A little bit of Olympic trivia

[girlyswot]

I can't think why I don't have a sporty icon. LOL!

So, this is the 29th Olympiad. But how many Olympic Games have been held? Not 29.

In 1916, 1940 and 1940, the games were, for obvious reasons, cancelled. In 1906 an extra set of games was held, though these are no longer officially recognised. For some reason, the IOC defines an Olympiad as a 4 year period, regardless of whether an Olympic Games is actually held.

The Beijing Olympics is in fact the 26th official Olympics and the 27th actual Olympics (I'm guessing the ones who won medals in Athens in 1906 felt pretty miffed when they were downgraded).

Comments

[amamama.livejournal.com]

Amazingly enough, I don't have a sports icon either. Wonder why?

So they count the olypiads, not the actual games... What do they officially call the next winter game then, 29 1/2, since it's in two years?

[girlyswot.livejournal.com]

I think it's part of the 29th Olympiad which starts in 2008 and ends 4 years later.

[girlspell.livejournal.com]

I didn't know there was an extra set of games.

I have noticed though that the winter games have to have the word winter in front of them. There is no summer olympic games. Just Olympics

[liriop.livejournal.com]

That's because the "summer" olympics isn't about summer sports only. Most, if not all of the sports in it can be played (and are played) all along the year. The Winter Olympics Games includes only those sports that are typical from winter. Living in a tropical country, I must remind you that there are lots of countries between the tropics, where only the rich people that can travel to other countries can do winter sports. So the number of countries that participate of the winter Games is much smaller , and even smaller the ones with any chance of medals.

[liriop.livejournal.com]

I forgot one detail. The Olympic Games of 2000, in Sidney were during winter, since in the South Hemisphere it is winter this time of the year.

[crumplehornedki.livejournal.com]

the Sydney games were in September which is spring really in Aussie and they were as hot as the Beijing games are now so I'm not sure you can really say they were in winter you really wouldn't have wanted to have them in true summer in 40 degree heat all the outside games would have had to be cancelled for lack of athletes lol

[alkari.livejournal.com]

The Sydney games weren't THAT hot, LOL! A couple of the days had temperatures in the low 30C+ range, but basically it was just lovely warm weather 25-30C, and clear skies. There was one night when it rained heavily, but it stopped by early morning and the day itself was only overcast - I remember going out to the showjumping and the grounds were wet, but not slippery because of the good surface.

[liriop.livejournal.com]

Well until September the 22nd or 23rd it's technically winter, so they began officially in winter.

[girlspell.livejournal.com]

It's late summer here. But I've already seen the leaves turning and falling. I guess in Australia it's spring. One thing for sure....I would love to live in a warm climate all year.

[tdu000.livejournal.com]

I was wearing shorts when we went to watch the torch relay the week before. Not very winterish. It was officially spring and warmer weather than many countries (though not tropical ones) have in their summer. The debate should rather be whether we can really count any season in Sydney as winter!

[girlspell.livejournal.com]

I didn't know you were from Sydney! You still have great weather. Up in the 80's and not really bad humidity.

One of our students (theatre) did a semester abraod. Well sevweral semesters now at the University of Sydney. She hopes to be an actress/director. She has fallen in love with Sydney. Lucky girl.

[tdu000.livejournal.com]

I'm actually English, which is probably why you didn't realise I'm in Sydney. I've lived here for the last fifteen years so was here for the Sydney Olympics.

[girlspell.livejournal.com]

I went ahead and added you as a friend. Hope you don't mind. I've been posting to you for a while.

I just posted my photo on LJ. You can check out my latest LJ entry.

[tdu000.livejournal.com]

To use a good Aussie phrase, "No worries, mate!" I will befriend you in return.

[megan29.livejournal.com]

"The debate should rather be whether we can really count any season in Sydney as winter!"

Good point! I was in Sydney 2 years ago, in late May - early June, during what should have been the beginning of winter. That didn't stop me from swimming on Bondi Beach, nor from taking my very first surfing lesson. True, it was a bit chilly, but certainly not cold enough to keep me off the beach. But one of my most poignant memories is looking at a clear, starry night sky, and not recognizing even one constellation. :-)

[tdu000.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean about the stars. I've never been interested in stars and couldn't name many costellations but I now look for Orion because it's the only one that's familiar to me. It can get a bit chilly at night (currently it's about 6 degrees C at night) but it warms up beautifully in the day so you don't need to wrap up warm to go outside. Most houses are built to lose heat so they get cold easily in winter even when it seems warm outside. So we have a fire to keep warm inside and then can go outside in short sleeves.

[megan29.livejournal.com]

You can see Orion in the southern hemisphere? I didn't know that. I looked for it, but couldn't find it. Everything looked so different. I knew not to look for the Ursas, but there are a few other constellations I can generally identify (Cassiopeia, Orion). However, the sky looked very... alien in Sydney. I had this thought that I might as well be on another planet - the sky would look just as alien. It was the first time I felt really far away from home. And then the next day I saw my very first live kangaroos and koalas, and I KNEW I was on another planet. :-)

[alkari.livejournal.com]

LOL at this. Many years ago when I was driving around Cornwall and Devon with a friend, we had a somewhat hysterical time when none of the maps or road signs seemed to match up. And of course, were cheerfully lost somewhere south of Torrington. I assured poor RK (who has absolutely NO directional sense) that as it was January in the UK, we would eventually end up at the English Channel if we kept the afternoon sun ahead and to our right (around 2pm if we were looking at imaginary 12 o'clock) and if it got dark, I could always navigate due south by using the Pole Star, which I could definitely find!! She didn't sound at all reassured, but as we successfully ended up at Widdecombe in the Moor (which was on a map), we didn't have to rely on astronomy or my dead reckoning.