Olympic Sports that should not be
August 31st, 2008 at 12:00 pm by David FarrarRaybon Kan has a funny but largely correct column of what sports should not be in the Olympics:
Soccer. The Olympics should be the pinnacle of achievement. If not, get out. For tennis, it’s a Grand Slam. For basketball, it’s an NBA championship. For football, the World Cup. In the Olympics, football is a patronising under-23 tournament. If we wanted to see under-age competitors, we’d watch gymnastics.
I could not agree more here. If winning the gold medal is not the most aspired for achievement in that sport, then don’t have it in the Olympics.
Hockey. This is the best example of a sport really being improved by ice. Handball. As far as I can tell, handball is football with everyone cheating. Or it’s waterpolo without the water. If we must have a sport for people without skills, I’d rather see dodgeball, or even tag.
Ice Hockey is great! I don’t mind hockey at the Olympics but generally think team sports are a bad match, unless it is very small teams such as relays or rowing where no one is potentially a spare part.
Dodgeball would be a great Olypmic sport 
Rhythmic gymnastics. The proper place for this is the opening ceremony. Equestrian. I don’t mean to be speciesist but let’s let the Olympics be about humans. Horses, giddy up. You’re outta here. The pinnacle of achievement for a horse is the Triple Crown or Melbourne Cup. Besides, any horse that plaits its own hair is obviously taking some serious stimulants.
If horses are in, they might as well include dogs catching frisbees, or dolphins in the swimming. There’s a reason Mark Todd can compete in this many Olympics: the horses do the work. Is it a summer sport if you can compete at the highest level, wearing that many layers of formal clothing, like the admiral of a brass band? I’m sure there’s a Siegfried and Roy/Dr Doolittle ingenuity to training a horse to be this clever. But do it in Vegas, not the Olympics.
I expect Raybon will receive many outraged missives from horse riders on this!
And how do you think poor countries feel when they see equestrian? The horses eat better than most of their own citizens/refugees/insurgents. Entire developing continents probably watch equestrian because it looks yummy.
Beach volleyball. I feel like I’m watching a bad teenage movie set at the beach. And I am quite a perv. Yet, even as a perv, I have yet to be motivated to watch beach volleyball any longer than it takes to change the channel. The only good thing you can say about beach volleyball is that it positively influenced what women wear in the high jump and pole vault.
Heh indeed.
Whitewater kayaking. Slalom skiing minus the excitement.
Walking. No appeal, no question. Gone. Walking is a bunch of people urgently looking for the toilet, wanting to hide the fact they’re busting. It wouldn’t even be good sped up, with music from Benny Hill. And if a judge can keep pace with a competitor, while studying their feet, and holding a flag, the competitor is not doing anything special. When I get out of the car, and walk to a cafe, no onlooker would say I am making this transition in the spirit of the Olympics. When you do your grocery shopping, you are not performing an Olympic sport, with the extra challenge of weights.
This is also bound to get him many outraged letters!
Related posts:
- Raybon Kan on Olympic gag
- Blogging now an Olympic Sport!
- SST editorial on Olympic gag also
- Pole dancing now a sport
August 31st, 2008 at 12:48 pm
DPF, Funniest of all on the “irredeemable sports” is Anthony Lane in the New Yorker. His take on walking as a sport: “learning to moonwalk too soon after a hip replacement.”
I use his take on synchronized swimming as my quote of the day yesterday.
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Raybon has some good, irreverent humour. Is there anyone else out there in Blogland that has no interest in the Olympics whatsoever?
http://www.kiwipolemicist.wordpress.com
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 1:16 pm
The Aussies want to include sheep-shearing! I suppose sheep-shagging is out of the question?
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 1:45 pm
Bring back Tug of War!
It was actually an Olympic sport for a while.
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Hockey has a world cup but I would suggest Olympic Gold means at least as much, if not more. From the point of view of a hockey fan it is great to have it in the olympics as there are very few opportunities to see coverage or top level international hockey in NZ.
And that leads to my next point. I don’t care that there are lots of sports in the olympics. I don’t care that there are several which are daft (Beach Volley Ball for eg) and shouldn’t really be there (U23 football) because for two weeks I get to watch as much or as little sport as I want (and need for sleep/work allows). I also get to see sports I do not understand or ever see outside of the olympic window (hand ball, water polo) and I enjoy it.
More sports the better (although could Sky please get the hosting rights so we can see all the coverage).
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 4:09 pm
Raybon Kan is the living proof they were wrong in that Seinfeld episode that they were saying ‘Asians aren’t funny’
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Hard to watch TV now the Olympics have finished but I really dont believe there is a place for any ‘sport’ that requires a panel of judges to determine a winner
Vote:August 31st, 2008 at 8:35 pm
Totally agree with Patrick Starr above. If it involves judges, it’s not a sport. End of story.
Vote:September 1st, 2008 at 11:17 am
Pretty spot on, gotta leave the beach volleyball alone though!
Walking, gone!
Rhythmic gym… gone!
Soccer, gone!
The team stuff is good, sweating sheilas! Ha!
Vote:September 1st, 2008 at 7:06 pm
You just leave those equestrians alone!
My daughter spent five years working with her horse to get to international standard in eventing, and believe me, if you don’t think the rider has to be fit as well as skilled to do cross country, dressage and showjumping in three consecutive days you’re crazy.
The points system makes it quite clear that there is no ‘panel judgement’ in this Olympic Event, the commentators were telling everyone what the score was for every step sequence in dressage and the time and point system for cross country and showjumping are self evident to all.
THOSE PEOPLE who think that the rider just sits there and enjoys the ride, should try riding a horse over a seven foot fence, they’ll bottle out, I bet! As for charging down hills, through water and then over bracken fences, again, not for the feint hearted, and definitely not for someone who hasn’t trained day in and day out with that horse. Lastly, just look at the dressage event. Getting a horse that weighs in at six times the riders weight, to do things that are totally anti-natural, AND ENJOY IT as those horses do, is a major achievement; while I love my rugby and never miss a game, I know for sure that it takes a LOT more skill and determination to get a horse to walk at a forty-five degree angle alternating foot sides than it does to throw a ball to the right place in a line-out.
So yes David.. There are those of us who are madder than a girl-scout called a guide at the idea of removing this exceptional sport from the Olympics.
As for men’s beach volley ball – who watches that! Girls in skimpy bikinis I understand, but guys, dressed the way they dress? I doubt that even Boy George would bother wasting the electricity!
Vote: