Olympicitis.

Day 5 of the Olympics in what looks like blanket coverage by the BBC (perhaps it's the time difference, perhaps they need to recoup much of the money spent advertising these games).

My daughter woke up this morning at the usual time of 6:30 (her body clock is sharper than quartz) and whilst making her breakfast I stuck beeb one on – yup the Olympics were off to an early start.

Finish an episode of the Wire late at night just before bed and voilà – the Olympics still streaming out of the tellybox.  Not sure if it's bad timing on my behalf but every time I've viewed these games I seem to fall upon either equestrian events (in all honesty this has never been one of my favourites), rowing (again not one I'd go out of my way to view) and canoeing: now I'd almost written this off as a none too pleasing to the eye sport but I was ultimately hooked.  The British fella, David Florence, although initially somewhat behind, soon pulled himself up a few gears and before you know it a silver was his.  This looks like one of the toughest sports in the game (mind you most of them look back breaking) a lone competitor wrestling with what look like angry flash floods whilst commanding a canoe through flagged gates.

The cycling always has me hooked, there's something ferocious in the sport in which the body is almost torn apart from the nerves up during the races/grotesque feats of endurance.  Cyclists seem to be the leanest and fittest looking people in the world.  Great news that Nicole Cooke won us our first gold.

Swimming is always good viewing (and yes I haven't forgotten beach volleyball...neither it seems has that Dubya Bush fella).  Michael Phelps (as of writing) has won a record 11 gold medals marking him down as the greatest Olympian in history (and he hasn't finished yet).  

Here again Rebbeca Adlington did us proud with a gold medal.

Unsurprisingly China leads the medal tally (currently at 27 golds).  The only games I saw today was the women's weight lifting.  A rather strong, yet stout lady called Liu Chunhong not only won the gold medal in the 69kg division but she also hammered in three world records.  All this talk over 'clean and jerk' and 'third attempt in the snatch' left me a little befuddled so I promptly called it a day.

The opening ceremony was pretty special...it will be a hard act for London to follow in four years.  Everything ran like human clockwork, a giant organic German car personified.  The architecture for the most part is brash and flash (the aquaitc centre and the stadium are undoubtedly gorgeous looking).  Overall I can't help feeling a little confused over whether I should be watching this at all, without guilt over the goings on of such an oppressive regime.  I'd hope that this will open China up to the world and in turn make the citizens of this vast country much more free...I'm just not sure if this emerging (and emerging quickly by the looks of it) superpower can be trusted to be in charge of  this planets steering wheel.

Anyway...I'm now off to see if I can catch any of the table tennis – a true Olympic sport if there was one!