Out in force: regardless of the dreary weather the Brits were smiling
If the magical festivities of the Queens Diamond Jubilee proved beyond doubt – and how could we have had any such doubts? – it is that Britons, deep down are happy people.
The London Olympics and Paralympics have always been a portent for a month of non-stop good times, but with this summer-long party having started in the most majestic of ways the Olympic concerns of transport, security and crowding are but just an annoying sideshow.
For while the economies of countries around Britain are tanking, the weather is bitterly cold, uninspiringly grey and sodden, the stiff backbone of the British character is shining at its brightest.
Who would have thought that the dismal weather actually enhanced the weekend celebrations?
The fear of Olympic organisers is for a fortnight of dreary conditions not unlike Sunday. Yet the Queen's steely resolve to stand and acknowledge the heaving riverbank masses of red, white and blue despite the damp elevated the river spectacle way beyond it being a simple I-have-to-be-there-moment with strangers cuddling close to keep warm.
Commentators have talked about crowds 20-deep along the Thames on Sunday, but I rode my bike the length of the parade on the south side and 50-deep was the norm. From my vantage point, underneath the Millennium Bridge where artists were painting the modern-day Canaletto panorama, there was British sparkling wine in plastic cups, crisps and chocolate (in the shape of the Union Jack) shared around, and a subtle shuffle of order when the pageant started so that the little ones could get a better view.
Tens of thousands of spectators then weaved their way back to the railway stations. A queue of colourful umbrellas 700-yards long – presumably with people underneath sheltering from the driving rain outside of Waterloo – transformed this drab part of the city in to an eclectic party scene. Even so, taking the bicycle turned out to be an inspired choice.
Railway chiefs will have noted the failures of the trains to cope with the thousands of passengers turned away at Birmingham and other major cities and the chaos at tube stations like Westminster and Vauxhall.
Seemingly the crowd – officially 1.2 million – was much bigger than organisers expected. But we have seen throughout the Olympic torch relay that everyone across the country wants to get outside and engage with their community.
This is the summer of wearing funny hats and getting to know neighbours (the things you learn at a street party: mine is that a neighbour is a member of a popular boy band).
Yet some of the pageant spectators were perturbed by the sight of police carrying assault weapons along the river, others were frustrated by the crowd control officers more concerned with getting their packed lunched and sliver of a vantage point, rather than assisting those that were struggling especially families with young children.
With the Olympics security force now above 42,000 (military, Met Police, G4S staff and Locog security volunteers) Games planners can learn much from the river pageant.
More carriages on the trains, more toilets, more entertainment near critical transport hubs to turn a wait into a more relaxed time should be top of the list.
Organisers will have also seen that the good-natured crowds will put up with nearly anything if the mood of those in uniform is happy and relaxed and there appears to be some semblance of progress. Keep Calm and Smile On.
London 2012: Lizzie Simmonds turns insomnia into a positive force - The Guardian
Each night before she races Lizzie Simmonds lies awake, struggling to sleep. At the age of 21 she is used to it. Simmonds has been suffering from insomnia since she started swimming. "My problem isn't waking up in the night," she says with a sigh. "It is not being able to go to sleep." She has tried to find a fix, has seen the sports psychologists and sleep experts, has tried popping sleeping pills. Nothing seems to work. The best cure Simmonds has found is just to take herself off to the bathroom so she can turn on a light without waking her roommate, Fran Halsall, and read a book.
"I should try and fill my time with some positive distractions," she says. "Instead of thinking: 'Right, back to Pride and Prejudice' of an evening."
For all the frustration it causes her, Simmonds has learned to put a twist on her affliction. It might even, she reckons, give her an edge over her rivals in the Olympics this summer. It didn't, after all, stop her winning the 200m backstroke title at the European Championships in 2010. "It can be a positive in that I'm not going to be worrying about it if I can't sleep the night before my race, because I'm used to not sleeping. I'm used to coping.
"A lot of people won't sleep before their race because of the nerves and the excitement and they get up in the morning and are like 'Oh my god, I haven't had any sleep'. With me that's not an issue. It was the same as three nights ago so it doesn't make any difference."
Simmonds has what you might call a monkey-mind. She just can't stop it running and leaping and turning twists around all the things she has seen and heard and thought about. "I end up thinking about all sorts of things. People tell me to write a list, to write down all my worries but unless you are a bad sleeper and you can't sleep you don't really understand. Writing it down is not going to solve anything."
The sleep expert that Simmonds saw told her to get up at the same time every day, to settle into a routine. Fat use that was; swimmers aren't afforded such luxuries as regular hours. Simmonds loves to nap between training sessions, and she likes to sleep in on Sundays, the one day of the week when she doesn't have to get up at 6.30am.
The erratic hours that she has to keep were what caused her to develop the problem in the first place. "It was probably exacerbated by my younger swimming years, when I used to get up and train at 4am in the morning four times a week.
"My school was brilliant about not being that fussed about me going in for every single lesson. So if I had a PE lesson in the morning I could skip it. So I'd be up at 4am one morning, then 11am the next. Having two or three hours' sleep one night and then 11 or 12 the next." By the time she left school to study at Loughborough she "had got used to it not affecting my school work or my life if I had had only two hours sleep. It has just progressed from there".
Simmonds always had a lot of talent, just as she always had sleep problems. She reached the senior national finals when she was 13, and won her first national title at 15. She has struggled a little, she says, because she has had to divide her attention between the 100m and 200m backstroke. It turned her into "the perfect 150m swimmer". But she won't have to worry about that at the Olympics, because she did not make the team for the 100m. Just as she has with her insomnia, Simmonds has picked out the positives from the situation.
"To be able to completely focus on the 200m and blank out the 100m is a better balance rather than trying to juggle them both in training," Simmonds says. "Trying to do the sprint and the power work but also the endurance and aerobic work is a difficult thing to do. It gives me more of a direct focus." Goodness knows, she could use a little more of that.
London Symphony to pretend to play for Olympics ceremony - Los Angeles Times
Reports from Britain state that the orchestra will mimic playing to prerecorded music due to concerns about the weather and the shape of the performing venue -- a large, oval-shaped arena whose scale would apparently make a live-music performance tricky.
The ceremony, which is set to take place at the new Olympic Stadium, is being overseen by Oscar-winner Danny Boyle, who serves as artistic director for the massive event.
The London Symphony has reportedly recorded the music that is scheduled to be played during the July 27 ceremony. The Daily Mail reports that Boyle wanted the orchestra to perform live, but that he was overruled by the organizing committee for the Games.
When viewers around the world tune in for the ceremony, they can expect to see the conductor and musicians from the renowned orchestra going through the motions while a soundtrack plays.
This wouldn't be the first time that the mimicking of live music was used at an Olympics ceremony. In 2008, a mini-controversy developed during the Beijing Games when it was revealed that a 9-year-old singer lip-synced to the voice of another young girl whom officials had deemed less telegenic.
Similarly, at President Obama's inauguration, the musical performance by cellist Yo-Yo Ma, violinist Itzhak Perlman, pianist Gabriella Montero and clarinetist Anthony McGill played, unamplified, to a recording. The decision to use a recording was made over fears that the cold weather that day could damage the instruments.
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London 2012 Olympics: Britain's greatest badminton player Nathan Robertson retires after missing selection for the Games - Daily Telegraph
But he had no qualms in admitting that Adcock and Bankier had simply been the best mixed doubles pair over the last 12 months.
“For neutral fans, it has been entertaining to see how the rivalry played out,” he said. “We had expectations going into qualifying but we didn’t just miss out in the end, we missed out by a long way.
“They fully deserved their place and I have already offered my support to the players and coaches in the build-up to the Games.”
Adrian Christy, Badminton England’s chief executive, said: “It is a sad day for the sport as he is arguably our greatest ever player, a one-off, super-talented individual.
“He is an infectious character and a brilliant role model. Our pool of talented players now need to aspire to his heights.”
Keeping in line with Christy’s view that former players should be rewarded for their services, Robertson is now likely to take up an ambassadorial role within the sport.
Robertson competed at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 before winning silver with long-time partner Gail Emms at the Athens Games in 2004.
Two years later, the pair won Commonwealth gold in Melbourne and then the world title in Madrid. He forged a partnership with Wallwork following Emms’ retirement at the last Olympics in Beijing.
London loses in sale of app firm - lfpress.com
Toronto will reap the rewards of a promising hi-tech business developed in London.
And the sale of the company called Carbyn is a warning that the city needs to build a stronger tech community or it will lose more companies, a startup expert says.
Carbyn is working on cloud-based software for apps carried on mobile devices.
Owner Jaafer Haidar sold Carbyn to Synacor of Buffalo for $1.1 million. Synacor is shifting the core function of the business to a Carbyn office in Toronto. Carbyn’s London office that employs eight people will remain open.
Carbyn has had difficulty finding employees in London.
“We have not seen a lot of quality resumes here in London,” Haidar said. “It pains me to say it, but we may not be able to do it here.”
But Haidar said he plans to stay in London and invest the proceeds from the sale in new software he’s developing.
For technology observers, the loss of Carbyn is a blow, but the most important thing is that Haidar, forging a reputation as one of London’s most innovative software executives, is staying.
“It’s a concern, but with Jaafer the thrill is in the chase and in building. The most important thing is we still have a person like Jaafer here,” said John Pollock, director of BizInc, the technology incubator at Western University.
Jaafer also sold digital scrapbooking software to the craft company Michael’s for $1.5 million in 2010.
norman.debono@sunmedia.ca
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