Is Novac Djokovic’s Success Down To Going Gluten-Free?
According to some web sites, like this one, it is.
I’m sceptical, especially as that site has an agenda!
But statistically, the fact that I only know of one top class sportswomen, Hayley Turner, who has been diagnosed as a coeliac is way under the expected odds.
Greenwich Park Eventing Invitational CIC2
I would have liked to go to this event, but it is exclusive and the general public are not allowed, even if they pay for a ticket.
I would have liked to go to the eventing at the Olympics, but failed like many to get a ticket.
As I pointed out on this blog, Greenwich Park is just too small for the eventing.
I hope that this exclusivity doesn’t apply to all the preview events!
Boadicea Stands Guard
Standing guard opposite the Houses of Parliament is Boadicea, or as she is more normally spelled these days, Boudica.
Boadicea Stands Guard
She may or may not have defeated the Romans, as whatever happened they remained in Britain.
Her spirit lives on, especially in East Anglia. She probably came from that region, although no-one is sure quite where! I have heard several people say, including my father, that if the Germans had landed in Suffolk in the Second World War, they would have got similar treatment to that meted out by Boadicea and her ragbag army of upwards of 100,000 men. When questioned as to the legitimacy of this treatment under the Geneva Convention, a common reply was “What would Boadicea have done?” I don’t know the truth of all these reports, but I know Suffolk people well and they wouldn’t have taken an invasion lightly.
Some also say that her tribe, the Iceni, were the supreme horsemen, who when their horses were suffering from horse sickness, looked for a new and healthier place to raise them. They found this valley in the chalk downs and moved there, calling the place New Horse Market. In time this was corrupted to Newmarket. The town is the world centre of horse racing and breeding, known amongst racing people as Headquarters. Every thoroughbred can trace their ancestry back to this small town in Suffolk.
What’s Gone Wrong With Murray?
He won the quarter-final at Wimbledon without any pain.
For us that is, not him!
Gluten Free For Players At Wimbledon
According to The Times today, gluten free food is there if the players want it.
Very good!
The Good Don’t Always Die Young!
Unless of course you consider 95 to be before your time.
Arthur Budgett was a racehorse trainer, who is one of only two people to have bred, owned and trained two Derby winners. In his case they were Blakeney and Morston. C and I actually used Blakeney to cover one of our mares and I had the pleasure of meeting the horse several times at the National Stud, where he was very much a favourite of everybody.
To get more of the flavour of someone who seems to have been a truly good man, read his obituary in the Telegraph. I particularly like this paragraph.
That he had only two head lads — Denis Rayson and Tow Dowdeswell — throughout the 30 years that he was training speaks elegantly of his consistency of character and the esteem in which he was held by his staff. Despite all the success he enjoyed, Arthur Budgett remained a modest and unfailingly courteous man, though he would fight his corner resolutely when he thought he was being unfairly treated — as happened when one of his horses was subjected to a dope test, and an official attempted to prevent him from having an independent vet carrying out another test. Budgett won his point; had he not done so, his career could have been brought to a very early end.
They don’t make people like that these days. More’s the pity.
The Real Problem With Olympic Tickets
I did get a few tickets, but not the real ones I wanted like the cycling and the 5,000 metres. I did get some for the beach volleyball though!
I should have applied for more events and perhaps only two tickets for each, rather than the three or four I did.
The real problem isw that for some events there are just not enough tickets. And that doesn’t mean that too many are going to sponsors and the great and good.
Take the equestrian events, which are being held in Greenwich Park. I applied for the cross-country day for the eventing and got none. It should have been held in a larger venue, where they could really have spread everything out. Three venues would have offered much more space and they already have purpose built grandstands that can take over 50,000 spectators. These are the racecourses at Epsom, Ascot and Sandown. If you really want space, then you could have done it at Newmarket, the biggest horse centre in the world. After all, if you are doing the sailing at Weymouth, surely putting the eventing slightly out of London wouldn’t have been a problem.
And then of course there’s the British. And I’ll chuck the Irish in here as well. All of us, be we English, Scotch, Welsh or Irish love our sport and big events. Just look at all the fans, who are going to Glastonbury this weekend, to get filthy dirty in the mud. It’s an event and we’ll go and fill it.
When did you last here of a major sporting or cultural event in these isles, that wasn’t a success. I go to Liverpool regularly and many there will tell you how the celebrations in 2008, when the city was European Capital of Culture was a real party, something to be proud of and also an event that kicked the city into the future.
So did we do the Olympics in too small a way?
The Fixtures For 2011-12 Are Now Out.
Now that the fixtures for next season have been published, what are going to be the difficult ones to get to from London or even Ipswich?
At present there is only one, that I probably couldn’t make.
That is on the 29th November 2011 at Burnley. It was a good trip last season and too far for a Tuesday in November.
How Things Have Changed
Tonight I saw a friend back to the bus stop. Whilst waiting a guy came past, who’d obviously been to Royal Ascot, as he was fully dressed complete with a black top hat.
It just shows how you can gwnerally walk the streets dressed in any manner you want. It reminded me of how C and I used to walk back from University balls in Liverpool, through Princes and Sefton Park to the Halls of Residence, in dinner jackets and long dresses.
But it wasn’t so long ago, when to do something like that would have been to attract all the wrong sort of attention.
There is always the story of Ted Kid Lewis, who was possibly London’s greatest ever boxer, walking home smartly dressed, before the Second World War in the East End and being set upon by four thugs. As he knocked the fourth out, he produced his visiting card and dropped it on his attacker.
I don’t know whether my father ever saw Lewis fight, but I can remember him telling me the tales of the Aldgate Sphinx.
Willie Carson and Katherine Jenkins
I had to laugh at the racing on BBC this afternoon.
Willie Carson was cuddling up to Katherine Jenkins, whilst they were commentating on the racing. He just about reached up to her bust.
I suspect the picture will make the papers.
The Anonymous Widower 