Wiston Papers

A final word on the Olympics 2012

         The Olympic Games 2012 have ended and they were filled with the full range of emotion and drama that you expect of the quadrennial athletic contest.

Unlike some other observers, I thought the NBC network did  a very good job of televising the major events during prime time.  And even if your favorite competition wasn’t covered at night,  the network’s sports channel on cable and the online video service made it easy to watch every moment of the games and every sport.

We were rewarded with some world class athletic performances.  There were the inevitable disappointments, of course, as some big names failed to live up to expectation.  But there were also the surprise victories by contestants who pulled off unpredicted wins.

One of the most pressure-packed contests I witnessed was by Tagir Khaibulaev of Russia.  He captured the gold medal in the 100 kilogram weight division of men’s Judo.  

Watching from the stands during the match was Russian President Vladimir Putin.  Mr. Putin himself has a black belt in judo.

I’m not sure what happens to Russian judokas who lose a match when Mr. Putin is watching.  In the U.S.A. losers simply don’t get their pictures on a box of Wheaties.  I suspect the fate for Russian athletes is a little more severe.

Finally, a friend and I were talking on the eve of the London games and we were trying to recall the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics in Beijing in 2008.  We couldn’t.  The festivities were colorful but forgettable.

That will be the memory most of the world will have four years from now of the London Olympics beginning and end...they were too long.

Perhaps Brazil will take a lesson and scale back on its plans for the summer games 2016.  I doubt it.  Half of the work is already done, of course.  After all Brazil boasts the most lavish and colorful spectacle  Carnaval every February so the nation is already used to big celebrations.  And many visitors to the next Olympic games there will fully expect a Carnaval-like atmosphere with Samba, song and sensuality.

At the end of the party, however, the games are always about athletic aspiration and achievement.  As the ABC Network described the competition of sport for so many years, it still is “The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.”

Steve Coon

August 14, 2012