Greg Norman is the club house leader after finishing his second round of the British Open.
Now there is a sentence I never thought would be written again.
I want to write it again, just to savour it:
Greg Norman is the club house leader of the British Open.
The guy is 53, plays bugger all tournaments a year, spent most of the last month organising a lavish wedding for himself and his new bride Chris Evert (now there's a sentence I know I never expected to write!), and now after two rounds of the greatest golf tournament in the world (I know there is the US Open and Masters, but I think links golf is a sterner test than the lovely American courses) he is in the lead. Amazing.
Now he is a long way from winning this thing, and not even I am going to suggest he is more than an outside chance to be contending come Sunday afternoon, but the thrill I got watching his round tonight ensures I'll be glued to the TV for his next round.
The only person who ruined more mornings of my adolescent life than Norman was my Dad who liked to start up the lawn mower on Saturdays to give me an all too subtle hint that it was time to earn my allowance.
Look at Norman's record in the US Masters from 1986-89: Tied 2nd, Tied 2nd, Tied 5th, Tied 3rd. So that's four Monday mornings that I would have gotten up at sparrow to watch Norman contend and then falter. In 1986 he also came tied 12th in the US Open, and 2nd in the US PGA. That's 2 more anti-climactical early mornings. And given I was serious about sport I would have watched the first 3 rounds of all these tournament so lets make that at least 24 mornings in the 1980s that ultimately ended is despair.
There's no accounting for why some people affect millions while others don't.
Take Ian Baker-Finch. Nice guy, excellent commentator. But I tell you if it was he who was in the lead of the British Open, I would think that it's pretty interesting, but would not be thinking of investing any hope in a win.
Greg Norman has no equal with any other Australian sportsperson when it comes to being the cause of hours of lost sleep. For a few good years Pat Rafter at Wimbledon had us staying up till 2 in the morning; Leyton Hewitt likewise; but Norman did it year after year - late nights for the British Open; early mornings for the US majors.
And so while others may like to criticize Norman for being too American, not playing in Australia enough (as incorrect an argument as ever was made), or for being a choker, I don't. Adam Scott is supposedly our best golfer since Norman, and I can't recall losing a minute of sleep for him.
Norman for all his faults kept you believing, kept you hoping - in fact that was his biggest fault; regardless of reality when you saw him saunter down the fairway you thought maybe this time. Maybe.
And though it's been 5 years since he even finished in the top 20 of a major, and I thought the feeling long gone, it just took one look at the leaderboard to realise it is still there.
I have no confidence it'll end well, but I'm hoping. And I'm happy to lose some more sleep - just for old time's sake.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Dorothy Gillard?
As parliament gets closer to returning I’ll do a bit of a form guide for the second half of the year (my intention is to do nightly reviews of the day’s Question Time action), but I want to make a quick comment on Julia Gillard.
Now Julia (excuse the first name use, but some people just seem more suited to being referred to by their first name and Julia is one of them) has been, according to pretty much everyone, far and away the stand out parliamentary performer for the Government. She burst out in the first week like she had been waiting her whole life for the opportunity to stand at the dispatch box and taunt the Liberals – which is not surprising as I’m sure she has been waiting her whole life to do so.
The first question she received from the opposition came from Julie Bishop; it was a particularly poor delivery and Julia skipped down the pitch and put it over the fence for six:
Ms JULIE BISHOP (2.21 p.m.)—My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Minister for Education and Minister for Social Inclusion. Will the minister guarantee that her preferred workplace agreement—union negotiated collective agreements—do not take away award conditions such as penalty rates and leave loading?
Ms GILLARD—I was waiting for page 2, but page 2 did not come. For a former minister of the Howard government who claimed to care so much about literacy, it would be really useful if the Deputy Leader of the Opposition read Labor’s policy. If she is in any doubt about how to find it, it is on the internet. We campaigned on it for all of 2007. I will send it to her.
I happened to have been in the public gallery for this QT, and Julia was actually laughing before she stood up to answer. Bishop was not impressed:
Ms Julie Bishop—Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The question was simple: will she guarantee—
Mr Debus—On what grounds?
Ms Julie Bishop—Relevance!
The way she snapped “relevance” revealed to everyone that she was woman not used to being laughed at, and she was not coping well with the change to opposition (or the fact that she was being so easily beaten).
To her credit Julie B tried a few more questions the following week – one an absolute long hop about hairdressers, which given that Julia's partner is himself a hairdresser, allowed Julia to make a wonderful crack:
As I joked with the Leader of the Opposition before question time started, I have certainly valued the services of people who give manicures. And, as a matter of public record, I am very fond of hairdressers—one in particular!
Bishop was beaten, and since then, in her role as the shadow Minister for Employment, Business and Workplace Relations she has asked her opposite number only two questions. In that time she has asked Lindsay Tanner 1, Wayne Swan 4, and Kevin Rudd 24 (of which at least 9 were in the area of work place relations and could justifiably have been asked of Gillard).
So much for the battle of the top women in Australian politics. An absolute TKO to Julia.
Since then Julia has for the most part not had to worry too much about the opposition, but one could argue she has never really had to worry too much.
So far this year she has answered 49 questions, of which only 12 were from the opposition – thus around 75% of the time she is dealing with Dorothy Dixers.
Since the hairdresser day, she has only twice had to answer more than one opposition question in a day. The main occasion was 3 June, when Tony Abbott tried to trap her on increases in child care costs. It was the only day she had any stumble (as Annabel Crabbe noted) due to her desire not to utter the phrase “watching”. But my verdict is that even on this bad day, she still put Abbott away with her last answer:
Ms GILLARD—Obviously the question of childcare fees is one that impinges on working families who need to pay for child care. Maybe my memory fails me, but if there was some amazingly effective Howard government initiative to deal with childcare fee increases then I do not seem to recall it.
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER—Order! The question has been asked.
Ms GILLARD—I do not recall it. So for 12 years—the member for Warringah being in the cabinet for most of that period—nothing effective was done on childcare fee increases. In contrast, what is this government delivering?
Mr Tuckey—Mr Speaker, on a point of order: on the question of relevance, this is a question asked on behalf of the people, not the opposition. Young parents are entitled—
The SPEAKER—Order! The member for O’Connor will resume his seat.
Mr Albanese interjecting—
Ms GILLARD—The Leader of the House reminds me that I have been asked the question by Mr ‘People Skills’, but I did not think we had promoted him to being the single voice of the people!
So while she has had benefit from a lot of deliveries bowled by her own teammates, her reputation as the ALP’s best performer is well deserved.
My reckoning is only 1 out of 12 deliveries from the opposition have beaten the bat; most of the others have scored boundaries.
Now Julia (excuse the first name use, but some people just seem more suited to being referred to by their first name and Julia is one of them) has been, according to pretty much everyone, far and away the stand out parliamentary performer for the Government. She burst out in the first week like she had been waiting her whole life for the opportunity to stand at the dispatch box and taunt the Liberals – which is not surprising as I’m sure she has been waiting her whole life to do so.
The first question she received from the opposition came from Julie Bishop; it was a particularly poor delivery and Julia skipped down the pitch and put it over the fence for six:
Ms JULIE BISHOP (2.21 p.m.)—My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Minister for Education and Minister for Social Inclusion. Will the minister guarantee that her preferred workplace agreement—union negotiated collective agreements—do not take away award conditions such as penalty rates and leave loading?
Ms GILLARD—I was waiting for page 2, but page 2 did not come. For a former minister of the Howard government who claimed to care so much about literacy, it would be really useful if the Deputy Leader of the Opposition read Labor’s policy. If she is in any doubt about how to find it, it is on the internet. We campaigned on it for all of 2007. I will send it to her.
I happened to have been in the public gallery for this QT, and Julia was actually laughing before she stood up to answer. Bishop was not impressed:
Ms Julie Bishop—Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The question was simple: will she guarantee—
Mr Debus—On what grounds?
Ms Julie Bishop—Relevance!
The way she snapped “relevance” revealed to everyone that she was woman not used to being laughed at, and she was not coping well with the change to opposition (or the fact that she was being so easily beaten).
To her credit Julie B tried a few more questions the following week – one an absolute long hop about hairdressers, which given that Julia's partner is himself a hairdresser, allowed Julia to make a wonderful crack:
As I joked with the Leader of the Opposition before question time started, I have certainly valued the services of people who give manicures. And, as a matter of public record, I am very fond of hairdressers—one in particular!
Bishop was beaten, and since then, in her role as the shadow Minister for Employment, Business and Workplace Relations she has asked her opposite number only two questions. In that time she has asked Lindsay Tanner 1, Wayne Swan 4, and Kevin Rudd 24 (of which at least 9 were in the area of work place relations and could justifiably have been asked of Gillard).
So much for the battle of the top women in Australian politics. An absolute TKO to Julia.
Since then Julia has for the most part not had to worry too much about the opposition, but one could argue she has never really had to worry too much.
So far this year she has answered 49 questions, of which only 12 were from the opposition – thus around 75% of the time she is dealing with Dorothy Dixers.
Since the hairdresser day, she has only twice had to answer more than one opposition question in a day. The main occasion was 3 June, when Tony Abbott tried to trap her on increases in child care costs. It was the only day she had any stumble (as Annabel Crabbe noted) due to her desire not to utter the phrase “watching”. But my verdict is that even on this bad day, she still put Abbott away with her last answer:
Ms GILLARD—Obviously the question of childcare fees is one that impinges on working families who need to pay for child care. Maybe my memory fails me, but if there was some amazingly effective Howard government initiative to deal with childcare fee increases then I do not seem to recall it.
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER—Order! The question has been asked.
Ms GILLARD—I do not recall it. So for 12 years—the member for Warringah being in the cabinet for most of that period—nothing effective was done on childcare fee increases. In contrast, what is this government delivering?
Mr Tuckey—Mr Speaker, on a point of order: on the question of relevance, this is a question asked on behalf of the people, not the opposition. Young parents are entitled—
The SPEAKER—Order! The member for O’Connor will resume his seat.
Mr Albanese interjecting—
Ms GILLARD—The Leader of the House reminds me that I have been asked the question by Mr ‘People Skills’, but I did not think we had promoted him to being the single voice of the people!
So while she has had benefit from a lot of deliveries bowled by her own teammates, her reputation as the ALP’s best performer is well deserved.
My reckoning is only 1 out of 12 deliveries from the opposition have beaten the bat; most of the others have scored boundaries.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Obama and U2
When Powderfinger came along I knew they were a great band. They sounded great, had excellent lyrics and they were honest – no gimmickry, no studio flashiness. But they could never be my band; they were too late.
When I just started high school I happened to be watching a music video show (pretty sure it was Music Express for those old enough) when on came a clip of U2 at Red Rocks singing "Sunday Bloody Sunday". Well put down your glasses, we have a winner. From then on they were the only band that really mattered to me.
Because it was before “Pride”, before The Joshua Tree and (God help us) before Rattle and Hum, this was no band wagon riding. I could say their name at school and a good percentage of my mates would think I had just made up a name.
Now if a band is worth defending, it will at times be hard to defend, and geez if Bono doesn’t at times make it hard to defend. But no matter, I’m with them till the end. I figure I owe it to them, because their albums seemed to coincide so perfectly with my life (a point The Sports Guy has also made).
The Joshua Tree when I was in Year 10 and thinking I might be as good as anyone; Rattle and Hum when I was in Year 12 and believed it was a fact of the universe that I was better than anyone; Achtung Baby when I was at uni and wasn’t so full of myself, but also knew I was living the best years of my life; Zooropa and Pop came out when I was somewhat lost in life; and All That You Can’t Leave Behind when my life regained focus and drive. By the time How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb came out, I was a father, and feeling like maybe the best years weren’t behind me.
And so while I will buy Powderfinger CDs, they’ll only ever be a band that plays good music; I’ll never be the one to die in a ditch for them – they came along too late for me, let someone younger take that role.
And likewise, this year’s US election has me feeling older than I should, and it’s all Obama’s fault.
This time last year, I was all for Hillary. I must admit I hadn’t analysed her voting record, read many of her speeches, or pondered what her stance on the NAFTA was. But I felt excited by the prospect of her victory. Symbolism is a mighty thing in politics and a female US President was something to anticipate – an ‘I remember when’ moment, and perhaps even better, a 'can you believe it’s taken this long' moment.
And then in waltzes Obama and with an elbow to the solar plexus, out goes Hillary, and out goes my feelings of being excited by a moment in history.
Now I know that if he wins he will be the first black President, and there are many who will contend that that is more significant in US history, but it just doesn’t grip me in the same way that the prospect of a female President would.
Probably it’s because I’m not American and don’t know the racial divide. But mostly I think it’s because Obama seems to be someone teenagers and first time voters get excited about.
If I were 20 years old and at uni, I know that I would be all for Obama. I would be crazily inspired by his “yes we can” speeches. Hell, I would probably be thinking about going to America and volunteering to work for his campaign. I don’t doubt this at all; I know I would have been driving my friends crazy with how defining a moment this was, how inspirational it was, how much better the world would be.
Yet although I know my 20 year old self would support Obama, I just can’t get electrified by the man from Chicago and his apparently inspirational speeches. To me he seems rather ... can’t believe I’m saying it... all style, no substance.
And perhaps that is what I dislike most about Obama: he makes me feel like an old fart. Instead of being inspired by his speeches, I shake my head and think, you’re no MLK, you’re no RFK. (And I’m not even a bloody baby boomer, so what the hell am I thinking?)
“Yes we can”? What the hell? Now I am all for getting a chant going, but please try not to make it so ubiquitous that it can be used for everything from running for president to getting stains out of a shirt.
You want inspirational? Try Martin Luther King Jr’s I've been to the Mountain top.
Try RFK announcing the assassination of MLK. (Can you imagine hearing a politician of today adlib Aeschylus?)
By comparison Obama’s “Just words” speech is not only not original; it’s not even as inspirational as the original
(which leads me to think Obama’s ‘inspiration’ is due mostly to a supportive audience).
Now this is not to say I think Obama would make a poor president, it’s just that unless something happens between now and November I can’t see myself getting carried away by his victory.
But hey, maybe U2 will provide the answer once again, – in October, they are releasing their next album – I know I’ll feel young then.
When I just started high school I happened to be watching a music video show (pretty sure it was Music Express for those old enough) when on came a clip of U2 at Red Rocks singing "Sunday Bloody Sunday". Well put down your glasses, we have a winner. From then on they were the only band that really mattered to me.
Because it was before “Pride”, before The Joshua Tree and (God help us) before Rattle and Hum, this was no band wagon riding. I could say their name at school and a good percentage of my mates would think I had just made up a name.
Now if a band is worth defending, it will at times be hard to defend, and geez if Bono doesn’t at times make it hard to defend. But no matter, I’m with them till the end. I figure I owe it to them, because their albums seemed to coincide so perfectly with my life (a point The Sports Guy has also made).
The Joshua Tree when I was in Year 10 and thinking I might be as good as anyone; Rattle and Hum when I was in Year 12 and believed it was a fact of the universe that I was better than anyone; Achtung Baby when I was at uni and wasn’t so full of myself, but also knew I was living the best years of my life; Zooropa and Pop came out when I was somewhat lost in life; and All That You Can’t Leave Behind when my life regained focus and drive. By the time How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb came out, I was a father, and feeling like maybe the best years weren’t behind me.
And so while I will buy Powderfinger CDs, they’ll only ever be a band that plays good music; I’ll never be the one to die in a ditch for them – they came along too late for me, let someone younger take that role.
And likewise, this year’s US election has me feeling older than I should, and it’s all Obama’s fault.
This time last year, I was all for Hillary. I must admit I hadn’t analysed her voting record, read many of her speeches, or pondered what her stance on the NAFTA was. But I felt excited by the prospect of her victory. Symbolism is a mighty thing in politics and a female US President was something to anticipate – an ‘I remember when’ moment, and perhaps even better, a 'can you believe it’s taken this long' moment.
And then in waltzes Obama and with an elbow to the solar plexus, out goes Hillary, and out goes my feelings of being excited by a moment in history.
Now I know that if he wins he will be the first black President, and there are many who will contend that that is more significant in US history, but it just doesn’t grip me in the same way that the prospect of a female President would.
Probably it’s because I’m not American and don’t know the racial divide. But mostly I think it’s because Obama seems to be someone teenagers and first time voters get excited about.
If I were 20 years old and at uni, I know that I would be all for Obama. I would be crazily inspired by his “yes we can” speeches. Hell, I would probably be thinking about going to America and volunteering to work for his campaign. I don’t doubt this at all; I know I would have been driving my friends crazy with how defining a moment this was, how inspirational it was, how much better the world would be.
Yet although I know my 20 year old self would support Obama, I just can’t get electrified by the man from Chicago and his apparently inspirational speeches. To me he seems rather ... can’t believe I’m saying it... all style, no substance.
And perhaps that is what I dislike most about Obama: he makes me feel like an old fart. Instead of being inspired by his speeches, I shake my head and think, you’re no MLK, you’re no RFK. (And I’m not even a bloody baby boomer, so what the hell am I thinking?)
“Yes we can”? What the hell? Now I am all for getting a chant going, but please try not to make it so ubiquitous that it can be used for everything from running for president to getting stains out of a shirt.
You want inspirational? Try Martin Luther King Jr’s I've been to the Mountain top.
Try RFK announcing the assassination of MLK. (Can you imagine hearing a politician of today adlib Aeschylus?)
By comparison Obama’s “Just words” speech is not only not original; it’s not even as inspirational as the original
(which leads me to think Obama’s ‘inspiration’ is due mostly to a supportive audience).
Now this is not to say I think Obama would make a poor president, it’s just that unless something happens between now and November I can’t see myself getting carried away by his victory.
But hey, maybe U2 will provide the answer once again, – in October, they are releasing their next album – I know I’ll feel young then.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
More Whimper than Bang
I'm not sure what to make of The Hollowmen. I want to like it; and obviously it's too early to make any definitive statements.
But the first episode was ok; the second less so.
A few things irk me: the Rob Sitch character (you know "Mike Moore in the PM's office", does he actually have a name? Everyone I know just calls him Mike Moore) is too dumb, and not opinionated enough. Guys in his position didn't get there by being self-effacing.
Murph is excellent, and Lachy Hulme is acting everyone else under the table.
The Secretary of PM&C and his underling are too bumbling - this guy is the top bureaucrat in Australia; give him a bit of gravitas - Murph needs to seem to at least be challenged by him. In tonight's episode it was hard to believe that the PM's advisers wouldn't just tell this guy to bugger off. He looks as powerful as a Coles night manager.
And I'm sorry, but Merrick Watts needs to do more than have the worst haircut in TV history before he can call himself an actor..
Despite all this, I'll keep watching, shows like this often improve - the early episodes of Frontline are not a patch on the later ones; heck even the first few Yes Minister episodes are a bit patchy (though it didn't take long to hit it's stride).
I'll write a longer review in a few weeks. For now it suffers coming after The Gruen Transfer, which is getting better each week and seems the more likely of the two shows to push boundaries and make you feel like you've gotten some insight into how the world works.
But the first episode was ok; the second less so.
A few things irk me: the Rob Sitch character (you know "Mike Moore in the PM's office", does he actually have a name? Everyone I know just calls him Mike Moore) is too dumb, and not opinionated enough. Guys in his position didn't get there by being self-effacing.
Murph is excellent, and Lachy Hulme is acting everyone else under the table.
The Secretary of PM&C and his underling are too bumbling - this guy is the top bureaucrat in Australia; give him a bit of gravitas - Murph needs to seem to at least be challenged by him. In tonight's episode it was hard to believe that the PM's advisers wouldn't just tell this guy to bugger off. He looks as powerful as a Coles night manager.
And I'm sorry, but Merrick Watts needs to do more than have the worst haircut in TV history before he can call himself an actor..
Despite all this, I'll keep watching, shows like this often improve - the early episodes of Frontline are not a patch on the later ones; heck even the first few Yes Minister episodes are a bit patchy (though it didn't take long to hit it's stride).
I'll write a longer review in a few weeks. For now it suffers coming after The Gruen Transfer, which is getting better each week and seems the more likely of the two shows to push boundaries and make you feel like you've gotten some insight into how the world works.
Twenty Grand Well Spent
You have to wonder why anyone would bother trying to be an Olympic athlete.
You need to devote your life to achieving something that you know may not occur purely because something in your body snaps at the wrong moment; but you don’t think about that – gotta keep focused – you just keep puting in the hours training.
Your friends are out late drinking and dancing, and dancing and loving, loving and drinking (you are only young once you know, gotta live it up a little!) but you go to bed early because the next day promises more training, more weights, more punishment.
If you are a rower or swimmer you will wake up at some ungodly hour and dive into a pool even though it’s mid winter, or you will put the boat on the lake even though the fog is such that you cannot see your team mates already out on the water going through their paces.
If you are a long distance runner, you will wake up at some ungodly hour and run 15 kilometres through a forest, over hills on dirt tracks with members of your club and when you finish you know you’ll be doing it again that afternoon, or perhaps it’ll be a session of repetition running, where you will push yourself for 1500m through a forest, over hills on dirt tracks and then rest for 60 seconds and then push yourself for another 1500m. And again. And again. And again.
English champion distance runner Brendan Foster once said that “all top international athletes wake up in the morning feeling tired and go to bed feeling very tired.” He came third in the 10,000m at the Montreal Olympics. Pretty amazing really, the only ones in the world who could beat him were the supreme Lasse Viren, winner of three other Olympic Gold Medals; and Carlos Lopes, who would go on to destroy Australian hopes by beating Deek in the Marathon in LA in 1984.
But what that means is for all his adult life up to that point Foster had woken up tired, put his body through hell, denied himself those luxuries and joys non-athletes and footy players take for granted, went to be feeling very tired, only to come third in the one race that mattered. (Because all that pain guarantees nothing).
The tennis player with a 10 year career will have a chance to compete in 40 Grand Slam tournaments, ditto golfers and the majors (though their careers are much longer). The tour de France is on every year. Footy players talk of next season even when the current season still has 10 rounds to go.
But for those foolish souls who have picked a sport which has the Olympics as the pinnacle lives a life measured in leap years, and know that they will be fortunate to get to one, unlikely to make two, and among the rarefied (and perhaps lucky) few if they get to three.
And because these men and women are in the public eye we feel free to criticise.
We are incredibly hard on sportsmen and women. We judge them according to standards we could never meet ourselves. Roger Federer puts a backhand down the line into the net, and we sigh ruefully and think that he’s not quite as good as he used to be. Greg Norman wins 87 tournaments worldwide, but because he only won 2 majors, he is forever an underachiever, forever linked with choking. Tamsyn Lewis gets run out of in the heats of the 800m World Championships, and the critics let fly.
And you know what? Fair enough. Federer isn’t as good as he once was, Norman should have won more majors, and Tamsyn Lewis needs to bloody well perform when it matters most.
But while I have no problems with judging sports people for not performing as well as they themselves would wish to, I remain in awe of them. And my ultimate respect is again for those poor fools who chose to pursue Olympic glory.
For the most part, events which have the Olympics as the ultimate are not accompanied by loads of cash. But they do what they do, getting the odd sponsor to help pay costs of travel and equipment. If they are lucky they have an AIS scholarship; if they are very lucky they are an Australian swimmer; if they are really lucky, they are an attractive, champion, world record breaking, all-round nice guy Australian swimmer.
Consider the comparison: Brendan Fevola a guy who sometimes can be bothered to play footy, but most times cannot, was reputedly offered a $2 million 3 year contract. And he knocked it back. This year, in the richest athletics competition in the world, the IAAF Golden League, a $1 million prize is on offer to anyone who can win his or her event at ALL six Golden League meets. If two athletes do it, they get $500k each, and so on.
So to earn more than Brendan Fevola you only have to go undefeated against everyone in the world who does your event, and hope that no one also does the same in another event. The best will of course get appearance money, but even then you don't need to understand advanced mathematics to work out who's got the sweeter deal.
But this year at Beijing, if nothing snaps when it shouldn’t, and the day that matters most is the day when that Australian athlete puts everything together, and they win the gold, well then they get $20,000 from the Australian Government.
And cue the outrage. Conservative commentators love such stories. It allows them to decry a waste of public money; money for taxpayers that should be spent on... err something... you know...hospitals... schools and... hey I do my job day in day out, where’s my medal?
Those damn Gold medallists, all living on the high hog, then wanting to grab our precious money? Bastards. Why should we give Grant Hackett money (always good to choose the one Olympic champion you know has managed to make some money in sponsorship)? If their sport doesn’t pay them well enough well then they should chose another sport! They only play games.
To such critics, I say fine, you’re entitled to your view point, just please don’t watch the Olympics.
Every Australian athlete in Beijng will have to varying degrees received some form of Government support. If you are against such things, then don’t watch. Turn over and watch the CSI repeats on Channel 9. And if you do by accident find the television is showing an Australian winning gold in any event, then don’t for the love of God enjoy it, because I wouldn’t want your philosophical values impunged.
Because why is the $20,000 being paid? It’s not saying, look we really have no bloody idea what to do with this money, but we found under the cushions of the front bench, so you might as well have it.
It’s not even an incentive bonus. It’s a small way of saying well done and thank you.
Like it or not Australians love sport. And like it or not Australians love Australians winning sports, and above all we love Australians wining sport at the Olympics.
I love sport more than most, and I love track and field above all sports. A true highlight of my life was the night I was at the Sydney Olympics watching the men’s long jump final. Everyone in that stadium clapped, cheered and had their heart beating in unison as Jai Taurima battled with Sotomayor for Gold.
Another highlight was when I stood with a crowd of close to 10,000 in Olympic Park outside the stadium watching on a big screen Cathy Freeman win the 400m. At this point strangers were hugging each other, world peace was achievable, the planets were aligned and would be forever more.
Would I be prepared to pay my share of the $20,000 to feel that again? Heck yeah.
Let’s say there's 10 million tax payers, that’s about 0.2 cents per gold medal. That’s pretty cheap for a return of feeling great about your country. Ask yourself what else the Government spends money on that makes you feel so proud to be Australian?
And do all those rich athletes deserve more money than they’ll know what to do with? I don’t know; let’s ask any members of the Australian 2004 men’s hockey team, seen any of them on your cereal box? What about those rich swimmers, you know Bill Kirby or Todd Pearson – they won Gold at Sydney in the relays. Obviously they’ve been too busy counting their cash since then to be bothered fronting up this time round.
At Sydney, one of the highlights was the women’s water polo team beating the American’s in the last seconds. Think any of them are wealthy because of it?
All I know is I was richer for having experienced the joy of their win.
$20,000? It’s cheap. Pay your fifth of a cent, switch on and enjoy.
You need to devote your life to achieving something that you know may not occur purely because something in your body snaps at the wrong moment; but you don’t think about that – gotta keep focused – you just keep puting in the hours training.
Your friends are out late drinking and dancing, and dancing and loving, loving and drinking (you are only young once you know, gotta live it up a little!) but you go to bed early because the next day promises more training, more weights, more punishment.
If you are a rower or swimmer you will wake up at some ungodly hour and dive into a pool even though it’s mid winter, or you will put the boat on the lake even though the fog is such that you cannot see your team mates already out on the water going through their paces.
If you are a long distance runner, you will wake up at some ungodly hour and run 15 kilometres through a forest, over hills on dirt tracks with members of your club and when you finish you know you’ll be doing it again that afternoon, or perhaps it’ll be a session of repetition running, where you will push yourself for 1500m through a forest, over hills on dirt tracks and then rest for 60 seconds and then push yourself for another 1500m. And again. And again. And again.
English champion distance runner Brendan Foster once said that “all top international athletes wake up in the morning feeling tired and go to bed feeling very tired.” He came third in the 10,000m at the Montreal Olympics. Pretty amazing really, the only ones in the world who could beat him were the supreme Lasse Viren, winner of three other Olympic Gold Medals; and Carlos Lopes, who would go on to destroy Australian hopes by beating Deek in the Marathon in LA in 1984.
But what that means is for all his adult life up to that point Foster had woken up tired, put his body through hell, denied himself those luxuries and joys non-athletes and footy players take for granted, went to be feeling very tired, only to come third in the one race that mattered. (Because all that pain guarantees nothing).
The tennis player with a 10 year career will have a chance to compete in 40 Grand Slam tournaments, ditto golfers and the majors (though their careers are much longer). The tour de France is on every year. Footy players talk of next season even when the current season still has 10 rounds to go.
But for those foolish souls who have picked a sport which has the Olympics as the pinnacle lives a life measured in leap years, and know that they will be fortunate to get to one, unlikely to make two, and among the rarefied (and perhaps lucky) few if they get to three.
And because these men and women are in the public eye we feel free to criticise.
We are incredibly hard on sportsmen and women. We judge them according to standards we could never meet ourselves. Roger Federer puts a backhand down the line into the net, and we sigh ruefully and think that he’s not quite as good as he used to be. Greg Norman wins 87 tournaments worldwide, but because he only won 2 majors, he is forever an underachiever, forever linked with choking. Tamsyn Lewis gets run out of in the heats of the 800m World Championships, and the critics let fly.
And you know what? Fair enough. Federer isn’t as good as he once was, Norman should have won more majors, and Tamsyn Lewis needs to bloody well perform when it matters most.
But while I have no problems with judging sports people for not performing as well as they themselves would wish to, I remain in awe of them. And my ultimate respect is again for those poor fools who chose to pursue Olympic glory.
For the most part, events which have the Olympics as the ultimate are not accompanied by loads of cash. But they do what they do, getting the odd sponsor to help pay costs of travel and equipment. If they are lucky they have an AIS scholarship; if they are very lucky they are an Australian swimmer; if they are really lucky, they are an attractive, champion, world record breaking, all-round nice guy Australian swimmer.
Consider the comparison: Brendan Fevola a guy who sometimes can be bothered to play footy, but most times cannot, was reputedly offered a $2 million 3 year contract. And he knocked it back. This year, in the richest athletics competition in the world, the IAAF Golden League, a $1 million prize is on offer to anyone who can win his or her event at ALL six Golden League meets. If two athletes do it, they get $500k each, and so on.
So to earn more than Brendan Fevola you only have to go undefeated against everyone in the world who does your event, and hope that no one also does the same in another event. The best will of course get appearance money, but even then you don't need to understand advanced mathematics to work out who's got the sweeter deal.
But this year at Beijing, if nothing snaps when it shouldn’t, and the day that matters most is the day when that Australian athlete puts everything together, and they win the gold, well then they get $20,000 from the Australian Government.
And cue the outrage. Conservative commentators love such stories. It allows them to decry a waste of public money; money for taxpayers that should be spent on... err something... you know...hospitals... schools and... hey I do my job day in day out, where’s my medal?
Those damn Gold medallists, all living on the high hog, then wanting to grab our precious money? Bastards. Why should we give Grant Hackett money (always good to choose the one Olympic champion you know has managed to make some money in sponsorship)? If their sport doesn’t pay them well enough well then they should chose another sport! They only play games.
To such critics, I say fine, you’re entitled to your view point, just please don’t watch the Olympics.
Every Australian athlete in Beijng will have to varying degrees received some form of Government support. If you are against such things, then don’t watch. Turn over and watch the CSI repeats on Channel 9. And if you do by accident find the television is showing an Australian winning gold in any event, then don’t for the love of God enjoy it, because I wouldn’t want your philosophical values impunged.
Because why is the $20,000 being paid? It’s not saying, look we really have no bloody idea what to do with this money, but we found under the cushions of the front bench, so you might as well have it.
It’s not even an incentive bonus. It’s a small way of saying well done and thank you.
Like it or not Australians love sport. And like it or not Australians love Australians winning sports, and above all we love Australians wining sport at the Olympics.
I love sport more than most, and I love track and field above all sports. A true highlight of my life was the night I was at the Sydney Olympics watching the men’s long jump final. Everyone in that stadium clapped, cheered and had their heart beating in unison as Jai Taurima battled with Sotomayor for Gold.
Another highlight was when I stood with a crowd of close to 10,000 in Olympic Park outside the stadium watching on a big screen Cathy Freeman win the 400m. At this point strangers were hugging each other, world peace was achievable, the planets were aligned and would be forever more.
Would I be prepared to pay my share of the $20,000 to feel that again? Heck yeah.
Let’s say there's 10 million tax payers, that’s about 0.2 cents per gold medal. That’s pretty cheap for a return of feeling great about your country. Ask yourself what else the Government spends money on that makes you feel so proud to be Australian?
And do all those rich athletes deserve more money than they’ll know what to do with? I don’t know; let’s ask any members of the Australian 2004 men’s hockey team, seen any of them on your cereal box? What about those rich swimmers, you know Bill Kirby or Todd Pearson – they won Gold at Sydney in the relays. Obviously they’ve been too busy counting their cash since then to be bothered fronting up this time round.
At Sydney, one of the highlights was the women’s water polo team beating the American’s in the last seconds. Think any of them are wealthy because of it?
All I know is I was richer for having experienced the joy of their win.
$20,000? It’s cheap. Pay your fifth of a cent, switch on and enjoy.
Newspoll: ALP 55-LNP 45
Last year was a dream for political junkies: polls came out weekly, and each one mattered.
Polls of course only matter in so far as they influence perceptions; but it is foolish to forget they are not just random results – they do reflect reality. Rudd was in front all of 2007, therefore the Howard Government was in trouble in perception and reality.
Tony Abbott in a moment of great self-delusion last year forgot the second aspect and tried to argue that the only reason the Howard Government was in danger of losing the election was because the polls were saying they were in danger of losing the election.
To continue the Abbott argument into this year, we can say that Brendan Nelson is only struggling because the polls are telling everyone that he is struggling. Obviously this ignores the fact that you don’t need a poll to tell which way the political wind blows when it blows as bad as Nelson does.
The other argument put forward about the polls is that Rudd is not ahead because he is popular, or because the Government is doing well, but because the alternative is unpalatable. This is known as the Iemma Explanation. It’s a cute argument; akin to saying Leyton Hewitt’s time as world Number 1 didn’t really count because he didn’t have to beat anyone of any note (Sampras was past his best, Federer had yet to really arrive).
Now those in the media, such as Denis Shanahan, who have been predicting the end of the Rudd honeymoon for about 18 months, have been viewing politics as the AFL and see Rudd as the Adelaide Crows. Throughout the first 10 rounds of this years’ season the Crows were doing great, but they hadn’t actually beaten any team of worth. Now that they have lost to Brisbane, Hawthorn, Geelong and Collingwood, they suddenly seem ordinary (losing Burton didn’t help either).
Likewise, the commentators believe Rudd’s been getting wins over the easy opponents – Kyoto, Sorry, China, Nelson; but when he comes up against the tough opponents (and the “tough decisions” he apparently cannot make) then he will fall faster than my mood while watching Adelaide capitulate during the first quarter against Geelong.
The problem with this argument is that Australian politics is a tennis match not the AFL.
Rudd does not have to stay on top of the Premiership table; he only has to beat the opponent across the net. At the moment it’s Nelson. True there may be something to the argument that he is only winning because of Nelson’s copious unforced errors, but it’s still looking like being a win in straight sets.
The problem with the AFL theory is also that the Libs are not Geelong. They have a few in the party who think they are Gary Ablett or Cameron Ling, but the truth is in the first seven months, neither Turnbull, nor Bishop, nor Hockey, nor Abbott has scored any goals on Rudd at all, and unfortunately not only are they not a team of champions, they are not a champion team.
Their captain’s performance hasn’t helped - the only time Nelson has sounded slightly convincing was during his Budget reply speech when his rent-a-crowd in the public galleries cheered his every attempt at humour or conviction. His fuel excise policy was a nice mark 50m out from goal, but you wouldn't back him to put it through from that distance.
Going back to the tennis analogy, many think Turnbull will be Federer to Rudd’s Hewitt (Howard being the past-his-best Sampras). The argument is that once he takes over, the numbers will turn and it’ll be an LNP Grand Slam in 2010.
I’m not so sure. Mostly this is because Turnbull has failed to ace Wayne Swan despite the Treasurer spending much of the first sitting period of parliament looking and sounding nervous and unprepared. In March, all the talk was about how soon it would be before Rudd replaces Swan. Since the budget, this talk has died. During the last parliament session Swan at times laughed openly at some of Turnbull’s questions. He appeared well-briefed, confident, and most importantly looked to be enjoying Question Time.
But then given the opposition’s poor performance, it’s little wonder he is enjoying it. Consider the last question Turnbull asked Swan:
Mr TURNBULL (2.43 p.m.)—My question is addressed to the Treasurer. I refer to the Treasurer’s top 10 tips for shoppers, which are listed on his personal website, and to the Prime Minister’s answer to the Leader of the Opposition’s first question. Tip No. 8 states that shoppers should:
Ask store managers to match their competitor’s prices on particular products ...
Will the Treasurer confirm that under the government’s proposed Fuelwatch scheme, once a petrol retailer has nominated their price, it will be illegal for them to match a lower priced competitor, even if asked by a customer to do so?
This is an absolute full toss, fully deserving to be dispatched to the fence (Question Time must always be talked of in cricketing terms – it’s a Yes Minister rule). The problem is the reference to Swan’s Top 10 Tips; the rest is superfluous. Any Minister with any level of intelligence above that of a newt will focus only on that. Which indeed Swan did:
Mr SWAN—I thank the honourable member for his question. The opposition can do nothing but sneer at average Australian families who do the shopping. They have a snobby disdain for the fact that people out there might be interested in where they can buy a special. That was absolutely on display in this House last week by the member for Curtin—the snobby disdain for the fact that I have had a price watch operating in my electorate since 1993. It is staffed by a band of loyal volunteers who have supplied information to people in my electorate who want that information and who have come to rely on it.
Of course a point of order followed, but Swan was being relevant, and carried on happily.
The problem is Turnbull tried to be too clever. He thought he had trapped Swan by showing the hypocrisy of his own “tips” (let’s just forget that Swan’s tips do not suggest getting a petrol station manager to match prices, so he’s comparing apples and oranges), instead he gave Swan the opportunity to talk about how out of touch is the rich Mr Turnbull. It is indicative of many of Turnbull's questions, and they have in effect allowed Swan to come back from 5-Love down and now finds himself serving for the first set at 6-5.
Such a performance by Turnbull really should not be surprising; he was a poor performer last year as a Minister in parliament. In spite of this, I thought he would be better in opposition (lawyers are good at asking questions), but too often he falls into the trap of trying to be clever, and instead comes across as being too clever by half. In retrospect this should also not have been surprising – it was the great failing of his performance during the Republic referendum.
It is in his nature. It won’t change if he takes over the leadership.
So back to the poll. ALP 55% - LNP 45%. Yep it’s a drop for the Government from the dopey heights of March and April. But it doesn’t matter. Nelson is still in the teens when it comes to preferred PM, and I don’t think any poll will matter until the opposition leader is within 15% of Rudd on preferred PM. If Rudd stays above 50%, and Nelson or Turnbull or whoever can’t get above 35%, then the election will be a rout.
And the reality is even if a leader does get that close, it still won’t matter until we get into 2010.
So we’re only in the early part of the first week of the tournament; the problem for the opposition is that on the other side of the draw I don’t see any potential match-ups that will stop Rudd progressing to another title.
Polls of course only matter in so far as they influence perceptions; but it is foolish to forget they are not just random results – they do reflect reality. Rudd was in front all of 2007, therefore the Howard Government was in trouble in perception and reality.
Tony Abbott in a moment of great self-delusion last year forgot the second aspect and tried to argue that the only reason the Howard Government was in danger of losing the election was because the polls were saying they were in danger of losing the election.
To continue the Abbott argument into this year, we can say that Brendan Nelson is only struggling because the polls are telling everyone that he is struggling. Obviously this ignores the fact that you don’t need a poll to tell which way the political wind blows when it blows as bad as Nelson does.
The other argument put forward about the polls is that Rudd is not ahead because he is popular, or because the Government is doing well, but because the alternative is unpalatable. This is known as the Iemma Explanation. It’s a cute argument; akin to saying Leyton Hewitt’s time as world Number 1 didn’t really count because he didn’t have to beat anyone of any note (Sampras was past his best, Federer had yet to really arrive).
Now those in the media, such as Denis Shanahan, who have been predicting the end of the Rudd honeymoon for about 18 months, have been viewing politics as the AFL and see Rudd as the Adelaide Crows. Throughout the first 10 rounds of this years’ season the Crows were doing great, but they hadn’t actually beaten any team of worth. Now that they have lost to Brisbane, Hawthorn, Geelong and Collingwood, they suddenly seem ordinary (losing Burton didn’t help either).
Likewise, the commentators believe Rudd’s been getting wins over the easy opponents – Kyoto, Sorry, China, Nelson; but when he comes up against the tough opponents (and the “tough decisions” he apparently cannot make) then he will fall faster than my mood while watching Adelaide capitulate during the first quarter against Geelong.
The problem with this argument is that Australian politics is a tennis match not the AFL.
Rudd does not have to stay on top of the Premiership table; he only has to beat the opponent across the net. At the moment it’s Nelson. True there may be something to the argument that he is only winning because of Nelson’s copious unforced errors, but it’s still looking like being a win in straight sets.
The problem with the AFL theory is also that the Libs are not Geelong. They have a few in the party who think they are Gary Ablett or Cameron Ling, but the truth is in the first seven months, neither Turnbull, nor Bishop, nor Hockey, nor Abbott has scored any goals on Rudd at all, and unfortunately not only are they not a team of champions, they are not a champion team.
Their captain’s performance hasn’t helped - the only time Nelson has sounded slightly convincing was during his Budget reply speech when his rent-a-crowd in the public galleries cheered his every attempt at humour or conviction. His fuel excise policy was a nice mark 50m out from goal, but you wouldn't back him to put it through from that distance.
Going back to the tennis analogy, many think Turnbull will be Federer to Rudd’s Hewitt (Howard being the past-his-best Sampras). The argument is that once he takes over, the numbers will turn and it’ll be an LNP Grand Slam in 2010.
I’m not so sure. Mostly this is because Turnbull has failed to ace Wayne Swan despite the Treasurer spending much of the first sitting period of parliament looking and sounding nervous and unprepared. In March, all the talk was about how soon it would be before Rudd replaces Swan. Since the budget, this talk has died. During the last parliament session Swan at times laughed openly at some of Turnbull’s questions. He appeared well-briefed, confident, and most importantly looked to be enjoying Question Time.
But then given the opposition’s poor performance, it’s little wonder he is enjoying it. Consider the last question Turnbull asked Swan:
Mr TURNBULL (2.43 p.m.)—My question is addressed to the Treasurer. I refer to the Treasurer’s top 10 tips for shoppers, which are listed on his personal website, and to the Prime Minister’s answer to the Leader of the Opposition’s first question. Tip No. 8 states that shoppers should:
Ask store managers to match their competitor’s prices on particular products ...
Will the Treasurer confirm that under the government’s proposed Fuelwatch scheme, once a petrol retailer has nominated their price, it will be illegal for them to match a lower priced competitor, even if asked by a customer to do so?
This is an absolute full toss, fully deserving to be dispatched to the fence (Question Time must always be talked of in cricketing terms – it’s a Yes Minister rule). The problem is the reference to Swan’s Top 10 Tips; the rest is superfluous. Any Minister with any level of intelligence above that of a newt will focus only on that. Which indeed Swan did:
Mr SWAN—I thank the honourable member for his question. The opposition can do nothing but sneer at average Australian families who do the shopping. They have a snobby disdain for the fact that people out there might be interested in where they can buy a special. That was absolutely on display in this House last week by the member for Curtin—the snobby disdain for the fact that I have had a price watch operating in my electorate since 1993. It is staffed by a band of loyal volunteers who have supplied information to people in my electorate who want that information and who have come to rely on it.
Of course a point of order followed, but Swan was being relevant, and carried on happily.
The problem is Turnbull tried to be too clever. He thought he had trapped Swan by showing the hypocrisy of his own “tips” (let’s just forget that Swan’s tips do not suggest getting a petrol station manager to match prices, so he’s comparing apples and oranges), instead he gave Swan the opportunity to talk about how out of touch is the rich Mr Turnbull. It is indicative of many of Turnbull's questions, and they have in effect allowed Swan to come back from 5-Love down and now finds himself serving for the first set at 6-5.
Such a performance by Turnbull really should not be surprising; he was a poor performer last year as a Minister in parliament. In spite of this, I thought he would be better in opposition (lawyers are good at asking questions), but too often he falls into the trap of trying to be clever, and instead comes across as being too clever by half. In retrospect this should also not have been surprising – it was the great failing of his performance during the Republic referendum.
It is in his nature. It won’t change if he takes over the leadership.
So back to the poll. ALP 55% - LNP 45%. Yep it’s a drop for the Government from the dopey heights of March and April. But it doesn’t matter. Nelson is still in the teens when it comes to preferred PM, and I don’t think any poll will matter until the opposition leader is within 15% of Rudd on preferred PM. If Rudd stays above 50%, and Nelson or Turnbull or whoever can’t get above 35%, then the election will be a rout.
And the reality is even if a leader does get that close, it still won’t matter until we get into 2010.
So we’re only in the early part of the first week of the tournament; the problem for the opposition is that on the other side of the draw I don’t see any potential match-ups that will stop Rudd progressing to another title.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Tour de France
This is Exhibit A in the case for why I am not a professional road cyclist:
This is what the riders in the Tour de France were faced with yesterday. It’s not often that a picture can convey the excruciating agony of a sporting contest, but this goes close. It looks fake. To someone like me from flat Australia, where the highest mountain is 2,228m (that’s right, only 113m higher than the Col du Tourmalet), such a step rise looks other worldly.
This is what the riders in the Tour de France were faced with yesterday. It’s not often that a picture can convey the excruciating agony of a sporting contest, but this goes close. It looks fake. To someone like me from flat Australia, where the highest mountain is 2,228m (that’s right, only 113m higher than the Col du Tourmalet), such a step rise looks other worldly.
The final climb looks like the draftsman has just got bored and took out a ruler and decided to not even bother pretending that the picture is meant to represent any reality. But once you take in the fact that such climbs do exist, and that the riders in the tour were all expected to climb them (and the leaders expected to race up them), well then it’s just plain scary.
The tour is one of the few great sporting contests. It is one of the even rarer great international sporting contests which happens annually. Because of its length I compare it more to the Olympics as a whole than an event in the Olympics. It is Wimbledon – the one everyone wants to win. It is the US Masters – it’s invitational. It is the Champions League – it goes on forever and is swamped in money.
But it is better than all of them. It has the tradition of Wimbledon and the Masters, but the commentators aren’t obliged to act as though they are broadcasting a religious act (remember there’s no rough at Augusta National, only “second cut”); and the event does not need to be moribund in traditional foolishness – make sure those tennis shirts are white thank you.
While the riders are extremely well paid and as covered in sponsorship as a footballer for Man United, they never take a dive and roll around on the ground in the hope advantage – in fact they are expected to shrug off a crash that would send you or I crying home to Mum, or at the very least flinging our bikes in the shed and swearing never to ride the bloody thing again.
The riders are thin and wiry, yet strong and tough. They hurl themselves up a mountain with muscles screaming in pain, and then scream down the other side at a manner simultaneously utterly insane and completely in control.
When you look at the picture you wonder what it must be like to see the event live, and pity yourself that you must make do with television, which cannot replicate being there. But here again the tour bests other sports; because while undoubtedly to be among the throng of spectators on the side of a mountain road must be thrilling, watching it on television is no poor substitute.
In fact watching the tour on television is a treat. The vistas of the French countryside and the villages through which the riders pass make the viewer yearn to be able to sell up, move and take up a job perhaps working in the local bakery, and going home each day by bicycle to your lovely little 16th century cottage.
Truly, when you see France through the prism of the tour you understand why it has been invaded so many times throughout its history – it is achingly beautiful, and looks for all the world a paradise; no heavy industry, no garish architecture, just mountains, vineyards, rolling hills, brooks with men in waders fishing, and the greenest grass in plentiful supply for cows to leisurely feed upon.
But the tour on television is also great because, unlike other events where the action is missed because the camera can only cover so much – the AFL telecast that renders the viewer blind to the leads and moves by those in the forward line while the ball comes from defence – in the tour the cameras are part of the event.
The motorcycles are there with the riders, focusing on their faces, zipping past those who have been dropped by the peloton, and above all, giving the viewer an accurate picture of the incline the ride must climb. Last night at time the road seemed to disappear behind the riders, and their legs completed revolutions in slow motion – it seemed to me a pace that I would have ridden (were the mountain a slight incline, and I much younger and impossibly more fit) – it looked hard.
Through out the stage, their faces changed from studied blankness to badly acted blankness. They tried not to show pain, they desperately attempted to keep their facial muscles relaxed – look at me they say to the others, it ain’t so bad, anyone care to have a surge, you know just to break the monotony? And then bit by bit up the Hautacam the pain broke through the relaxed jaw, and twisted itself into an expression that fooled no one. They were living pain, and when they finished they all knew more days of pain waited.
Last night Cadel Evans took the lead by one second. His comeback from a bad fall on Day 9 – a fall that so easily could have broken his oft broken collar bone, or dislocated his shoulder – to take control of the leaders group and go up the mountains on his own, surrounded by riders from CSC and Saunier Duval was breathtaking. And it was great because it was so human. He never zoomed ahead as though he were powered by a force made by man in laboratories. All of the riders in fact struggled and inched either ahead or behind. Truly it was riveting.
I needed to go to bed, but Evans kept me awake, on the last climb I dared not leave the couch for fear of missing a surge. Then to watch the clock turn over as we waited to see the leaders’ group come round the final bend to see if he would take the lead was as thrilling as the end of close AFL match.
Evans will likely give up the yellow jersey over the next few days – it does not matter, so long as he wears it down the Champs-Élysées – but he has proved himself, and if he does win it will rank with the greatest of Australian sporting achievements. He won’t be on any breakfast cereal boxes in this country, but he will stand in the pantheon of Australian greats.
The next two weeks will be exhilarating.
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