Tracking Fringe Elements

So here we are, deep into another Olympics and the question is, is this really a big deal or is this just something we make a big deal of?

Thousands of people are here for Sydney 2000. About half of them, it seems, are reporting for newspapers or TV. All over the world, people are getting up early, skipping lunch or hurrying home from work to see the latest from Sydney on TV. No question, a lot of people take the Olympics very seriously.

Stop and think, though, of the Olympic sports. Sure, there are some of our staples--baseball, basketball, boxing, soccer. But consider that among the showpiece sports--swimming, gymnastics and track--none is an everyday must for most sports fans. Track, in fact, although still big in Europe, is dying on the vine in America.

Basketball is a day-to-day biggie, of course, but doesn’t really belong in the Summer Games. Being a sport played over the winter, it rightly should be in the Winter Games, along with its winter companion, hockey.

Oops, make that ice hockey. Wouldn’t want to confuse anybody, since what they call hockey in the Olympics is what everybody else calls field hockey. Field hockey differs from ice hockey in several ways. First, of course, there is no ice, hence no skates. Instead of a puck, there’s a ball. And instead of hockey sticks, these hockey players use sawed-off shepherds’ crooks.

Hockey, field hockey, that is, is just one of the many games that make the Olympics what they are today--the greatest collection of recreation and niche sports known to man. Judging from its schedule, though, one would think field hockey provides the underlying structure for the Games. They started playing it here practically the minute the opening ceremony was done, they will continue playing it today, and they will continue just about up to the closing ceremony.

But field hockey, and the rest of these fringe events, play to considerably less than full houses. And the people in those “crowds” tend to fall into two categories: those who are knowledgeable, even passionate about them, and those who are there because they wanted to be part of the Olympic experience and the tickets were available.

Some of the, um, different sports will be examined below, and there will be suggestions on how some of them might be improved. Kindly remember, though, what Baron de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympics, always said: “There are no bad games, only poor sports.”

Archery

OK, already we have a problem.

Surely you remember the Barcelona Games of 1992, and the opening ceremony. An archer lighted the Olympic caldron at the top of the stadium with a flaming arrow from about two blocks away. It was one of those real WOW! moments. But you watch these guys here and you have to wonder, was it real or was it Memorex? Did that bowman really light the fire? Or did he just have to get close, while some mechanism we didn’t know about did the actual igniting?

Olympic archers apparently shop at Gadgets R Us. Their space-age bows are cluttered with dials and knobs and sighting devices and three or four weird-looking stick-out attachments, all designed, apparently, to make an arrow go straight where it’s shot. But very often, it doesn’t. Or it goes straight to the wrong place. Seldom does an archer put one dead center in the bull’s-eye.

Robin Hood stepped out of Sherwood Forest, disguised as a monk in a clunky robe, using a beechwood bow strung with twisted deer gut, and won the Nottingham tournament by splitting another shooter’s arrow. The guys here have more equipment than the rich kid down the block, but you won’t see any arrow-splitting. And you really have to wonder about that fellow in Barcelona.

Badminton and Table Tennis

These are not coupled sports, as are canoeing and kayaking, but they’re put together here because they have something in common. They are extremely fast sports.

Most of us have played backyard badminton or rec room pingpong, but the people playing here have raised those sports to levels far beyond the backyard or rec room. The table tennis is so fast, you sometimes hear the “pong” before the “ping.” And the forehand smashes in badminton make volleyball spikes look like lollipops.

These are great games that need no improvement. But five or 10 minutes of each is quite enough to hold you for another four years.

Canoeing and Kayaking

These are coupled sports because they are so similar. In fact, they really are the same thing in slightly different craft. Kayaks are a little pointier than canoes, which in no way resemble what everybody thinks of as a canoe. They look like kayaks, complete with the rubber girdle that keeps the water out of the boat and the paddler in. A kayaker uses a paddle with a blade at either end, a canoeist a traditional canoe paddle.

Canoeists and kayakers paddle down a flume, an artificial white-water river, complete with rocks, grade changes and other obstacles, racing against time. It’s good entertainment, but it would be more fun if boats raced side by side. Or if three or four went at the same time. Let’s have a real race through the slalom gates.

While we’re on the subject, rowers are noted for their strength and stamina, but they normally row on reasonably placid water. Wouldn’t it be neat to see an eight-oared shell navigating the kayak flume?

Cycling

The mountain bike and road racers are OK. They wear normal-looking helmets--or simple headbands--and ride normal-looking bikes. Their races make sense. They race from here to there.

The track cyclists are something else. They get themselves up to look like space aliens, wearing weird-looking teardrop helmets and dark glasses, then get on weird-looking bikes and ride in weird races. Somebody has threaded crepe paper, or something, through the spokes so the bikes look as if they’re going to be in the Fourth of July parade. What, no handlebar streamers?

And the races! The other night, two alien women got on their weird-looking bikes and sort of dawdled around on the banked track until one swooped down under the other and off they went for a minute or so. Then they were done.

That was followed by a four-man pursuit race--two teams of four riders each on opposite sides of the track. The teams took off, each riding in tandem, then suddenly the lead rider went high on the track and the others moved up while he tucked in behind. That happened three more times, then the race was over. Can’t they just line up and race?

If they wanted to do something really exciting, they could do what we did as kids--find a fairly quiet street and see how far you could ride with your eyes shut. Your ride was over when you hit the curb with your tire--kerb with your tyre as they would write here--or a parked car. You were disqualified if you hit a moving car, or one hit you.

Equestrian (Dressage)

Not fair, you say? Too easy a target? Too bad. People who dress up as dandified geeks to ride horses are asking for it. Cutaways and top hats, indeed! Especially fetching are the porkpie versions of the toppers favored by the women and worn by some men.

There are some equestrian events that are fairly interesting--the horses jump hurdles and run through the woods and such--but dressage? Watching figure skating’s school figures is more exciting.

Apparently, the riders are making the horses do certain things, but it looks like a lot of walking and prancing around. If they want the horses to do tricks, why don’t they teach them to rear up, or bow, or spin around on their hind legs, the way Roy and Trigger did? Now those were some horse tricks.

Handball

Another misnomer, to go along with hockey. It really is team handball and is nothing like the sport played against a wall. Team handball is sort of a combination of basketball and hockey. The ball is smaller than a volleyball, so it’s easy to palm. You can dribble but you don’t have to.

The players run around until somebody decides to throw it at the goal, on the fly or on the bounce. There are goalies, but they seem to be supernumeraries and with goals counting a point apiece, scores soar into the 20s. Looks like fun to play. Watching? Ehh?

Shooting

Again with the gimmicks, just like the archers.

Actually, that’s not quite true. The shotgun shooters are fairly normal. They wear rose-colored or yellow-tinted shooting glasses and earmuffs, but their guns look a lot like the shotguns any hunter could buy.

The riflemen are a different story.

Rifle shooters wear funny visors that come down on the sides to cut the glare. Some tape the non-aiming eye shut, others mount an eye baffle on the rifle. The rifles, of course--even the air rifles, BB guns--are more tricked up than a circus pony. There are scopes and sighting rings and knobs for elevation and windage, and stocks that look like shaved-down tree trunks. You wonder how these guys would do with a GI-issue weapon on an Army range.

This probably will never happen, but how about a shoot-off between the champion archers and the champion rifle shooters? Then they could compare gadgets.

There are, of course other offbeat sports in the Olympics--rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized swimming spring to mind--but everybody picks on them. Enough of this. Let’s go watch that gold-medal baseball game.