Olympics.
Coverage tonight of the British athletics team...plus a report from Michael Buchanan. He writes:
"To my utter disgust, I've failed to make the British Olympic Team for Beijing. In any sport. And this after watching the Games in Athens and promising to get to China. It will simply have to be London in 2012. I've always though that some sports would be easier than others. Even with the aid of Boots' entire repository, I'd never presume to make the 100 metres sprint. But archery? All you do is stand there firing an arrow at a target, right? Well yes, but no.
The Beijing team have been practicing for years, and are calling on the latest technology to help them. For the past 18 months, they've been using high-speed cameras
to record the arrow leaving the bow, to make sure it doesn't brush anything that could interfere with it flight path. On such small matters rest gold medals.
Another seemingly low-tech sport - clay pigeon shooting - is also using a timing device to work out what the optimum time difference is between shooting the first and second bullet. The typical difference is 0.4 seconds - far to quick to be using a hand-held stopwatch - so BAE have devised a timing device for them.
Olympic hopeful (and 2000 Gold Medallist) Richard Faulds says it'll be of great help.
Its all part of UK Sport's attempts to up our medal wins at the Olympics by bring the best experts in their field to sport. 
Cycling is the benchmark the rest have to follow. It won a pannier's worth of medals at the recent world championships, and is hoping for more success in Beijing.
Under former champion Chris Boardman, they've analysed ever aspect of the Olympic bike to see if they can make it better. The outcome is that it will cost on average £10,000 to physically make the bikes; add in the R+D says Boardman and the cost rises to between £50,000 and £60,000. For a bike.
Finally, a picture of archer Alan Wills. He's going to his first Olympics games and he's got a tattoo to celebrate. That'll be me in 4 years time - you heard it hear first."
Listen to PM
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~44~RS~)
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Well if we can see Alan's biceps can we have a glimpse at Chris Boardman's thighs please ;-0
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pervert !
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now if you was talking about the British beach volley team......
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T Bird That has to be the mixed team to maintain fairness.
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When the winner of a 'simple' running-race is decided in fractions of fractions of a second...
When a speck of dust on the string of a crossbow is an unacceptable barrier to excellence...
... no wonder I don't find 'sport' interesting to watch!
I anticipate a great deal of guitar practice, and getting on with the novel Sid and I were talking about a while back, during the Olympics.
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Jonnie - you seem to be feeling a little better now.
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As an Archer (no where near Olympic standard I hasten to add) I'm glad to hear someone admitting it's not as easy as the best make it look! I've lost count of the number of times I've had people saying: "All them bits and bobs and sights and stuff you have on them bows, I reckon I could hit fly at 100 yards with that lot. I mean, how hard can it be..?" Then they give it a go and have trouble even pulling the bow back!
;o) []
And yes, it does do wonders for your biceps!
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Stewart (4). Whatever floats your boat.
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Eddie, Why don't they use proper, old fashioned, longbows? I had a 40 pound one when I was young and it was probably much harder to use. It didn't have all sorts of doo dahs dangling from it.
jonnie 1, Chris Boardman is appearing daily on the Tour de France from 7-8 pm on, er, another channel available on freeview. There is also a special about him.....some time....somewhere. As I'm not a thigh person, I don't remember where.
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sorry, there are a couple of typo's
para 4 - for to read too
para 6 - for ever read every
my motto:
"Check everything twice to see if you've something out"
(snigger)!!!
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How do you get text only reports? No pics
Where is there further reading on this subject?
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David @ 9 - plenty of archers do use longbows still, it's just not a class in Olympic competition. The trouble is for the serious kind of competition these guys go in for, where fractions of an inch matter, a traditional longbow just isn't accurate enough. That said, a number of my club colleagues shoot a longbow too. Each kind has it's own difficulties, I wouldn't say one was more difficult to use than the other kind, just different.
The bow shown in the picture is a 'recurve' kind, the shape is somewhat similar to those used by the horse archers from the steps several hundred years ago. That shape is actually far more efficient than a longbow, combined with modern materials it allows for more power and greater accuracy. The bars on the bow, front and "Y" bars coming off at an angle add weight to the bow. This serves two purposes; one, it adds weight to the bow, giving it greater inertia and making it more stable, and second, it helps absorb some of the vibration when the arrow is shot, again (in theory) increasing accuracy.
A good way to think of it is like Motor Racing. You have F1 with it's use of technology, but you also have hill climbs and time trials for those who just want to stick some gaffer tape on the lights of their Austin Healey and have some fun. I wouldn't say one is better than the other, (or more "proper") and each has it's place. A longbow is more about raw power, the modern recurve is about accuracy and finesse.
;o) []
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Thanks for that David - TB and Joe
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Wonko 12, ) -> O
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