Sportswatch

I am not one of those who follow sports avidly. I like to watch some - the Wimbledon finals, World Cup Soccer, the Superbowl, the basketball championship, and the like. Otherwise it is just some random game now and then.

Not every sport is exciting to watch. Take golf for example. You can only see bits and pieces of the action. If you are on site then it is even more frustrating as you simply cannot keep up with the overall standings or even the score of an individual player. On TV, you get to see some amazing aerial shots. The camera follows the arc of the ball for your convenience. Still, golf is hardly a spectator sport. It does not create enough tension and excitement. You are not likely to get to the edge of the seat seeing Tiger Woods attempt a putt from thirty-five feet. Even the commentary is subdued. But it has one merit. On a lazy Sunday afternoon, it is the ideal companion for a snooze. The green, the fairway, the sand traps and the lack of crowd noise all contribute to the soporific effect.

The Olympics just got done at Rio and this is obviously one time when I do watch a lot of sports on TV.  Unfortunately, this puts you at the mercy of the network which decides when to air and what to air. Being on the west coast always means a tape delay. In addition, the coverage focuses a lot on story-telling. I am not really keen on knowing all about the athletes' backgrounds, their parents or their ninety-year old grandma. I just want to see the actual performances. But the network spends a lot of time and effort preparing these back stories and you have little choice but to suffer through them. The coverage is naturally US centric. I wish they would try to shine the spotlight on others too now and then. Often, key events are shown late at night. And of course, everything is edited heavily to suit the breaks for commercials. Watching them online as they happen may be an option but you are likely to be at work then.

Despite all these shortcomings, much time in the past two weeks has been spent in front of the television watching the Olympics. It was annoying to wait while they went through all sorts of other sports before getting to the ones I like. Water polo and synchronized swimming leave me cold especially the latter where you mostly see two pairs of legs sticking up over the water. I do realize that this takes a lot of skill and effort, but I can't seem to get excited about it. Ditto for trampolining and other made up sports.

This year, swimming competitions produced a few close finishes and new world records. The dash and splash of the relays, the camera capturing the swimmers from above and below the water, and the roar of the crowd made for some good TV. The absolute excitement of the commentator his voice going higher and higher as each race went on at first felt way over the top but I actually ended up liking it.

To me, the Olympics are ultimately all about track and field. The sprints are electrifying and even in slow motion replay they look ridiculously fast. It was quite a thrill to see Usain Bolt dominate the sprints for the third time. The way the jumpers glide over the bar head first in high jump and feet first in pole vault is fascinating. I wonder if these techniques were inspired by the White Knight's ideas about jumping the gate in Through the Looking Glass. The relay races always provide some unexpected turns.

The 110 metre hurdles is my favourite event. There is a sort of poetic rhythm in this race. The starting gun goes off and the sprinters launch themselves from the blocks. They alternately sprint and fly (there is no other way to put it) as they jump over each hurdle. It is better than the 100 metres dash where the whole thing goes off like a blur. Here you kind of get a break each time a hurdle is cleared letting you savour the moment. When the camera follows along showing you the view from the side the effect is truly magical with the runners being almost synchronized. I can say that I feel quite athletic watching it practically jumping up from the couch.

At the other end of the spectrum is the marathon. The sheer endurance of the runners as they ran in high humidity this year was a testament to their physical and mental strength. This is where TV coverage is at its best with close ups and aerial shots. Surprisingly, it is not monotonous to watch this. It is quite absorbing to see the lead group slowly thinning and then completely pull apart over the last half hour. This year's winner  Kipchoge of Kenya who had been a picture of calm focus all along, reached the finish line with a broad smile on his face. What a fitting coda to the whole games!

*'I'll tell you how I came to think of it,' said the Knight. 'You see, I said to myself "The only difficulty is with the feet: the head is high enough already." Now, first I put my head on the top of the gate -- then the head's high enough -- then I stand on my head -- then the feet are high enough, you see -- then I'm over, you see.' (Through The Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll)