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London 2012 – the epilogue

Usain Bolt - he didn't let us down :)I’m pretty much exhausted after the Olympics. I guess it doesn’t help having spent 8 days out of the fortnight one way or another down in London. It’s not coming here again in my lifetime…

The press is of course full of comment – they are going to continue milking it for all its worth as long as they can.

I doubt that there is anyone out there who doesn’t believe the games were a complete triumph. I am lucky enough to have gone to many events, partly because I have paid the money and partly because I received invitations from sponsors due to my seniority in the business. The Olympics have been great for me.

Whilst they have been billed as “the people’s games” I will volunteer that this is the one element that I had doubts over in the run up to the starting gun.

These games cost so much money to put on that many tickets were out of the price range of many people, assuming they could even get their hands on them. I realise we couldn’t fit everyone that wanted to go into each venue so supply and demand was part of this. Also the pressure to maintain the exclusivity of the big spending corporate sponsors meant that the Locog police went over the top in enforcing their branding rules. Stories abound of butchers not being allowed to display circles made out of sausages, or of local cafes having to change their long standing names because they included the word “Olympic”. This does not smack of people’s games.

The games’ huge success has to a large extent been because we have spent the money to “do it right”. Whilst it is now right for us to sit back and enjoy this success I do feel a certain regret that the Olympics have come to the position of needing to be huge and costly events.

Although the International Olympic Committee runs the games I don’t think anyone should feel that the IOC owns the games. They can only be there as guardians.

The games must be owned by everyone and it didn’t feel that the London games belonged totally to the people. They belonged in significant part to the IOC and Locog and the big companies that had shelled out lots of money for the rights to advertise their affiliation. I suspect that there is nothing we can ever do to change this for future games.

During the build up to these games I was free with my use of “proscribed” words and phrases such as London 2012 and Olympics. In part I hid behind the non-commercial aspect of trefor.net even though I am patently affiliated with Timico, a provider of (high quality) communication services.  In a sense I was doing it because had I been hauled up before the Locog kangaroo court it would have been great publicity but I was also standing up for what I believed was right and that is the Olympics is ours not Locog’s or the IOC.

Anyway enough of the rant. I, like most of you I’m sure, do feel a huge sense of pride in our country’s success in London 2012. Although I am at this stage unlikely to ever be an Olympic champion (it has  made me feel old looking at the ages of many of the competitors) the success of our sportsmen and women has spurred me to wanting to achieve more in my own life.

If anyone fancies a game of conkers this autumn the season is not far off… 🙂

Trefor Davies

By Trefor Davies

Liver of life, father of four, CTO of trefor.net, writer, poet, philosopherontap.com

One reply on “London 2012 – the epilogue”

There is always Cribbage, for when after the clocks go back. You can play that from the comfort of your fireside chair, without having to leave the comfort of your own slippers.

TFG

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