Les Croupiers Blog

NASA has helped Speedo develop new swimsuits with a "new seamless fabric that slides through water and polyurethane panels to mold the body into more aerodynamic shapes." Via Carnival of Space.

That reminded me that I'd seen the new Nike Lunar Trainer in Run and Become. (It's discussed in more detail on the US Runners' World.)

I'm a Nike sceptic, and I in no way endorse the claim that running in these shoes in like running on grass, downhill, with a tailwind; you'll have to apply your own hyperbole filters. But 2 words.

I want.

PS For readers too young to remember some classic science fiction, title link.

I like running. I like seeing people run and I like running myself - running is the opposite of being still.

Martin Creed's Tate Britain artwork shows sprinting runners. One could quibble with the word 'sprinting': doing a short interval over and over again isn't really sprinting - it's just running fast.

He denied the work is pretentious: "It's literally not pretentious because they are not pretending to run. They really are running."

Surprisingly, their art critic like it.

Master of Ceremonies: Simon Nurse
7.30 for 8.00 pm (until 12 midnight), Friday 9 May 2008,
St Peter's Hall, St Peter's Street, off City Road, Cardiff

Tickets 10 pounds from Clare Johnson. Leave a comment if you want one (or more!) but can't get to the club on Thursday nights.

The 2008 Duathlon series dates are June 4, July 2, August 6. All are on the first Wednesday of the month. The distances are the same throughout the series (there is no Dragon's Bite this year) 3K run + 14K bike + 3K run.

The venue is the same traffic-free circuit at Llandow Race Circuit, Nr Cowbridge, Vale of Glamorgan CF71 7PB. Full details and an entry form link are on the Dualthlon Series page.

Well, hello there. As I still haven't finished coding my own blogging software, I've moved the club blog over here. We can have multiple authors, comments, and everything.

To get things started, I thought I'd be controversial. (What, me?)

So, what about those Olympic Games, eh? I should mention that I was pretty happy when London was awarded the 2012 Games, though I always thought that as London hosted the event in 1908 and 1948, it could reasonably have gone to Manchester (which has a velodrome, Olympic pool, etc thanks to the 2002 Commonwealth Games) or Sheffield. But I've started to go sour on the idea. Partly, it's London, which represents the worst of England and the UK to me (and I used to live there). It's not like London needs an ego-boost or more infrastructure or more income. If there are deprived areas in London (as there are), that's down to distribution, not to the resources available. I grew up in Edinburgh, which hosted the Commonwealth Games in 1970, as a result we had an Olympic swimming pool (and further exercise as it was 6 miles from my house, and my best friend and I used to spend our return bus fare on crisps and walk back) and a stadium which could accomodate pretty much every sports. Between the ages of 8 (I was born in 1962) and about 14, I tried archery, fencing, basketball, and I can't remember the others, because they were forced on me during the summer holidays. This was a good thing, and in my opinion other cities should have the same facilities. London has them. The Games themselves last a couple of weeks, children stay around a bit longer.

As for the putative boycott of 2008, it's entirely in bad faith in my opinion. I'm not defending China's invasion of Tibet - if anything, I think it's unjustified and brutal. But they've been there a long time. Wikipedia says Tibet proclaimed its independence from China in 1911, right before the fall of the Qing government. However, "at no time did any western power come out in favor of its independence or grant it diplomatic recognition.”³ The People's Republic of China (PRC), citing historical records and the Seventeen Point Agreement signed by the Tibetan government in 1951, claims Tibet as a part of China (with a small part, depending on definitions, controlled by India). Currently every country in the world recognizes China's sovereignty over Tibet. If there was a time to protest, it was when the Games were awarded The Olympic games were awarded to Beijing, People's Republic of China after an exhaustive ballot of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on July 13, 2001. Boycotting now can only hurt the athletes, without making (as far as I can see) the lives of Tibetans or Chinese dissidents any better.

Now, if I may construct a straw man here, I can see a counter argument along the lines of "You just want to watch the Olympics because you like all that running and jumping stuff." Well yes, but I feel that the momentum against the Games comes from people who don't and therefore wouldn't miss it, so it's just convenient way of signalling their humanity. Cynical, moi?

Given that China re-annexed (if that's a word) Tibet 50 years before it was awarded the 2008 Games, the "shock, horror" boycott looks a lot more opportunist than the one of the 1980 Moscow Olympics (ostensibly because of the invasion of Afghanistan) which in turn was ignored by the British Olympic Association whose members summarily kissed goodbye to ever competing for their country again, let alone being elected Members of Parliament, elevation to the House of Lords, and being head of the London 2012 bid. No, wait, something is wrong there...

While I think the political reasons for boycotting the Games are bad, I think the political reasons for supporting the Games are good. The Telegraph today: Afghan girl defies death threats over Olympics. I don't think that boycotting the Olympics will have any effect on the Tibetans (apart from boosting the Dalai Lama, but he hasn't lived there for ages), but it will have a detrimental effect on women struggling for the (basic, in my opinion) right to compete and train. Have at it, friends.