Winter Olympics

I think the snow boarding event yesterday should have been cancelled, how those girls didn't seriously injure themselves I don't know.

What also fascinated me was how well the Australians were doing in some events, I don't associate Australia with snow!!!

David

Absolutely agree David. How on Earth the girl who landed on her back didn't sustain (along with lots of others) serious injury is nothing short of miraculous.

ps The Australians never fail to surprise do they? 😀

Plenty of snow in Australia! 

https://www.onthesnow.co.uk/news/a/585247/the-8-best-ski-resorts-in-australia---new-zealand

I wonder if U.K. tax payers believe the £32 million given by the government and the lottery is truly value for money.  A recent study concluded that it is schools, parents and clubs that encourage children to take sport.  Olympic medal winners are thought to encourage less than 7% of youngsters in sport.  Source: guardian newspaper

A lot of the money goes into searching for elite athletes capable of stepping up from what schools and parents can provide. And let's face it, some parents aren't always around to encourage, and most schools have very limited PE resources. OK if you are a pupil at Millfield School, their resources are outstanding, but your inner city comprehensive probably doesn't even have a patch of scrubby grass. Someone in the past decided it would be a good idea to sell off school playing fields! After a working life time providing sports children and youngsters, the sense of achievement, better health and overall feel good factor is worth all the money spent on sport. The Australian culture recognised this way prior to the British. 

We have yet to see how successful the Winter Olympics will be for the UK but the talk of 10 medals seems a bit on the optimistic side but lets face it sport is all about optimism. 

Certainly investment in the Summer Games has been very successful and clearly the only way you can become a world leader. The UK funding comes in a roundabout way but we are only doing what other countries are doing. So if you want a level playing field (groan) you have to invest. At least the Olympics are an investment in national pride which is a commodity which seems to be in short supply at the moment!

David 

A return of 10 medals @ £3.2 million each? I'd get my skates on for that sort of money!

Sadly, as the Premier League has shown (and there's a conversation for anthor time) a huge amount of money is now required to compete at the top level.

Even with all this money, our male luge competitor cannot compete for a medal because he doesn't have the technology available to him, even though he has the talent. It seems we're not investing enough in our young talent and the equipment?

Ten medals seems very optimistic to me as well. I watched the men's luge event early this week, and it was stated on there that GB athletes lack the funding of a lot of the other athletes, still a minority sport. Football is the only sport that irritates me. Apparently, some PL teams spent more on their defence players in the transfer windows, then some Governments did on National Defence! Now that is obscene money. Not enough gets down to levels below PL and beyond.

This is the sort of funding crisis that some UK teams are up against, maybe crowd funding is the answer. I wish them well.

See here