mumsy the teevathlete

i'm suffering from the post-olympics hangover.

and it just won't GO AWAY!

for 2 weeks in august, i was a teevathlete. my eyes were glued onto the screen almost every night as i struggled to catch as many events as i possibly could. the coverage from starhub was AWESOME! 6 different channels broadcasting almost every single game, round, race, match...

volleyball. beach volleyball. swimming. track and field. gymnastics, diving etc. it was every teevathlete's dream.

everyone was talking about US swimmer michael phelp's quest for a seemingly impossible feat of 8 gold medals which he amazingly pulled off, smashing almost all the world records he'd already owned. phelp's going to be a gazillionaire. the golden boy can retire NOW and still support his future great grandchildren with money from sponsorships, endorsements and advertisements.

while i enjoyed watching the swimmers thrash and splash about in the watercube, my main focus was on the track events.

and boy, did it bring back memories of my days as a competitive school athlete. it was such a loooooong time ago when i sprinted. but whenever the runners lined up at the starting blocks, my heart would thump loudly. the adrenaline rush made me giddy with excitement and i felt like i was literally at the starting line waiting for the gun to go off!

without a doubt the beijing olympics sprint sensation was jamaican usain 'lightning' bolt who dashed the world records in 100m, 200m and the 4x100m men's relay. this unusually tall sprinter cruised so effortlessly to victory and caused a stir when he actually slowed down towards the end of his 100m final race. despite his clowning (and some say arrogant) antics, bolt still struck gold thrice and claimed new personal world records in 9.69 seconds (100m) and 19.30 (200m)!

imagine how much faster bolt would have been if he'd been really serious...

check out this youtube spoof of bolt's historic race:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzSpPaCIG0g&feature=related

well, it's been almost a month since the visually spectacular beiing 2008 opening ceremony directed by the talented zhang yimou. personally i felt the closing ceremony wasn't as breathtaking although the fireworks stole the show.

and the clever people at starhub probably realised there would be many teevathletes like me who'd be experiencing traumatising withdrawal symptoms and kindly scheduled re-runs of several final games and matches. i sought some measure of relief watching these re-runs and was grateful that i didn't have to suffer the cold-turkey treatment.

for now, it's 4 more years of wait. many things can happen in 4 years.

will usain bolt retain his sprint double fastest-man-in-the-world status?

will there be another upstart who'll challenge his reign?

will michael phelps come back to haul back more golds?

all will be revealed in 4 years' time.

see you in london 2012.