Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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big mervyn
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

Post by big mervyn »

solidarity wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 8:40 pm Li Wen Wen also weighs three and a quarter Simone Biles (who is only 4ft 8ins tall, by the way)

Speaking about Biles and others, there's something very wrong with sport in contemporary culture when an activity that should be done for pleasure and should be a support to good mental health actually harms the athletes' mental health.
There seems to be a mental 'elf pandemic among the young.This generation, for whatever reason, seems to lack mental resilience.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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big mervyn wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 9:09 pm
solidarity wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 8:40 pm Li Wen Wen also weighs three and a quarter Simone Biles (who is only 4ft 8ins tall, by the way)

Speaking about Biles and others, there's something very wrong with sport in contemporary culture when an activity that should be done for pleasure and should be a support to good mental health actually harms the athletes' mental health.
There seems to be a mental 'elf pandemic among the young.This generation, for whatever reason, seems to lack mental resilience.
Too true, Merv. I get the feeing that our generation may have to take some of the blame. We did our very best to 'protect' our kids, so they never learned how to cope with difficulties, disappointments etc.
My favourite current example of mollycoddling is that my daughter, a primary school teacher, is not supposed to mark childrens work in red pen as it is too intimidatory. Green is better. :duh:
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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Back to the olympics. How on earth do they fly up that 'speed' climbing wall?
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BR
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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big mervyn wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 9:09 pm
solidarity wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 8:40 pm Li Wen Wen also weighs three and a quarter Simone Biles (who is only 4ft 8ins tall, by the way)

Speaking about Biles and others, there's something very wrong with sport in contemporary culture when an activity that should be done for pleasure and should be a support to good mental health actually harms the athletes' mental health.
There seems to be a mental 'elf pandemic among the young.This generation, for whatever reason, seems to lack mental resilience.
I don't think it is as simple as that. There are multiple components to this, and among those is the relative openness with which mental health is now being discussed. And I'm pretty sure that is a good thing. In terms of sportsmen - 10 years ago any withdrawal for mental health reasons would have been explained away as a 'physical' injury (there are probably plenty that still are). Just like 10 years ago, I doubt I would have admitted to suffering with problems to complete strangers on a rufty-tufty, rugby forum.

As someone who has zero experience of being an 'athlete', let alone an elite one, I can only repeat what I hear from some that have experience. Just recently I heard from someone who could not over-emphasize the gulf between his own mindset (as a journeyman competitor) and that of the serious gold-medal prospects in his disciplines. "Completely different breed," is what he said. We hear about rugby players suffering from the high-low cycles of winning/losing, playing/not-playing. In some sports you could have all the emotions of competing on the world stage with the associated adrenaline, buzz, euphoria/disappointment and then have to do it all again less than 2 days later in the next round or in an associated discipline. If there s such a difference in mindset even within the elite level, I'm not sure that the pleasure that we, here gain(ed) from participating in sport a few times a week is even remotely related to the way these guys derive pleasure from what is usually their entire profession, lifestyle, ... and in many cases all they have known as adults.

And, of course, we need to factor in the simple fact that the pressures on sports people in increasing year-on-year. At the top where it is a multi-million pound business right down to the grass-roots. I suspect there is no longer any rugby team operating with the sort of mentality that we had in the 9ths, 10ths or 11ths back in the day.

Away from sport - I agree that mental health issues are a great problem amongst younger people. But let's face it, there are plenty of older people who have suffered in relative silence for years. You could call that 'resilience' or you could just call it 'suffering'. Does our new-found openness about madness contribute to an expectation that people in crisis will receive the help they need in a timely manner? Yes - and we are all aware that younger people have an increasing urgency about their lives, where 'timely manner' translates to 'right now', whereas I have seen older people who have been resilient/suffering for decades overcome with gratitude that they are finally getting the help they need. Is the solution to teach the kids to suffer longer or to improve the crisis interventions? No easy answers.

Talking of mad - I must get a look at this speed climbing thing.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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Agree to an extent although it’s 15 years since Marcus Trescothick had to come home from Australia.

I’m not sure it was helpful to hear all the virtue-signalling surrounding the problems Biles was having (similar to the ‘yips’ or ‘dartitis’) only for her to then medal in an event she didn’t need to twist so much in a week later.

That’s not a reflection on Biles of course, more the perils of social media and putting a microphone in front of people willing to opine on issues they aren’t qualified to talk about.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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justinr73 wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 11:11 am
That’s not a reflection on Biles of course, more the perils of social media and putting a microphone in front of people willing to opine on issues they aren’t qualified to talk about.
Jesus! Don't tell us we need to be qualified in order to state FACTS on here!
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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I'm not so sure all this talking about it always helps - it almost becomes a self fulfilling prophecy in some cases. Pushing things into a a dark recess of my mind and never mentioning it to anybody never did me any harm >crazy1 :lol:

... if that fails there's always >burp :stout:

I reckon that's why Federer Nadal and Djokovic are still unbeatable well into their 30s. The younger cohort are soft as shyte.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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... and Jimmy's still at it in the cricket.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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I have two issues. The first is that we have elevated sport to such a place in contemporary society that it destroys young lives, sometimes through physical injury and sometimes through mental health problems. We demand so much from athletes that it is no surprise that far too many get broken. Without pushing the comparison too far, we are heading towards a gladiatorial situation in which significant injury is just accepted as part of the deal; not necesarily as part of the entertainment but just part of the way sport is conducted.
My second issue is that we, as a society, have done all that we can to push 'suffering' out of our experience. Obviously it is good to eliminate many types of suffering as far as we can but we have redefined suffering to include too much. We only really grow and mature as we face and deal with discomforts, frustrations, disappointments and so on (suffering lite, if you like). If we don't develop the capacity to deal with these and similar things, it is no surprise that mental health problems increase.
Many of today's young peope, and older folk, have very real mental health problems. Those who suffer are, by and large, not to be blamed; they are more often victims and are to be helped as much as we can. The roots of the problem are much more societal than individual.

Back to Tokyo. Could be another late night or maybe very early morning. Love the 5,000m must check the timings.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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Trying to find the timing (1.00pm, by the way), I've just Googled 'Olympic 5000 metres'. The first of the questions coming up under, 'People often ask' is 'How far is a 5000 meter race? :duh:

To be fair, the answer is '3 miles 188 yards or 16,404 feet 2 inches'
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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People have always got hurt at sport - Brian Clough, Dave Whelan etc and plenty more who didn’t get another chance at a decent living - but the rewards these days are so much (and obscenely) higher.

Is that good or bad? I dunno.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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solidarity wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 7:50 pm Trying to find the timing (1.00pm, by the way), I've just Googled 'Olympic 5000 metres'. The first of the questions coming up under, 'People often ask' is 'How far is a 5000 meter race? :duh:

To be fair, the answer is '3 miles 188 yards or 16,404 feet 2 inches'
I think the marathon is the only imperial measured race in the Olympics.

Nobody ever seems to run the mile anymore. Used to be a big thing in the 70s/80s in the golden era of middle distance running.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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big mervyn wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 2:13 pm I'm not so sure all this talking about it always helps - it almost becomes a self fulfilling prophecy in some cases. Pushing things into a a dark recess of my mind and never mentioning it to anybody never did me any harm >crazy1 :lol:

... if that fails there's always >burp :stout:

I reckon that's why Federer Nadal and Djokovic are still unbeatable well into their 30s. The younger cohort are soft as shyte.
Did Djokovic not go postal in Japan?
Last edited by BR on Fri Aug 06, 2021 1:41 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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solidarity wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 7:44 pm I have two issues. The first is that we have elevated sport to such a place in contemporary society that it destroys young lives, sometimes through physical injury and sometimes through mental health problems. We demand so much from athletes that it is no surprise that far too many get broken. Without pushing the comparison too far, we are heading towards a gladiatorial situation in which significant injury is just accepted as part of the deal; not necesarily as part of the entertainment but just part of the way sport is conducted.
My second issue is that we, as a society, have done all that we can to push 'suffering' out of our experience. Obviously it is good to eliminate many types of suffering as far as we can but we have redefined suffering to include too much. We only really grow and mature as we face and deal with discomforts, frustrations, disappointments and so on (suffering lite, if you like). If we don't develop the capacity to deal with these and similar things, it is no surprise that mental health problems increase.
Many of today's young peope, and older folk, have very real mental health problems. Those who suffer are, by and large, not to be blamed; they are more often victims and are to be helped as much as we can. The roots of the problem are much more societal than individual.

Back to Tokyo. Could be another late night or maybe very early morning. Love the 5,000m must check the timings.
Largely agree with that, bar the love of people running around in circles.

And to be clear, i was referring to actual suffering of real MH issues. Someone much smarter than me used to have a rule of thumb - does it impact your ability to function as a useful member of society? Below that, there's a fair chance, what you are experiencing is simply life.
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Re: Where roughly is the Olympic Torch now mate?

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big mervyn wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 2:13 pm I'm not so sure all this talking about it always helps - it almost becomes a self fulfilling prophecy in some cases. Pushing things into a a dark recess of my mind and never mentioning it to anybody never did me any harm >crazy1 :lol:
Not confusing the benefits of society talking about MH issues and individuals using formal/informal talking therapies to treat their MH problems.

The latter is not for everyone, although the indications are that it is more successful than the continued use of medication whether thrown at them by a myopic GP, bought on the street, or >burp .
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