But what I believe will happen is that this Games will encourage more investment in all sports from school age and up, and that children witnessing it will want to take up sport more seriously.

This ^^^ loads of kids on bikes out on our street this week having little sprint races and scooting around, one asked me where he could get a pointy helmet from.. 😀 and another little girl said she’s gonna win the lympics when she’s big…
It’s ace… 😀

Another vote for Mo Farah for pure yelling at the screen emotion. The 10K being longer than most events really gave time for the tension to building. Love the mental head-slapping reaction as he crossed the line.

Oh and did anyone else notice his training partner who got the silver – as they stood exhausted together, he spat out either some belgian toothpaste, or possibly a little bit of sick, and Mo collapsed on the floor and came soooo close to rolling around in it 😯

Brownlee. Untouchable.

Or hopefully Keri-Anne Payne.

But what I believe will happen is that this Games will encourage more investment in all sports from school age and up, and that children witnessing it will want to take up sport more seriously.

It would be a great legacy, but the facts differ. The coalition has now approved sales for 22 schools playing fields since coming to power.
What they are saying, and what they are doing are vastly different.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/aug/06/school-playing-field-sale-gove

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/aug/07/school-playing-field-sell-offs-rise

edit: sorry, perhaps its the wrong thread to be posting such negative news but it did seem relevant to the comments.

Pendleton’s gold
Hoy’s gold yesterday.

Lin Dan v Lee Chong Wei in the badminton final. Wow.

100m final: Usain Bolt doin it.

Enjoyed Hoy’s keirin gold:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/19171359

Just totally schools the entire field…rides out in front of them, someone tries to sneak past and he puts the hammer down again to win by a length.

So many great moments. VP winning the kieran maybe – I got the impression that she won the kieran at the moment the GB team got ‘relegated’ in the team sprint; during the interview afterwards she was very diplomatic but you could just see that the only way for her to get over that was to win gold in her next event.

Did anyone else pick up what the Australian coach said to Anna Mears after she’d beaten VP – he embraced her and said “I’m so f*#king proud…” with the BBC crew eavesdropping live on prime time at about 5.45. Ooops!

and Sir Steve, when he virtually resuscitated Alan Campbell after his Bronze effort
Never saw that the first time round, pretty awesome.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/19114000

My word – I must have something in my eyes. That is just an amazing few minutes to watch.

Also worth Checking out is the bit where Redgrave lifts the lightweight double sculler out of his boat. I’ve met Pinscent a couple of times & he’s huge – Sir Steve must be massive!

Loved Bradley, Jessica, Mo, the GB Team Pursuit squads, Sir Chris, the rowers and kayakers etc. Also, Nick Skelton finally winning gold. i have absolutely no idea or interest in show-jumping, but the bloke’s been around for ever, and it must mean so much to finally win gold in your own Olympics in front of your own home crowd. Every medal by British athletes has been brilliant; Christine Ohoruogu, Beth Tweddle, the Brownlee brothers. All of them deserve so much respect.

But a special moment for me was seeing Anna Meares win the sprint in such style. She came back from a broken neck in 2007 to win silver in Beijing, and is a true fighter. Fantastic to watch.

The Meares V Pendleton rivalry is one of the best in sport, ever. Up there with Leonard V Duran, England v Germany, Senna v Prost, Real Madrid v Barcelona, Coe V Ovett, Borg v Mcenroe, Jocky Wilson V Eric Bristow. It’s sad that it’s over, and nice to see some real respect between the two at the end.

THE greatest is of course Michael Phelps.

Only when measured by number of medals won. If he competed in a sport where you only get one chance each games (eg rowing) then he’d only have 3 medals. I’m afraid the greatest ever is still somebody most of you lot have never heard of – Birgit Fischer won gold medals over 6 Olympic games, and it would almost certainly have been 7 if East Germany hadn’t boycotted LA84.

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I’m afraid the greatest ever is still somebody most of you lot have never heard of – Birgit Fischer won gold medals over 6 Olympic games, and it would almost certainly have been 7 if East Germany hadn’t boycotted LA84.

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She’d be bloody brilliant if she managed to still be winning Golds in 2012 then 😉

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But if we you are talking of number of Games spanned, then Aladár Gerevich won golds in 6 games too (between 1932 and 1960, almost certainly would have been 8 if Germany hadn’t started WW2 🙂

Bit of an obscure one, but the Danish mens doubles badminton pair’s coach’s reaction when they got through to the final. Might be my favourite just cause I was there watching though.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szauevcQ02w[/video]

She’d be bloody brilliant if she managed to still be winning Golds in 2012 then

Yeah – but you’d not describe Phelps as THE greatest just on the basis of these games, no more than you’d describe Hoy as the greatest Brit (even his medal haul here is equalled by Trott). Plenty of other performances equal or better that of Phelps this time round – I don’t see why he should be considered as better than everybody else just because he competes in a sport where you can get 7 or 8 chances at a medal each games.

Trott’s omnium win in the last event had me shouting ‘get in!’ at the telly.

But Vicky’s keirin ride was very impressive too.

Yeah – but you’d not describe Phelps as THE greatest just on the basis of these games

I agree, that’s why I mentioned the “swordsman” from the 1930/40/50/60’s

Carl Lewis is officially* the greatest (male) Olympian, so stop please arguing boys.

*It was in a programme on ESPN Classic.

1. Trott’s eliminator
2. Hoy’s win yesterday
3. Mo’s 10k (only heard it on radio and still welling up)

Honourable mention for Phelps’ magnanimous behaviour after Le Clos beat him. What a gent.

Third best moment the GB footballists going down to that well known footballing nation South Korea and no one in Britain giving a sh!t.

[giggles]
Sorry….

Ben Ainslie, you poke the tiger, the tiger bites back. he had an unbelieveably tough week, never seeming to get the better of the Dane nor the weather but once he was riled, he was a different man. Looking at s/h dinghies at the moment….

Mo’s final lap.
Armistead’s sprint finish in the pishing rain.
Wiggo swearing on live TV.

My son’s been doing this alot recently….

Nothing’s topped Macca singing Hey Jude yet.

Mo Farah, there have been other great races. But the fact he wasn’t a cert, it was Saturday night, we had just won 2 other t&f golds and not least that it was an edge of the seat race mean it was the only time during the games that I have been shouting an whooping at the tv. Awesome.

Wiggo was great, but at the end of the day it’s just a time trial. Not exactly exiting are they?

Stop press!

My new favourite moment is Mo Farrah doing the gold double- truly astonishing!!

Loved the way he went to the front and basically said..

“come on if you think your hard enough”

and Sir Steve, when he virtually resuscitated Alan Campbell after his Bronze effort
Never saw that the first time round, pretty awesome.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/19114000

My word – I must have something in my eyes. That is just an amazing few minutes to watch.+1 for this.

Doubt a bronze medal has meant so much to anybody else in years, and he had worked so hard to get it despite the odds.

And wasn’t the mountain biking fantastic- i’m looking forward to riding it. That will be my favourite Olympic moment of all 😉

I just hope they don’t water it down and remove all it’s best features…..