What a summer of sport. I keep wanting to move the blog back onto computing stuff thinking we’re done with that
World stuff, and another World event pops up on my busy sports watching calendar !
Today the 2009 World Athletics Championships conclude in Berlin and once again we’ve had a reminder of how tough it is to be an Athlete. Get this : unless you are from the Caribbean or the USA, you won’t win an Olympic or World Gold medal in the sprints, and unless you are Kenyan, Ethiopian, or a Russian woman, you won’t win a medal in the distance events starting at the 800m all the way to the marathon. So, if your profile does not fit either of these two, you will either need to content yourself with being European, Asian, African, or Americas champion, or you need to find a field event you can excel at.
Phew! Rather you than me !
Still, it does not lessen the wonderful performances of the athletes on show. But today Athletics is much more than the jumping, throwing, and running (yes, you and I can talk for years and I will still never agree that the “walk” should be part of Athletics!), it is also show business.
Usain Bolt has made sure of that. And it’s wonderful. The mascot carries Melaine Walker on her 400m Hurdles victory lap, runs straight into a barrier he hadn’t seen and the two of them crash to the floor, Robert Harting unexpectedly wins the Men’s Discus in front of his Berlin home crowd and goes ballistic providing more entertainment in his celebrations than in the previous three hours of discuss throwing. Linet Masai of Kenya (what an evocative surname, Masai!) leads for most of the 10,000m Women, she is then passed in the back straight by two Ethiopians and at 100m from the finish line she is 15m back, finished, a goner, fighting for the bronze medal, and then somehow she decides
“what the heck”, tries again and inch by inch by inch claws her way back to win in a photo finish. Unbelievable. The smile on Linet Masai’s face during that victory lap will stay with me forever
— she had just won the lottery, believe me !
This has been a wonderful week and Usain Bolt, Linet Masai, Melaine Walker, LeShawn Merritt, Shelly-Ann Fraser (how could I miss mentioning her!), Robert Harting, Steffi Nerius, Kerron Clement, Blanka Vlasic, and, of course, Germany’s Ariane Friedrich, and supporting actors, have put on wonderful entertainment.
Aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
I leave you with images of the first final which on the first day of these Championships set the tone for this wonderful week of Athletics, Linet Masai’s improbable win :
or, as this Italian commentator says (I love these Italian commentators —
they’re so passionate, even when it’s not Valentino Rossi they’re
talking about): Incredible, Incredible, Attenzione, Attenzione !!!
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Wednesday, 29th July 2009
Right,
1 million to 1 chance of this ever happening !
Since I've effectively dedicated this month's to sporting excellence I thought I'd finish the month with the most incredible motorcycle racing pictures I've ever seen. I was looking for videos of the last motorcycle legend before Valentino Rossi and of course it was the Australian
Mick Doohan. The first video I clicked on, however, was extraordinary. The stage is the 1990 German Grand Prix at The Nürburgring and the leading actors are Mick Doohan and Pierfrancesco Chili. What happens next is absolutely unbelievable
— as the Spanish-speaking commentator says, "In a scene more appropriate to ballet....".
Watch this amazing film :
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Tueday, 21st July 2009
The amazing Pings !!!!
Now what does this title lead to ? Checking if a router is up, or whether a server is up ?
Or, could it be the sound of plastic hitting a table at 65mph (105Kmh) ?
Well, I'll give you a clue. Imagine a 2.7 grams white ball being the national sport of China... Yes, Ping Pong.
I used to eat, drink, sleep that sport, six days a week till I ruptured an Achilles tendon in a squash match. Table-Tennis, or Ping Pong, was my Life
— nothing else mattered, and yet, after 4 years of YouTube it is only today that I thought of looking up Table-Tennis on YouTube. An absolute crime !
So, since this month's blog seems to have turned into a sports blog, I thought I'd delight you with this compilation YouTube video of the
sport of my Life. Please, Please, Please, watch it till the last unbelievable rally. Enjoy :
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Sunday, 6th July 2009
Roger Federer — a Tennis Genius
None of the sports journalists seem to have picked it up but, today, on the day when Roger Federer became the greatest tennis player of all time by winning his 15th Grand Slam tournament in winning Wimbledon against Andy Roddick, a major tennis mathematical fact was proven, and it goes like this :
"It is impossible to beat a guy who serves 50 aces in a match !".
Just look at the mathematics averaged out over a match : at 2 aces per game, this means 25 serving games with 2 guaranteed free points in each game. It also means that you are looking at someone who is extremely fit (to play 25 serving games!).
That's for the average. The reality is even more stunning. Roger Federer won the title 5-7, 7-6, 7-6, 3-6, 16-14. He served 22 of his 50 aces in the last set, ie. over 15 serving games. More specifically, he served 19 of his aces from 4-4 to the conclusion at 16-14, effectively 19 aces over his last 11 serving games, almost 2 aces per game.
Got it ? It was an incredible performance. Andy Roddick played the
match of his life, while Federer, who had been imperious on his way to the final, was tense in the face of making History through breaking all records and officially becoming the greatest tennis player of all time. His normally unreadable backhand was nowhere to be found and you could have been forgiven for thinking that his trademark run-around killer forehand was an urban myth. The pressure of making History reduced Roger Federer to a mere mortal, in tennis terms that is.
But Roger Federer is a tennis genius and an unbelievable champion, so what did this greatest of all time do? —
at 5-4 in the final set, when he realised that he was unable to play
his best tennis, when he realised that Andy Roddick was playing the
match of his life, Roger Federer, as a great champion, as the
greatest tennis champion of all time, visibly decided on a simple
strategy — "I am fit, I can last another 40 games if needed, the only thing that's working today is my serve, I can't even play a simple forehand when Andy returns my serve well, so I am going to concentrate on doing my serve extremely well, win all my games, and see where this gets me....". And from that point on Federer raised the standard of his serving and simply blitzed his way through his serving games, most of the time serving aces in batches of 2 or 3. It was unbelievable. There was even a game where, after the 3rd straight ace by Federer, Andy Roddick spread his arms, looked up at the umpire, and shook his head in disbelief !
The plan worked — eventually, Roddick simply wilted through fatigue and demoralisation at Roger Federer's aces-serving demonstration.
We witnessed today a master class of adaptation, of flexibility from
Roger Federer, the greatest tennis player of all time.
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Monday, 29th June 2009
Valentino Rossi & Zhu Zhq
Question : What have Valentino Rossi and Zhu Zhq got in common ?
Pure Genius !!!
Recently some of us here at AnswersThatWork have been receiving some animations labelled as
"fantastic". Well, OK, they were good. But the best one for me has to be the stick man
Kung-Fu Fighter (XiaoXiao) from the original master of animation Zhu Zhq. I couldn't locate it on safe pages on the web for all of you to enjoy so decided to post it on our own website. Enjoy Zhu Zhq's genius here.
Onto Mr Rossi, the GOAT (Greatest Of All Time). Valentino Rossi is the greatest motorcycle rider of all time. What really characterizes him is that when he is pushed, when the only thing that will do is going beyond the impossible, then Valentino
will go beyond the impossible. Yes, Valentino won the Dutch MotoGP Grand Prix at Assen, Netherlands on Saturday and established a lead over Lorenzo at the top of the leaderboard, but for me, in the same way that Valentino effectively won the 2008 title at Laguna Seca by going beyond the impossible and demoralising Casey Stoner in one of the most amazing races of all time, I truly believe that even though we are not yet at the middle point of the 2009 season, Valentino Rossi's unbelievable win 2 weeks ago in Barcelona effectively won the mental battle against Jorge Lorenzo for this year's title. You've read it here first : when the season ends in September everyone will say that Valentino Rossi won the title
two weeks ago in Barcelona at the 2009 Catalunya MotoGP Grand Prix.
Judge for yourself — Enjoy Valentino Rossi's genius below (and make sure you turn the sound up)
— The Doctor rules OK !
Enjoyed it ? Now, I couldn't help but also include a clip from the Italian channel that covered the race; the commentator even lost his voice
— Mama Mia ! Grazie per tutto questo !
I tell you : this was the most unbelievable 500cc race I have ever seen, and, certainly, the most incredible last lap. As everyone said :
the best race of all time culminating in an incredible last corner win for the Greatest Of All Time. Valentino Rossi
— a genius in our time.
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Thursday, 25th June 2009
The traces we leave behind....
You know those modern-day networked office photocopiers that can do anything from simply photocopying to printing from anywhere on the network, scan to a folder or to an email address, print double-sided, print books, all of this in colour of course, keep your print jobs for printing or reprinting later, and make pizza ?
Increasingly these photocopiers are known by their other description
— multi-function printers. Well, we had an interesting meeting recently. We were consulting with an embassy and they told us that all their embassies worldwide had new instructions as regards those photocopiers.
As you may or may not know, all these photocopiers have an internal hard disk. The photocopier receives all print jobs to the hard disk before printing them. If the print job is to be kept by the copier for reprinting at a later stage, it is stored on the hard disk. All scan jobs are first scanned to the hard disk before being stored into their destination folder or emailed. And, lastly, when you are photocopying, your originals are first scanned to the hard disk before being printed as photocopies.
Do you see where I'm going ?
The directive from this particular country to all its embassies worldwide as regards these photocopiers was :
"Whenever a photocopier engineer is required, make sure that someone watches him/her at all times. At no stage should the engineer be allowed to plug in a flash USB pen into the photocopier, and if the engineer should want to change the hard disk, the hard disk stays with the Embassy so that the IT guys can securely wipe the hard disk and erase all traces of passport photocopies, confidential government information, etc...".
The traces we leave behind....
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Thursday, 11th June 2009
To Believe or not to Believe
Here is one for the Philosophy professors.
Some will see this as a religious issue, but it is not.
Some will see this as a metaphysical issue, but it is not.
Some will see this as a philosophical issue, but it is not.
A few mathematicians and computer geeks out there will see it as a logical issue
— maybe they're right....
Question : if one does not believe in the good of anyone or any situation, if one always sees deviousness where there is straightness, if one always sees angles where there are none, can true contentment ever come to one ?
