Olympic legacy??

Hi all

Hope all you sun kissed lovelies are OK. Its a beautiful Saturday afternoon and i am about to sit down to watch the Sainsbury Anniversary Games on the beeb. Quite frankly i am flummoxed as to how this past year has flown by. This time last year we were just sitting down to watch the first full day of competition in London Town.

The legacy is something that as been mentioned many times in the last year and it annoys me how fast people have been to comment on the supposed lack of a legacy. Me thoughts are.... Chill out, it has only been a year! It is going to take many years to feel the impact of London 2012. I truly believe it won't be until 2020 until we really see the begin stages of our true legacy. It will happen though! Our Olympic heroes Jess Ennis Hill, Greg Rutherford and Mo Farrah have become household names and icons in the eyes of children, teens and adults alike. As i mentioned in a previous post i love the idea that these 3 and also paralympians are now role models to our children instead of footballers and singers.

The worry I have regarding the legacy revolves around the government's money saving measures. Growing up in Yorkshire i have seen this at first hand with the devastating news that Don Valley Stadium, the training hub of our golden girl Jess Ennis-Hill is to be demolished in the near future. This in my opinion is a complete travesty, not just for people wanting to follow in her actual footsteps at her home track but for the home of athletics in South Yorkshire. There is talk about moving training facilities to the nearby woodburn Road Athletics stadium but these facilities will require development also. The Don Valley facilities are due to demolished to make way for a newer sporting centre but my worry is that the build time will be too long for any potential olympic hopefuls wanting to take early advantage.

To have your say and sign the Save Don Valley petition please click here

The Last Leg is going for gold!

Well my Friday nights have just got even better thanks to the return of The Last Leg. A show which took the country by storm during The 2012 Paralympic Games. This show has not only prove to be a huge comedy hit but also has helped break down barriers surrounding disability sport and disabilities as a whole.

Hosted by the ever cheery Australian stand up Adam Hills and his wing men Josh Widicombe and Alex Brooker, these funnymen don't hide the fact that they too have a limb missing here and there. An opening line of the show last night (25/1/13) was "3 men with 4 legs between them" Adam for one example never lets his leg act as a taboo subject for him or his fans, he often uses it as the punch line within his stand up routines. His stories of airport security experiences, ways to ensure you have an entire beach to yourself and the response he gets worldwide to his newly Union Jack decorated prosthesis.    

"Sydney was the first Paralympic games where the competitors felt like equals, London is the first where they have been treated as heroes"      (Adam Hills)

The most insightful section of the show is the #IsItOk, which allows the viewers to ask a question they would probably be too scared to ask in the usual situation so provides them with the outlet to do so.
 During the paralympics we asked questions such as #Isitok 'to wonder why they bother showing a red card to a blind football player' and also #Isitok 'to wonder how an athlete with no arms gets out of a swimming pool?'
Why should it not be OK to wonder about these situations? Surely ignorance is more offensive than anything else in this world? I don't like the term disabled in the slightest! Surely we should celebrate everyone's ABILITIES
As The above quote shows, London 2012 made heroes of athletes such as Johnnie Peacock, Hannah Cockroft, Jody Cundy and Sarah Story and to be honest, I am very proud of being part of a generation who see Oscar Pistorius as a hero rather than an over-paid footballer


Sophie
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