USOC Hosts 2012 Team USA Media Summit

On the scene in Dallas at the U.S. Olympic Committee's 2012 Team USA Media Summit, it's been a whirlwind of interviews and photo opportunities to learn more about athletes for the London Games, now just 74 days ahead.
Lots of lessons learned, including some computer coding issues given the possible hack to this blog -- it's incredibly frustrating that I've not been able to post for 48 hours. Hopefully this post, including two photos with Olympians on site (Shawn Johnson and Michael Phelps) will work and be visible to readers.

Later today will attempt to post interview details and some information about Michelle Obama's announcement related to "Let's Move!" on site at the summit. Stay tuned for updates and send good vibes for an easy fix to the blog

Photos by Nicholas Wolaver

London Olympic Stadium

Catching up on Olympic website reading lately, found an outstanding London 2012 photo gallery of aerial shots around the Olympic Stadium. Check this link for some amazing images.

Photos via LOCOG

A Description of London

Found a delightful poem posted on today's edition of "The Writer's Almanac" describing a potential preview of people to meet in London during the 2012 Olympics and on other trips to the famous metropolis.

Since it's a public domain item, posting here the full text for "A Description of London" by John Banks. Hope ye like it.

"A Description of London"

Houses, churches, mixed together,

Streets unpleasant in all weather;

Prisons, places contiguous,

Gates, a bridge, the Thames irriguous.

Gaudy things enough to tempt ye,

Showy outsides, insides empty,

Bubbles, trades, mechanic arts,

Coaches, wheelbarrows and carts.

Warrant, bailiffs, bills unpaid,

Lords of laundresses afraid;

Rogues that nightly rob and shoot men,

Hangmen, aldermen and footmen.

Lawyers, poets, priests, physicians,

Noble, simple, all conditions:

Worth beneath a threadbare cover,

Villainy bedaubed all over.

Women black, red, fair and grey,

Prudes and such as never pray,

Handsome, ugly, noisy, still,

Some that will not, some that will.

Many a beau without a shilling,

Many a widow not unwilling;

Many a bargain, if you strike it:

This is London! How d'ye like it?

Illustration of London via Mappery.com

London 2012 Unveils Official Posters

Today the London Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG) unveiled the official posters for London 2012, including six Olympic and six Paralympic designs.

Check out the full press release (including artist bios) and links to the designs!
Building on an Olympic arts tradition spanning several decades, the LOCOG-commissioned works by 12 leading U.K. artists highlight competition and athletic themes of the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Looking at the collection, I am enthusiastically drawn to the work titled "Big Ben 2012" by Sarah Morris. The poster features a modernized view of the Clock Tower in a framework reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright windows. Beautiful! I want this poster in my apartment!

Another poster titled "Divers" -- created by Anthea Hamilton -- is also appealing with vivid color and silhouetted legs and Olympic rings in white.

The third and poster of note, however, sort of made me think, "Huh?!"

The work titled "Swimming" by Howard Hodgkin is described in LOCOG press materials with the following note: "The fluidity of the brushstrokes perfectly captures the movement of water and the sensation of swimming."

Not so much.

For this blogger, it sort of captures the movement of child's fingers dipped in finger paint.

Though to Hodgkin's credit, the painting did also remind me of a favorite R.E.M. song titled "Night Swimming" so I guess the poster is OK, just not for my walls.

Next!

Like Athens 2004's terrible selection of official posters, the rest of the London 2012 official poster series leave a bit to be desired. For instance, the illustration of two birds appearing under an inspiring message was to me, well, inspiring, yet better suited for the cartoon collections of The New Yorker magazine.

The other workz juzt make me zort of **yawn** zleepy ... ZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz ...

I guess my Olympic official poster tastes are influenced by the dazzling array of memorable official works created for LA84, Barcelona 1992 and Atlanta 1996. LA's official works, including artists Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg and Martin Puryear, are just tough to beat. Javier Mariscal's 1992 designs, and the 1996 posters by Howard Finster and James Rizzi, stand out as exceptional.

Other favorites Olympic poster works include designs by Jacob Lawrence, David Hockney, Andy Warhol and (official or not) the works of Dallas artist Bart Forbes are personal favorites (his works for several U.S. Postal Service stamps are tops in my book).

I'm sure the London 2012 official posters will be quite popular in spite of my remarks. Would love to hear which London 2012 Olympic posters are most liked -- or disliked -- by readers of this blog, and I will send an official 1996 Atlanta Olympic Opening Ceremony postcard of Muhammad Ali lighting the Olympic cauldron to the person(s) who post the most colorful comment(s) during the next three days.

Disclosures: LOCOG and the IPC/Paralympics are clients of Edelman, the agency where I work. Photo credits: London 2012/LOCOG website.

New York Times: Unfit London and the Games

Today's New York Times cover story regarding the London Games gave me a chuckle between bites of donut.

According to the report, the U.K. bid for the 2012 Olympics included a commitment to get more than 1 million host nationals up off of their arses and engaged in physical activity.

Jolly good show!

This was the first I heard of such a component of the Olympic bid process, but it was not surprising. The sounds of "fittest Games" ring similar to bid book language about "greenest Games" or other aspirational statements. Should we get ready for Annecy, Munich and PyeongChang to present their commitment to the "snowiest" Games in 2018.

Photo via Flaming Fun

Where Will You Be?

A colleague today forwarded a wonderful attachment to an e-mail: The London 2012 Olympic ticketing/event schedule.

Scanning the contents and the one-page version, I can tell you the future. Well, at least where I aspire to be on the following dates (this list will certainly evolve over time):

• 27 July 2012 -- Opening Ceremony at Olympic Stadium (duh!)
• 4 August 2012 -- Women's Tennis Final at Wimbledon, Centre Court
• 8 August 2012 -- Women's Beach Volleyball Final at Horse Guards Parade (for an Olympic attendance three-peat with my good friend, Brian; we attended in Athens and Beijing)
• 9 August 2012 -- Women's Football Final at Wembley Stadium
• 12 August 2012 -- Closing Ceremony at Olympic Stadium

The only disappointment to the schedule: Men's marathon does not conclude at the Olympic Stadium as it did in Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium, where I stowed away ALL DAY in the BBC press seats and then evaded Chinese security sweeps (once, twice, three times, including bomb-sniffing K-9 units) to view the Closing Ceremony at no charge. Therefore, no option to repeat stowing away trick.

Experience-wise, Beijing and Vancouver set very high standards for Olympic awesomeness. London should provide an array of adventures.

Where will I see you in London?

Ticketing logo via London 2012

Please Re-Peat This ... Four Times

If Bob Costas, Jim Lampley, the other NBC Sports anchors, or their army of Olympic researchers and interns, are online to gear up for the London 2012 Olympic commentary, I hope they'll read this post.

Because on my desk is a copy of a page-turning academic paper my good friend J. Brian Carberry got published in the most recent edition of the Journal of Olympic History.

In his report titled The Olympic 4-Peat -- A Rare Achievement, Carberry presents his case as to why the terms "Olympic Four-Peat" (changed here to match AP Style), "Olympic Three-Peat" or similar should be added to the Olympic and sports lexicon.

That definition states that to achieve the rare Olympic Four-Peat one must take home the gold medal in four consecutive Olympic competitions in the same sport/discipline. An example: Carl Lewis winning his fourth gold medal in the long jump at the Centennial Olympic Games in Atlanta. One blogger used the term in 2004 to describe the original/first Olympic Four-Peater, Al Oerter.

(11/7/2010 correction: Oerter was not the original/first Olympic Four-Peater.)

Carberry also charts the history of past or potential Olympic Four-Peats, including 15 athletes -- five women and 10 men -- who may Olympic Four-Peat themselves into the history books AND Carberry's updated research during the Games of the XXXth Olympiad.

Yes, we are shopping for tickets to attend the potential Olympic Four-Peats (as stated in my previous post, Carberry and I also seek tickets so we may achieve a personal Olympic Three-Peat in spectating at the women's beach volleyball final in 2012).

Following Carberry's six-page report, a 10-page chart provides excruciating yet thorough detail about Olympic Three-Peat and Olympic Four-Peat achievements in modern Olympic history (only eight Olympians achieved Olympic Four-Peats thus far -- remarkable.

Commentators should clamor to describe the one-time Olympic Five-Peat (would that also be an Olympic Pent-Peat or Olympic Pente-Peat) and the single Olympic Six-Peat (Olympic Sex-Peat?) winners in history, Hungarian fencers Pál Kovács and Aladár Gerevich, respectively. CNN.com features a nice write-up about Gerevich.

By way of this post, I am encouraging Carberry to set up his own website, Facebook page and blog to showcase and elevate the terminology he proposed should have more prominence. This way, Brian and others will be able to continue to build a case for the Olympic Four-Peat vocabulary to achieve mainstream status in sports coverage and conversation.

An online resource dedicated to this topic will permit more interactive history and discussion on this topic, and give fans a place to reference -- in real time from London 2012 -- the status of the upcoming Olympic Four-Peat contenders.

To inspire Mr. Carberry to get online and get busy, I added an "Olympic Four-Peat" statement to the Al Oerter page on Wikipedia.

(11/7/2010 update: Because this statement was incorrect, it was later edited from the Wikipedia page; I stand corrected.)

And send a copy of the article to Mr. Costas -- he needs to read it.

Photo via this site