Off Topic Thread 3.0

bilston wrote: »

I find Dublin weird.

There are no peace walls, everyone gets along and there are no murals. All very unusual.

Also the crisps are dire...

On a serious note I have no idea what I'd think of Belfast if I wasn't from the place. Sometimes I'm proud of the place, other times I'm ashamed of it (the fleg debacle being an obvious one). Lately I'm lot more proud than ashamed. It is a very different city now to the place I grew up in through the 80s and 90s but still nowhere near as cosmopolitan as Dublin.

How f**king dare you! We have lovely crisps here. The cheek.

wp_rathead

When you see the amount of money being blown on Rio Olympics (something mental like 10bn)- would it be better off not just moving it back in Greece and have it there every 4 years

irishbucsfan

wp_rathead wrote: »

When you see the amount of money being blown on Rio Olympics (something mental like 10bn)- would it be better off not just moving it back in Greece and have it there every 4 years

This has been suggested before by bigwigs I believe, I'm all for it. It would bring much-needed investment into a Greek state that's been ravaged and picked apart economically, it would make sense historically, it would prevent cluster****s like the current debacle, the weather and people are lovely and it has proven recently enough that it can handle the event.

Could Greece afford to host it though?

Podge_irl

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

Could Greece afford to host it though?

If they didn't have to build new infrastructure every four years I fail to see why not.

Have a hard time seeing the IOC go for it though.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/gallery/2014/aug/13/abandoned-athens-olympic-2004-venues-10-years-on-in-pictures

Deleted User wrote: »

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/gallery/2014/aug/13/abandoned-athens-olympic-2004-venues-10-years-on-in-pictures

It's weird that some places allow that to happen. London, as one example, seemed to have long term plans for all the facilities they built, I thought that's what the whole "legacy" of the games were supposed to be.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

It's weird that some places allow that to happen. London, as one example, seemed to have long term plans for all the facilities they built, I thought that's what the whole "legacy" of the games were supposed to be.

Some of London's long-term-plans for the facilities were not exactly well thought through either though!

West Ham effectively getting several million per year in state aid is an interesting one

Deleted User wrote: »

Some of London's long-term-plans for the facilities were not exactly well thought through either though!

West Ham effectively getting several million per year in state aid is an interesting one

True, but at least they've used it for a number of different events and have the Athletics World championships lined up for 2017.

Felix Jones is God

Kilkenny's greatest sportsman passed today
RIP Michael Ducksie Walsh

phog

Felix Jones is God wrote: »

Kilkenny's greatest sportsman passed today
RIP Michael Ducksie Walsh

Coming from Kilkenny you'd imagine he'd have starred at hurling and I don't know if he played it to any degree of success but he was certainly Mr Handball.

RIP

The 2 cycling road races have been excellent viewing.

Incredible finish to the women's race.

Plus a sickening crash to the race leader 15 minutes or so before the end, I genuinely hope not fatal.

Felix Jones is God

swiwi_ wrote: »

The 2 cycling road races have been excellent viewing.

Incredible finish to the women's race.

Plus a sickening crash to the race leader 15 minutes or so before the end, I genuinely hope not fatal.

She's ok, no report on the actual injuries, but alive and kicking

Felix Jones is God wrote: »

She's ok, no report on the actual injuries, but alive and kicking

Great news. It reminded me of some of the fatal accidents in motocycling. Looked to me like her neck took the brunt, although others say her back...but seeing a fellow human being lying limp and crumpled up like a rag-doll I found genuinely disturbing. Put a bit of a dampener on a thrilling race.

Felix Jones is God

swiwi_ wrote: »

Great news. It reminded me of some of the fatal accidents in motocycling. Looked to me like her neck took the brunt, although others say her back...but seeing a fellow human being lying limp and crumpled up like a rag-doll I found genuinely disturbing. Put a bit of a dampener on a thrilling race.

She's conscious and talking but that's all we've heard so far, I do remember an Italian guy getting killed on a downhill in the tour de France 20 wats ago, but thankfully deaths are few and far between

Bazzo

swiwi_ wrote: »

The 2 cycling road races have been excellent viewing.

Incredible finish to the women's race.

Plus a sickening crash to the race leader 15 minutes or so before the end, I genuinely hope not fatal.

If you mean the Dutch girl I hear she is conscious and speaking thankfully.

Edit: sorry, late to the party I see.

NZ has its first medal anyway.

As per tradition, Kiwis will go mad for finding medal tables based on population size, which usually sees us leapfrog the likes of the States and China.

What are Ireland's main medal hopes? Boxing off the top of my head.

The Lost Sheep

swiwi_ wrote: »

NZ has its first medal anyway.

As per tradition, Kiwis will go mad for finding medal tables based on population size, which usually sees us leapfrog the likes of the States and China.

What are Ireland's main medal hopes? Boxing off the top of my head.

But ye do get a very high number of medals and so much better than countries of a similar size.
Boxing mainly. Rob Heffernan in 50k walk, O Keefe in Modern Pentathlon, some of the sailors possibly.

Bazzo

swiwi_ wrote: »

NZ has its first medal anyway.

As per tradition, Kiwis will go mad for finding medal tables based on population size, which usually sees us leapfrog the likes of the States and China.

What are Ireland's main medal hopes? Boxing off the top of my head.

Haven't been following it very closely at all to be honest but boxing and showjumping are usually reasonable chances.

The Lost Sheep wrote: »

But ye do get a very high number of medals and so much better than countries of a similar size.
Boxing mainly. Rob Heffernan in 50k walk, O Keefe in Modern Pentathlon, some of the sailors possibly.

Yeah in recent times, rowing usually gets us a handful of medals, often gold.

We have the shot-putters, the sailors, apparently some decent velodrome cyclists, and the rugby 7s are in with a chance.

Best thing about Kiwi medals is that they are not drug-tainted. At least to the best of my knowledge. You cheat to win a medal in NZ (and get caught of course), you might as well not step back into the country. Family would probably be ostracised too.

irishbucsfan

swiwi_ wrote: »

Yeah in recent times, rowing usually gets us a handful of medals, often gold.

We have the shot-putters, the sailors, apparently some decent velodrome cyclists, and the rugby 7s are in with a chance.

Best thing about Kiwi medals is that they are not drug-tainted. At least to the best of my knowledge. You cheat to win a medal in NZ (and get caught of course), you might as well not step back into the country. Family would probably be ostracised too.

You guys should try it sometime and be like us with a larger population, less medals but much more craic with the tests

Yeah_Right

Felix Jones is God wrote: »

She's ok, no report on the actual injuries, but alive and kicking

Just read on the NZ Herald site that she's in ICU with a concussion and a cracked spine. Hope they're wrong but after seeing it happen, I'd be surprised if she wasn't injured.

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Just read on the NZ Herald site that she's in ICU with a concussion and a cracked spine. Hope they're wrong but after seeing it happen, I'd be surprised if she wasn't injured.

Official line seems to be 3 fractures in her lumbar spine and heavy concussion. Fully conscious and responses "adequate", no internal bleeding, no other abnormalities. Had full CT scan and will remain in ICU for next 24 hours.

I nearly threw up when I saw it happen, I genuinely thought she was dead. Chris Boardman was fairly angry on BBC afterwards, he reckons there were a number of spots on the route that needed extra safety precautions and whoever inspected it didn't do their job.

In other Olympics news, an RTÉ commentator told me to go f**k myself on twitter earlier.

swiwi_ wrote: »

What are Ireland's main medal hopes? Boxing off the top of my head.

There's two brothers from Cork who row, apparently they might be in with a bit of a shot at a medal. The wind is messing the rowing around though, maybe that'll do us a favour, who knows.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

There's two brothers from Cork who row, apparently they might be in with a bit of a shot at a medal. The wind is messing the rowing around though, maybe that'll do us a favour, who knows.

I can never understand how the people who fund sports don't do more with the likes of sailing rowing well water stuff in general for an island nation we kinda should promote them.

connemara man wrote: »

I can never understand how the people who fund sports don't do more with the likes of sailing rowing well water stuff in general for an island nation we kinda should promote them.

Years of money being invested in the same handful of sports. I assume.

I live quite near the new sports campus, a pretty impressive place, but a fairly large chunk of it is football/GAA/rugby pitches. There is an equestrian area in it too, an sport I think we're already fairly good at too. There's a few other bits and pieces in there, gyms and stuff, which may benefit other athletes too, I suppose, and the pool/diving obviously. I did hear one of the modern pentathletes, her name escapes me now, saying that it was a great place because she could train for all 5 of her events in the one place now whereas before she was spent a lot of time driving all over the place for different things.

We seem to have quite a few athletes, relatively speaking, doing various boaty things this year in Rio so maybe they are investing, it's just less obvious than with other sports.