Olympics and Paralympics 2012 (and now the legacy-part one)

Lioned wrote:Anyone coming down to London can sleep in my shed for a tenner.

You ought to put an Ad in the London Evening Standard Lioned, I'm sure there will be many young Backpackers camping out.

Many people are renting their homes out for the Olympics and getting loads of money
way over what you would normally rent a house for!

cherry1 wrote:You know Ive had a brilliant idea for the security staff, the army shouldn't be wasting their time on this, if they want people with a bit of muscle, mean, moody who will take no prisoners - what better than Lioned's army of Millwall supporters!

Under Lioned's regime this is what will happen if you dare drive in the 'Olympic lanes'.......

you just made me choke on my tea!

cherry1 wrote: you just made me choke on my tea!

Sorry Lioned I am only joking....couldn't resist it!!!

Mind you, faced in this situation...what lane would you drive into?
There is a bus lane and an Olympic Lane and you're not supposed to drive in either of them. £130 fine. So where are you supposed to go from here?

That's why the London Black Cabs blockaded the lanes yesterday, how are they supposed to make a living? One Driver said they had been treated like animals, a bit OTT that but you can understand how they feel.

I think faced with that choice jd I would rather walk!

So I'd still really like to get to see the Athletics and there are some tickets left but i dont really want to be spending £1200 per ticket and staying in a dodgy Thompsons Hotel.

I am thinking i may try getting tickets for the Paralympics which there are many left i think.

That 'blade runner' chap has also qualified for the Olympics so thats going to be worth watching.Personally i am not convinced thats a level playing field but good luck to him.I would imagine there would be some more complaints if he fitted springs to his 'legs' and went in for the high jump !

I think of the 440,000 tickets available, most are for Female Football Matches.To be honest, I don't know why Football has been included, there are World Cups, European Cups League Cups and essentially the Olympics is for amateurs IMO . I can't get my head around Russell Brand performing,
and Elton John writing a Song, trick cyclists? I hope there is a measure of the history of Britain and it's acheivements, inventivenness etc . If only for a couple of weeks let's have some pride in Britain , not just London .

By HAROLD HECKLE
Associated Press


AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill

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Olympics News
Britain puts 1,200 more troops on Olympics standby
Crisis-hit nations fight to prepare for Olympics

Rafael Nadal pulls out of London Olympics

Phelps complains about swim cap regulations

Olympic tourists warned about London cash squeeze

UK border guards to strike on eve of Olympics




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MADRID (AP) -- Defending Olympic tennis champion Rafael Nadal pulled out of the London Games on Thursday with an undisclosed injury.

"I am not in condition to compete in the London Olympics and therefore will not travel as planned with the Spanish delegation to take part in the games," the third-ranked Spaniard said in a statement.

Nadal did not mention any specific injury, but he canceled a charity match in Madrid on July 4 because of tendon problems in his left knee. He has had recurring knee problems in the past.

Nadal has not played since losing in the second round of Wimbledon to then 100th-ranked Lukas Rosol, one of the most surprising results in the tournament's history.

"I have to think about my companions, I can't be selfish and I have to think of what's best for Spanish sport, especially tennis and Spanish players, and give fellow sportsmen with better preparation the chance to compete," he said. "I tried to hurry my preparations and training to the very last minute, but it was not to be."

Nadal, who won the singles tournament at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, was set to be the flag bearer for Spain during the opening ceremony.

"(This) is one of the saddest days of my career as one of my biggest ambitions, that of being Spain's flag bearer in the opening ceremony of the games in London, cannot be," Nadal said. "You can imagine how difficult it was to take this decision."

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Jul 19, 10:55 AM EDT


UK border guards to strike on eve of Olympics

By JILL LAWLESS
Associated Press


Can you believe this!!!!!!!


UK border guards to strike on eve of Olympics





LONDON (AP) -- Border guards at British airports will walk off the job on the eve of the Olympics, their union said Thursday.

Members of the Public and Commercial Services Union have voted for the 24-hour strike on July 26 in a dispute over pay and job losses - an Olympic-sized headache for British officials.

Home Secretary Theresa May said the decision to stage a strike on the eve of the London Games was "shameful."

The union said its members will take other forms of industrial action, such as a ban on overtime, from July 27 to Aug. 20 - the period of the games and beyond.

Britain's government is eager to avoid any disruption as visitors descend for the July 27-Aug. 12 games.

Heathrow Airport has been beset for months by long lines at passport control, which the union blames on government spending cuts.

The problem has eased as thousands descend on London for the games, but a walkout threatens a return of the long waiting times at the worst possible moment.

May said the government would "put contingency arrangements in place to ensure we can deal with people coming through the border as smoothly as possible."

In more transit trouble, about 400 train workers threatened to strike for three days in central England during the Olympics in a pension dispute.

Drivers for East Midlands Trains said Thursday the strike would be from Aug. 6 to 8.

The strikes could be highly disruptive to the games - Olympic soccer matches are being held across the United Kingdom, many workers are coming from outside London and thousands of spectators are likely to use trains to get to venues around the capital.

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Im not surprised that they strike just before olympics start.

cherry1 wrote:Im not surprised that they strike just before olympics start.

I am incensed that these morons can hold their Country to ransom on what should be a great occasion. See it's ASLEF again, they go on strike at the drop of a hat. I think the Union Leaders ought to hang their heads in shame for showing the World what an alienated Society Britain has become, up
yours Jack I"m alright.

Life will go on and so will the Olympics very silly they will look

Never mind about silly....what about the disruption they will create and affect people from around the World who have travelled thousands of miles to
enjoy the Games. Shame on the bl**dy lot of you .

Jul 19, 4:16 PM EDT


Strikes and security trouble before UK games

By RAPHAEL SATTER and JILL LAWLESS
Associated Press





Olympics News
Strikes and security trouble before UK games
Rafael Nadal pulls out of London Olympics

Defending road race champ Sanchez out of Olympics

Opening ceremony tensions boiling over at Olympics

Emin calls Olympic torch run a surreal experience

Hoy not selected for individual sprint at Olympics






LONDON (AP) -- There's nearly a week to go before the Olympics kick off in London and British officials are stuck playing defense.

On Thursday, the country's Olympics secretary said 1,200 extra troops were put on standby in case embarrassing manpower shortages get any worse, while U.K. border agents announced a strike for the day before the games begin.

The one-two punch of bad news comes with only eight days to go, unbalancing a government which might have hoped to bask in glow of pre-Olympic buildup. By far, the most embarrassing episode has been the inability of security contractor G4S PLC to deliver on its promise to supply about 10,400 guards to help keep the games safe - a last-minute admission which has forced the government to call in 3,500 soldiers to help meet the shortfall.

Speaking Thursday, Olympics Secretary Jeremy Hunt acknowledged that even that may not be enough, telling the BBC that the government put the extra 1,200 troops on standby "in the unlikely situation that G4S's performance deteriorates from where it is today."

"We want to ensure the public against every eventuality," he told Sky News earlier. "We don't expect to use them, but they will be there."

Security has been a critical concern for the Olympics ever since 11 Israeli athletes and coaches died in a terror attack at the 1972 Munich Games. A huge international media presence makes the Olympics a prime target for any terror group intent on wreaking havoc on live events broadcast worldwide, and British authorities have pegged the threat level for the London Games as "severe," meaning an attack is "highly likely."

In that context, the inability of government officials to get a proper grip with staffing issues has become a major talking point, an issue which has been compounded by industrial disputes that threaten to spawn two Olympics strikes.

One, involving about 400 train workers, threatens to disrupt services in central England from Aug. 6 to 8. That could be a major games-related inconvenience - Olympic soccer matches are being held across the U.K., while workers and Olympic tourists from outside London are relying on those routes to get into the capital.

Potentially more serious is a walkout by border guards at London's Heathrow Airport timed for July 26 - the day before the London Olympics begin. Members of the Public and Commercial Services Union voted for the 24-hour strike in a dispute over pay and job losses on Thursday, saying its members would also take other forms of industrial action, such as a ban on overtime from July 27 to Aug. 20 - a period that's expected to be one of the busiest periods ever for London's airports.

Even without the strike, London's Heathrow Airport has been beset for months by sporadic long lines at passport control, which the union blames on government spending cuts. The problem had eased in the last week as thousands of Olympic VIPs arrived for the games, but a walkout threatens a return of the endless waits at the worst possible moment for Britain's international image.

Home Secretary Theresa May, Britain's interior minister, called the decision to stage a strike on the eve of the games shameful. She said the government would "put contingency arrangements in place to ensure we can deal with people coming through the border as smoothly as possible."

During previous border guard strikes in November and May, the government drafted in managers and civil servants - including Prime Minister David Cameron's press secretary - to help staff immigration desks and minimize the disruption to incoming travelers.

With headlines dominated by bad news about strikes and security, some are wondering whether Cameron's government might have done more, and sooner, to avoid the mess.

As Hunt made his announcement about more troops, May acknowledged that officials had been warned last month about Olympic security manpower issues - far earlier than she had previously admitted.

In a letter to an opposition lawmaker Keith Vaz, May wrote that she was told of a "possible temporary shortfall" in staffing numbers by G4S as long ago as June 27 and that she had already begun marshaling military resources as a contingency.

That's far earlier than the July 11 date that May had previously mentioned to lawmakers in Britain's House of Commons.

---

Boris Johnson has criticised the "brand army" which stamps on people using the Olympic rings symbol in the run-up to the London Games.

The London Mayor said: "If you want to stick five doughnuts in your window and call them Olympic rings then be my guest.

"Or if bakers want to make a gigantic Olympic pretzel in the high streets of London to advertise their wares then let them do so."

The symbol of the Olympic Games is composed of five interlocking rings, coloured blue, yellow, black, green and red on a white field.

The image was designed in 1912, was adopted in June 1914 and made its debut at the 1920 Antwerp Olympics.

But the rings symbol is trademarked and the Olympic Movement is very protective of its symbols.

The movement has exclusive rights to any interlocking arrangement of five rings, as well as the usage of the word "Olympic".

However, Mr Johnson was unimpressed, saying: "I think it's absolute nonsense.

"Certainly no brand army is going have support of the administration in London - and we won't be making any efforts to enforce it ourselves."

He likened the "brand army" to the "Grand Army" which was assembled by Napoleon for the invasion of Britain - which never took place.

Branding is not just an issue for the Olympic Movement, but for the sponsors of the Games as well.

The organisers have been attempting to clarify their restrictions after the head of the London Games suggested a shirt bearing the logo of Pepsi - the arch-rival of Olympic sponsor Coca-Cola - would probably be banned from Olympic venues.


Pepsi - no friend of arch-rival and Olympic sponsor Coca-Cola

"No, you probably wouldn't be walking in with a Pepsi T-shirt because Coca-Cola are our sponsors," said Lord Coe.

"They have put millions of pounds into this project, but also millions of pounds into grass roots sport. It is important to protect those sponsors."

But Locog, the organising committee that Lord Coe heads, denied that was the case.

"Any individual coming into our venues can wear any item of clothing, branded or otherwise," the committee said in a "mythbuster" fact sheet.

However it did admit there could be a problem "if large groups come in together wearing clearly visible branding/marketing".

It said that could be classed as "ambush marketing" by non-sponsors - which would be a definite no-no.

Organisers want to head off stunts like the one at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, when the Bavaria brewing company outfitted some 30 Dutch women in mini-dresses in its trademark orange for the Netherlands' opening game against Denmark.

Adidas is another big sponsor, but Lord Coe said visitors wearing Nike trainers would "probably" be allowed in.

And the organising committee insisted Nike shoes are definitely OK for spectators to wear - but not necessarily for Games staff or participants.

Guidelines sent to children who will be forming a guard of honour for the athletes' parade on July 27 have been advised to wear "unbranded or Adidas shoes".

The confusion follows a swirl of rumours about the event's complex commercial rules, including reports of visitors to the Olympic Park being forced to carry their crisps in a clear plastic bag because the brand was not an Olympic sponsor.

Locog insisted that was another Olympic myth.

Nevertheless, advertising is banned in "event zones" around the Olympic venues, and hundreds of uniformed officers are being dispatched during the July 27 to August 12 games to look for infractions.

Violators can be fined up to £20,000.

London 2012 Olympics: who should it be? Mandela or wizard? The candidates to light the flame are many

With the Opening Ceremony a week away, the conundrum drives the nerves into such a frenzy that there may not be enough tranquillisers in all the Big Pharma depots on earth.







In training? Sir Steve Redgrave, at Henley earlier this month, is favourite to light the Olympic cauldron. Photo: GETTY IMAGES







By Matthew Norman

7:00AM BST 20 Jul 2012

23 Comments





When Danny Boyle’s extravaganza reaches its juddering climax, patriots ask each other in anguished mystification, who shall light the Olympic cauldron?


For an aeon the torch has made its languid journey towards Stratford, guided on its path by such home grown paradigms of the Olympic dream as the steel plutocrat Lakshmi Mittal, and still we haven’t a clue who will deliver the coup de grace.


The guesswork veers wildly between the sensible and facetious. In a Huffington Post online poll, for instance, the options include David Beckham, Sebastian Coe, Daniel Craig as 007, Steve Redgrave, Margaret Thatcher, Roger Bannister, Albus Dumbledore (“it is a cauldron after all”, as the poll’s blurb usefully reminds), and Kelly Holmes.


Sir Steve, with almost a quarter of votes, is currently a few oar’s lengths clear of Dumbledore, with Bannister looking good for the bronze.


But as anyone with Lasse Viren’s endurance power will learn in the final paragraph – and let’s be brutally frank, this column is always a marathon, not a sprint – I cast my vote for “Other” with a different candidate in mind.



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Before we limp to the line, let the obvious be stated. But for the requirement that the igniter be a British Olympian, it would have to be Nelson Mandela. Apart from being the Greatest Living Human, he has an amazingly wide-ranging sporting pedigree.

In recent days alone, two athletes have cited him an inspirational force. Golfing journalists were stunned to find Tiger Woods impersonating a thoughtful non-narcissist when recalling a visit to his Pretoria home at a pre-Open press conference.

“He has such a presence and aura about him, unlike anyone I’ve met,” said Tiger on the day Mandela turned 94. “He has meant so much to so many people around the world, not just in South Africa.”

Anyone capable of humanising Woods, however briefly, must be some kind of sporting god.

More relevant in an Olympic context was an account from Caster Semenya, the South African denied not just the gold medal but her lap of honour after winning the 800 metres at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin.

There was no suspicion of doping when thrice the average amount of testosterone for a female was found in her body.

She was born with a more ambiguous gender than most of us, and shamefully treated as a result. Imagine the outcry were a male British athlete with outsize moobs stigmatised like that for having too much oestrogen.

When Semenya returned from Berlin, the Father of the Nation did his stuff. “I believe in you,” he told the then teenager. “Go out there and make me proud.” So she will, touch wood, in the days ahead.

Yet Mandela’s sporting credentials extend beyond that, and even than the “Rainbow Nation” pitch appearance in his Springbok shirt after South Africa won the 1995 Rugby World Cup.

As a young man, he was a useful amateur heavyweight, though unlike another beloved African leader, Idi Amin, he never won a national boxing title.

What he did do is crystallise the Olympic ideal almost as perfectly as the vision of Mr Mittal bearing the torch.

“Sport has the power to change the world,” Mandela once said, “the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair.”

If that quote alone establishes him as the ideal lighter of a cauldron which represents Olympic idealism, rules is rules. Apparently, it must be a British gold medallist, the only question being which.

Much as one reveres Sirs Steve and Roger, and Dame Kelly, not to mention his lordship himself, here is a golden chance for Coe to prove yet again what a big hearted, unegotistical ermine-wearer he is.

Where he would be excused for choosing Sebastian Coe as reward for the years of tireless effort, what a statement of Mandela-esque selflessness, egalitarianism, forgiveness and reconciliation it would be if the great Olympian he invited to light the cauldron were neither his noble self nor any of his titled chums, but plain Mr Steve Ovett.

It appears the plea for B/B owners to advertise because there was a problem not having enough accommodation was hogwash. Many Hotels in London
have suddenly substantially reduced their charges , including Budget Hotels in Central London.

The Saturday Profile

Organizer Embraces Olympics Challenge, Hoping for a Victory Lap


Ben Birchall/Locog, via Associated Press

"Of course it's the right thing to do. There is no way I could have sat this dance out," said Sebastian Coe.

By JOHN F. BURNS

Published: July 21, 2012





LONDON

AS Baron Coe, he is an appointed member of the House of Lords, with an ermine-trimmed ceremonial robe. It is a far cry from the day nearly 30 years ago in Los Angeles when as plain Sebastian Coe he did something nobody else has ever achieved, winning gold in the 1500 meters at two successive Olympics and breaking 11 world records.

But facing track challenges, he says, was nowhere near as daunting as the task he faces now as chairman of the organizing committee for the Olympic Games, opening next Friday. There is scant time for formalities now as he dashes around the 500-acre Olympic Park in East London, track-trim at 55 in his chinos, tending to last-minute glitches, spreading the word that all will be right on the day.

While eager not to seem complacent — “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not sitting in a corner of the room, with a cigar and stroking a cat” — and careful to hedge his optimism with an acknowledgment that there is still plenty of room for things to go awry, he oozes the resolve that once faced down competitors on the track, saying he has no regrets about taking on the challenge of the Games.

“I don’t wake up each morning making slide rule judgments about whether it is the right thing to do,” he said in an interview in the Olympic Park. In any case, it has been a personal calling, just as much as those heady days of Olympic competition. “Of course it’s the right thing to do. There is no way I could have sat this dance out,” he said.

Hosting the Olympics has been Britain’s biggest endeavor since mobilizing for World War II: a $15 billion bill for building stadiums and other facilities; upgrading transportation links to the stretch of former marshland and industrial poverty in Stratford, the site for the Olympic Park; and assembling a work force of about 200,000 people who are now on the Olympic rolls. More than 1,500 British companies have been involved, and officials say that three-quarters of the total outlay has been spent on “regeneration,” meaning the permanent transformation of formerly run-down areas like Stratford, renowned for centuries as one of London’s most blighted districts.

The lightning rod for much of this is Mr. Coe. Make a success of the Games, his friends and associates said, and a place in Britain’s sporting pantheon will be secure. But if he fails, his legacy may be permanently scarred among Britain’s 60 million people, who are waiting to see if the Games will provide a much-needed lift in the nation’s morale or a chapter of management blunders that will stand as a national embarrassment.

Will they be the “siege Games,” remembered for security overkill at the 34 sporting venues? Or the “damp squib Games,” with England’s summer of record-breaking rains persisting, and hundreds of thousands of as-yet-unsold tickets available to latecomers? Or will they be the “gridlock Games,” a traffic-clogged debacle that sees spectators — and even athletes — missing their events?

With less than a week to go, portents are finely balanced. Ticket sales are picking up, and the weather forecast improving. The stadiums are ready. Athletes from 200 competing nations and territories are filling up the Olympic Village. The Olympic Park is abuzz with officials, competitors and journalists learning to navigate the cheerless — but, officials hope, terrorist-proof — maze that security precautions have made of the park.

MR. COE returned to sports administration from a frustrated foray into politics, spending five years as a Conservative member of Parliament in the 1990s, and serving as the top aide to one of the party’s successive leaders after the Conservatives lost power. The experience left him with a skepticism about politicians that has been a shield as he navigates the implosion of the organizing committee’s half-billion-dollar contract with the British-based security company G4S.







A version of this article appeared in print on July 21, 2012, on page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: Organizer Embraces Olympics Challenge, Hoping for a Victory Lap.
.

What exactly is this event going to do for the UK....nothing


How exactly are people like you and me and shop owners going to make any sort off money from this event...there not.


Disgrace ...the way people's lives have been turned upside down by this event...macdonalds an american owned company telling British company's they can't sell chips in the Olympic village....company's that have helped build the village can't, for 12 years, advertise that they have done so, bushes planted so high OUTSIDE the village that visitors won't even be able to see from a mile away that there is a nice little restaurant there which by the way has been there for over 30 years or more...what right have non UK businesses like mcdonalds and cocacola to tell us what to eat and drink during the games ..disgusting....after all, people like me and you have PAID for these games and yet WE are paying for the 'Olympic spy police' to go round spying on people going about there business just to make sure they don't even mention the word 'Olympic' on their business premises...dispicable...only macdonalds and coke are allowed to make millions out off OUR event in OUR country.

Price off a mars bar...my arse.


I'd like to tell seb coe where to stick it.


Id rather my money to off gone on the homeless...ex vets fighting for there country, that's it..you done your job..you've had your mind totally f...Ed up but what the hell....they don't get help and come home only to find they have no home etc....makes me sick..

I am just plain sick of wading through Olympic tat in the shops, where the "real" stuff should be. And there's loads of it, it's all going to be half price in a couple of weeks. Who wants to buy a t shirt with a giant walking penis on the front of it? My job takes me all over Scotland at the moment, and I am yet to see any interest at all in the Olympics, in any of the places I have been. Everyone I have spoken to perceives it to be an "English" thing, bringing zero benefit to Scotland, although we'll have to pay for it along with everybody else. I was in Glasgow last week and the people I saw there were much more interested in the Commonwealth Games in 2 years time.

If true that it has cost Britain $15 BILLION..........when Britain is in the middle of a recession, that is an obscene amount. We were led to believe
sponsorship would pay for a lot, that Airlines, Shops, Transport etc would benefit . Now we find over 400,000 tickets have been returned unsold, Hotels are reducing their prices and shops are not benefitting from this huge influx of Tourists. \Macdonalds have built a massive takeaway which they will dismantle when the Games are over. The only Country ever to make money from the Olympics was the U.S. because they knew how to market the event properly.

O.K. there is nothing we can do, just hope there are no more problems and Britain comes out of this with some Kudos.

And did you see that poor wee Greek mannie in the news, he has a café in East London, a wee greasy spoon place, that's been called the "Olympic Café" since the 1950's. Well he's been told he can't call it that anymore and he has to change the name. All he did was get some paint and paint out the first O, so now it will be called the "Lympic Café" until this whole sorry debacle is over. It is so unfair. He was there first!


It's at 61 West Ham Road, Streatham, if you fancy a full English.