk and started swimming to help her rare hip condition (Perthes Syndrome).

Erraid in action ...

Erraid had not told her class mates that she was competing in the Games ... 

... and she was so excited about going home to show her friends her medal.  She lives 25 miles from her nearest pool in the remote Shetland Isles.

Which country speaks Gilbertese?  And who decided to live away from home for 4 years to achieve his gold?  The answers are the tiny Pacific island of Kiribati and David Kataotau who achieved his country’s first gold in weightlifting’s 105 kg Group A.

So pleased!

Another Kiribati – the teenager Taoriba Biniati had never been in a boxing ring before arriving to fight in Scotland.  Her national boxing club consists of a punch bag hanging from a breadfruit tree … know what one of those looks likes – look left or right!

Breadfruit tree

She has a fascinating history … it’s really interesting and worth reading to find out how she lives and then grabs the chance when she had one.  Check out Biniati’s story hereand see a little of Kiribati.

Triathletes

Kenya’s Vincent Onyangi had never swum in open water before diving into Strathclyde Loch for the triathlon.  Twenty minutes later he was bobbing around doing breaststroke while the leaders were onto their bikes and away …

Weightlifters need shoes … Fred Oala, a 17 year old 56 kg weightlifter from Papua New Guinea had to borrow a pair of shoes from a Clyde-sider – a volunteer – after his own footwear disintegrated.

Papua New Guinea
(Indonesia border as shown, Australia's
Great Barrier Reef to the east of
the triangular Cape York Peninsula of
the state of Queensland

His shoes were owned by two people before him and had been held together with yellow tape … he achieved a national record of 118 kg in the clean and jerk.

YouTube – how about learning how to achieve gold via YouTube?  That’s what Julius Yego from Kenya did … to improve his technique in Javelin throwing …

Rwandan cyclist, Adrien Niyonshuti, rode in the time trial – he is a Rwanda genocide survivor.  The 27 year old lost six siblings during the mass murders of 1m people in the East African nation 20 years ago.

While Dieudonne Disi, taking part in the men’s marathon, witnessed the killing of his entire family aged 14 and ran 50 km to neighbouring Burundi to escape the atrocities.  He came in 18^th …

an iphone pic

To uplift us a little: Cook Island competitors celebrate victory in lawn bowls … just by chance did their wonderful hats improve their bowling rolls?   Had to include these two cheerful ladies – I love their hats!

I’ve never got my head round the biased balls they use in lawn bowls … but you have to admire a sport that’s been around for 800 years … and is a core sport of the Commonwealth Games.

There are core sports and optional sports – selected by the host nation – subject to approval by the CG Federation.  Some team sports are/can be included.

Netball in action

There was competition in 18 sports (with 22 medal events for the Para-Sports up for grabs) … do you know what each one involves … here’s the Wiki Commonwealth Games link to check out each one …

Athletics – core event  (+ para medals)

Badminton – core event

Boxing – core event

Cycling – optional  (+ para medals)

Diving – optional

Gymnastics (Artistic) – optional

Gymnastics (Rhythmic) – optional

Hockey – core

Judo – optional

Lawn bowls – core (+ para medals)

Netball – core  (women only)

Rugby Sevens – core  (men only)

Shooting – optional

Squash – core  (the sport I enjoyed and played a lot when I was in South Africa)

Swimming – core (+ para medals)

Table Tennis – optional

Triathlon – optional

Weightlifting – core (+ para medals for Power Lifting)

Wrestling – optional

 

Ladies' Squash Doubles -
a devlish game!

Other sports are recognised … but only so many can occur in each Games …

Some more trivia questions - which might lead to a post or two – or provide an opportunity for some extra geography lessons (for you) or for your children?!

 

I believe this is the flat world!   With the
Commonwealth areas in colour

Where are the 71 participating countries?  At least I’ve given you a clue:

Africa – Botswana, Cameroon, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, The Gambia, Uganda, Zambia.

Americas – Belize, Bermuda, Canada, Falkland Islands, Guyana, St Helena

Asia – Bangladesh, Brunei Darussalam, India, Malaysia, Maldives, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka

Caribbean – Anguilla, Antigua & Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and The Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks & Caicos Island

Europe – Cyprus, England, Gibraltar, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Malta, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales

Oceania – Australia, Cook Islands, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Norfolk Island, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuata …

Check out the country venues …

Strathclyde Country Park 

Cathkin Braes Mountain Bike Trails

Barry Buddon Shooting Centre near Carnoustie Golf Course …

Strathclyde Country Park

Find out more about Glasgow, and how it started life as a fishing village way back when, then exponentially grew during the Industrial Revolution – being famed for the Clyde River and shipbuilding –  and becoming the second city of Britain for much of its history.

Love the logo

Culturally it holds its own in a diverse range of interests … museums, art galleries, universities, the largest public reference library in Europe, theatre, opera, festivals and performing arts, exhibitions … and as we can see plenty of sports facilities …

Well if I’ve bored you … what will a smile do? = bring out the best in most of us, brighten others’ lives and give our endorphins a lift …

... this will make you smile (I’m nearly at the end?!) … where next? Here’s where … Denise Covey is waiting to welcome us on the GoldCoast in Australia?!

Denise is with Nas Dean at the moment .. no doubt they'll check in in due course ... they're brushing up on their writerly skills, and then the chatterly skills!

Norfolk Island - looks good to visit?

A few of the many admirable, heart-warming stories of overcoming adversity, or just performing above and beyond expectations …

… or reminding us there are other places on this earth where excellence can be found, and where sportsmen who do succeed, do not want glory per se, but want to give back to their homeland and to their peoples … improving their lives and offering hope for a new future.

A Tunnock Teacake - cut in half or perhaps
bitten in half .. but not by me: though I did see
some in Waitrose and might buy some for
 the Nursing Centre staff for the Bank Holiday

Humbleness more often than not prevailed in ‘the Friendly Games’ … ‘the Everyman Games’ …

I mentioned Steve Way the marathon man who ran his way out of smoking, obesity and from alcohol … then this mathematician caught my eye … and again is an inspirational story that caught my attention …

A cooked haggis ready to be
eaten - not sure how the
mathematician got the haggis!

From Wired.com “What it Takes to Win the World’s HighestComputer Science Honour” … it’s not about the Iranian lady recently recognised with the Nobel Prize … but the whole is applicable to those of us who wish to achieve … yeah he’s slightly cleverer … but this down-to-earth story is worth a read.

This is long … but we all need to think creatively and I hope some of you, many of you, can find some inspirational ideas here …

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

BBC Olympic Games Coverage ...

I recently went to a lecture at the British Library given by Dave Gordon, Head of Major Events for BBC Sport, on the Transmission and Viewing of the Olympic Games ...

BBC Coat of Arms
"Nation shall speak Peace unto Nation"

Having the Olympics in London gave the BBC a huge opportunity to showcase their work to the world, yet we, the audience, had a huge expectation ...

... we would want to have the possibility to watch every venue (40+), every event start to finish, every session, every sport, every aspect, every day – so not a moment could be missed ...

... they had all the strands of the Beeb to consider – Radio, TV, World Service, local tv stations too – then the 24 digital streams going out with 2,500 hours of coverage – at Sydney ... the BBC only had 300 hours of coverage on BBC 1 and 2 ....

British Library: sculpture -
Sitting on History

.... here they also had to make arrangements with Sky, Virgin and the Beeb Facebook page ... there was BBC Twitter (which was monitored 24/7) ...

... of course they had to stick to programme listings ... and there were the big screens around the country, allowing the community to come together during the Games, torch ceremonies, etc etc

Then we need to remember the other events that were going on around Britain during this year, the different audiences who needed to be catered for – Children’s TV (CBBC), local tv and radio stations ...

CBBC Website

CBBC had its own website, children’s story recording, the torch route, Blue Peter (the flagship children’s tv programme) ...

The Torch Relay was broadcast from a converted horsebox,  which  followed the torch all the way around its 70 day route ... 8,000 miles, 66 evening celebrations ... and more.

Torch Relay Horsebox - BBC 

The Cultural Olympiad and London 2012 Festival ...  what an array of artistic, musical, architectural, literary et al events – the “Pentathlon of the Muses” ... all needing to be taken into account in the scheduling.

Then there’s the normal BBC scheduling of their regular programmes that needed to be taken into account.

The BBC Proms had to be catered for ... the annual 8 week (mid July – mid Sept) Promenade Concerts predominantly at the Albert Hall, but with events being staged around Britain – including tie-ins with the Olympic theme.

Now I’m re-reading this ... what an amazing quantity of broadcast coverage ... standard broadcasting, digital opportunities, not forgetting radio, nor more importantly the social media aspects, journalists working in the field ...

... then there’s the technology we expect now – all the interactivity ... the ‘extra’ slots, the ‘see it again/play it again’, the alarm calls for specific events, all the stats ...

Adding Cables

And I don’t understand that last paragraph at all really!  I hear the word “smart” bandied around ... and I guess that’s what technology is ... who does the glueing I’ve no idea!!

The International Broadcast Centre at the Park was the size of 5 jumbo jets and is provided by the host broadcaster, whose parameters are set by the International Olympic organisation to ensure there is neutral coverage of all events for all broadcasters, which the BBC then customised its coverage for the British audience.

International Broadcasting Centre in
June 2011

The BBC is decentralising from London and BBC Sport was one of the departments scheduled to move .... conveniently this happened in the 2012 summer!? 

The heart of the BBC Sports’ web operation, Olympics news coverage and distribution was now located in the north of England at the new MediaCityUK in Salford (just outside Manchester).

MediaCityUK

Still the BBC Olympic Studios had to be at the Olympic Park ... so they hired 18 reusable shipping containers at a cost of £2.50 per day!!  This had been tried out for the Football World Cup 2010 in Cape Town – so the BBC reused that studio, customising it as necessary.

Radio 2 also broadcast from one of the containers ...

c/o The Metro - Lund Point and the
unfinished Olympic Park in 2011

The BBC rented vacant areas of the top five floors of the 22 storey tower block, Lund Point, with views across east London and into the Park as a base for their Olympic and Paralympic coverage:

... BBC News and the BBC World Service used this space ... they built a studio on the roof, accessible via laddered scaffolding, to which ‘everyone’ climbed!

There were commentators at every sport – whose commentary and feeds  were available for other countries to tap into ...

 Each day the BBC1 was allocated to the Olympics and its events ... BBC3 opened at 9.00 am (instead of 7.00pm) – all the BBC Parliament bandwidth was transferred to the BBC3 transmission.

White Water Canoeing at Lee Valley

A nation was united:  28.7 m of us watched the opening ceremony, 27.3m of us watched the closing ceremony ... their target audience for Beijing was 75%, this year the target was 85%, but 91% was reached.

They took stats of everything, and are still evaluating those ... fully researched ...

Sport-On-Line reached 24million, while their mobile reach was 12million ... for breaking news, results, video, audio and analysis ....

The advent of Digital gives us, the audience, (seemingly) a never ending choice ... as well as High-Definition Television (HDTV) providing a resolution that is substantially higher than standard ...

Hadleigh Farm in Essex - Mountain Biking

... to which we’d all been subscribed to in the digital roll-out, the south-east being the final region in May of this year – new tvs or converter boxes being required ... and retuning, while it was all fine tuned.  I only use the basic tv set up – so am not aware of all the ‘goodies’ available – I’ll get there!!

Then Dave Gordon gave us an idea of the future for TV ... in about 20 years a much more interactive system, when the resolution would be sixteen times greater than today – Super Hi Vision tv screenings would be wall size.

BBC boxes!

The BBC had to work with all organisations to ensure they meet their public service charter ... so BBC Sport is looking at the lessons learnt from the Olympics and readying up for the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow 2014 ...

... they thought they might have 3,000 schools participating in the Olympic coverage – but it was 5,000 schools from around the world ...

The IOC has a Youth Olympics every four years (winter and summer) following the style of the Olympic Games ... the next one will be in 2014.

After Sydney 2000 there was a pile of letters to answer ... at London 2012 the BBC receive instantaneous feedback and need to react accordingly ...

Portland, Dorset - Olympic Sailing venue

They have social scientists on board to monitor, help with planning, scheduling and generally study society and human behaviour ... so improvements can be introduced.

The BBC had first call at the London Olympics, but usually get preferential treatment at Olympic Games due to the BBC’s worldwide coverage ... there is a lot of give and take amongst broadcasters during these international events – there is very little in-fighting.

The BBC is a broadcaster ... not a narrowcaster – and for the not so popular events they would include extra coverage within other programmes: the sport would get coverage, yet the probably tiny audience would have a sampling of the British aspects to the sport, but the sport and its successes would be highlighted elsewhere – eg in the One Show, or on Breakfast TV ...

Olympic Village

During the Olympic and Paralympic Games – the newly gained British expertise was being tapped into by the Brazilian authorities – for their Olympics in 2016 and the 2014 football World Cup ... and the BBC would be at the forefront broadcasting these events to its UK and global audiences.

Looking back on the talk and giving myself a better idea of the challenges the BBC and broadcasters face – it has opened my eyes as to how much is involved in just getting the sport into our sitting rooms, cars, mobile phones, high streets etc ... and the BBC costs us just 40p a day for all the pleasure and information it gives us.  There are no adverts - bliss!

BBC Sport covers a vast array of events, is constantly evaluating itself, has a global scrutiny going on – for the Olympics by the IOC, other events by the various sporting bodies  - the BBC values its position in global broadcasting ... while the British public have a first rate reputable broadcaster ... which cannot allow itself to be seen as biased in any way.

Look at what can be achieved with a few boxes!

The logistics of it all is immense ... the technicians, the electricians, the camera crews, the artistes, the journalists, backroom boffins and administrators, the actual broadcasting – all has to be assembled, co-ordinated,  scheduled ...

... and that was just BBC Sport ...

This is a piecemeal post – but gives an overview of what goes on behind the scenes in getting any sporting event broadcast ... it was an interesting British Library event ...

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories