The Greatest Moments
Watching the relentless BBC coverage of the Winter Olympics, there's been plenty of time to fill when a plucky Brit wasn't finishing a creditable 19th, and several times they've filled that time by reminding us that it is exactly 30 years since the timeless glory of Torvill and Dean at Sarajevo.
While Ice Dancing has never been high up on my list of sports, it is nevertheless an iconic moment, remembered by anyone who watched it. I realised that it is my very first sporting memory, predating the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics, the 1984 West Indies tour to England and the 1985 Davis-Taylor snooker final, which also figure clearly in my early consciousness.
So I've been a sports fan for 30 years. A massive sports fan. A sports bore. The title of this blog is exactly what I do. Except I don't actually believe that. I just think most people don't take sport seriously enough.
Once, when making my slightly controversial case to an unbeliever that sport is actually the most important thing in the world, and being met by contemptuous incredulity, I was asked "Do you even play any sport?" as if sitting on a sofa watching hour after hour of it wasn't enough to tell fully formed, rational people how everything they think is wrong! Pah!
Well, I don't play much sport these days, just a little and most if it more "exercise" (sport's dull, worthy little brother), but I've played a fair bit in my time, never one in particular to a very high standard, but quite a few to a fair standard.
So, when the 9th interview with the beloved Jayne and Chris prompted me to consider what the most thrilling, life-enhancing moments of my sporting life (a precise 30 years) are, very quickly a few different strands entered my head. There were 1) the worldwide defining moments, the shots heard around the world 2) my own Brit-centric versions of the above, those televisual treats which have left me personally walking on air 3) the most glorious, or meaningful, sporting moments I'd been lucky enough to witness in the flesh and 4) I couldn't help thinking that some of my greatest sporting joys were at moments in my own life.
Playing sport has many times made me feel very happy, taken me out of myself, and, though it might seem nonsensical to consider these alongside the stunning exploits of sporting greats, I hope that by considering the feeling of active sporting participation, the minor (to anyone else, meaningless) triumphs and disasters of an individual, alongside the greater moments in a wider world, I will say something a little more resonant about all that is great in sport, why some of us love it so much.
I expect that'll sometimes seem like I'm blowing my own trumpet, but let me assure you that all these moments I've had exist at a very low level and i'm fully aware of that.
So there'll be 10 moments across each of these strands, each in their own way representing the greatest moments of my sporting life.
It's funny, I've watched a lot of sport, but I've also missed a lot of sport, and a surprisingly high percentage of that I've missed deliberately. I can be an extremely nervous sport watcher, and switching channel, leaving the room, doing anything to keep the tension from invading me, are all regular tools. How much of the 2005 Ashes did I actually watch? I spent most of the terrifying last day trying to find anywhere in Clapham it couldn't get to me. I went and sat in the corner of the local library for an hour at one point desperately trying to get the time to pass quicker.
And for many great sporting moments I've been in a field in Dorset or somewhere, desperately refreshing my phone every minute for the latest news. And there are different versions of the thrill of sporting triumph. In some ways, the moments I woke up, switched on my computer, and found out that Joe Calzaghe had defeated Bernard Hopkins in the night or that Andy Murray had one a titanic battle against Djokovic in the US Open final, were almost as thrilling as the events I've lived every second of. Sometimes it's the result, the numbers, the facts that are the thrill, sometimes it's the experience.
In many of those extraordinary matches between Nadal and Federer of the mid-2000s which took tennis to a new level, I really didn't care which of them won, I just wrapped myself up in the magnificence of it all. Whereas, due to holidays, nervousness, etc, I saw very little of Ian Bell's three Ashes-winning centuries in the summer of 2013 (aah, such innocent, halcyon days) but that doesn't mean they weren't a huge delight to me.
I want to talk about the different meanings that sport has for me, how I respond to it, what aspects of it are important. It's not the same for every sportsperson or sports fan. I genuinely believe, for example, that when David Gower talks about statistics not really being important, he means it. Maybe he doesn't even know his own test batting average (I do, it's 44.25). I, however, remember what my batting average was in the Colet Court Under-13 season (67.67, thanks). I remember my times, my wickets, my goal records, I live through the numbers, I always have done. Perhaps, in my own life, if I could have let go of the numbers and just relaxed, I'd have been a lot better.
So there'll be lots of statistics in this blog which will be meaningless and boring to you, and rightly so, but I want to reflect that they are very often the joy for me. Not always, sometimes the joy of sport will have nothing to do with numbers, but often.
So, I've got four strands, and I'll probably have 10 in each strand, so 40 moments/events in total (though I might easily extend that if I feel the urge) and I'll probably mix it up, have one of one sort following one of another etc.
I don't think there'll be any rankings, I'm not really trying to say what "the best" is in this case. I'm really trying to make sense of sport and all that it's meant to me.
I'll start with something fresh obvious ... coming right up ...
While Ice Dancing has never been high up on my list of sports, it is nevertheless an iconic moment, remembered by anyone who watched it. I realised that it is my very first sporting memory, predating the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics, the 1984 West Indies tour to England and the 1985 Davis-Taylor snooker final, which also figure clearly in my early consciousness.
So I've been a sports fan for 30 years. A massive sports fan. A sports bore. The title of this blog is exactly what I do. Except I don't actually believe that. I just think most people don't take sport seriously enough.
Once, when making my slightly controversial case to an unbeliever that sport is actually the most important thing in the world, and being met by contemptuous incredulity, I was asked "Do you even play any sport?" as if sitting on a sofa watching hour after hour of it wasn't enough to tell fully formed, rational people how everything they think is wrong! Pah!
Well, I don't play much sport these days, just a little and most if it more "exercise" (sport's dull, worthy little brother), but I've played a fair bit in my time, never one in particular to a very high standard, but quite a few to a fair standard.
So, when the 9th interview with the beloved Jayne and Chris prompted me to consider what the most thrilling, life-enhancing moments of my sporting life (a precise 30 years) are, very quickly a few different strands entered my head. There were 1) the worldwide defining moments, the shots heard around the world 2) my own Brit-centric versions of the above, those televisual treats which have left me personally walking on air 3) the most glorious, or meaningful, sporting moments I'd been lucky enough to witness in the flesh and 4) I couldn't help thinking that some of my greatest sporting joys were at moments in my own life.
Playing sport has many times made me feel very happy, taken me out of myself, and, though it might seem nonsensical to consider these alongside the stunning exploits of sporting greats, I hope that by considering the feeling of active sporting participation, the minor (to anyone else, meaningless) triumphs and disasters of an individual, alongside the greater moments in a wider world, I will say something a little more resonant about all that is great in sport, why some of us love it so much.
I expect that'll sometimes seem like I'm blowing my own trumpet, but let me assure you that all these moments I've had exist at a very low level and i'm fully aware of that.
So there'll be 10 moments across each of these strands, each in their own way representing the greatest moments of my sporting life.
It's funny, I've watched a lot of sport, but I've also missed a lot of sport, and a surprisingly high percentage of that I've missed deliberately. I can be an extremely nervous sport watcher, and switching channel, leaving the room, doing anything to keep the tension from invading me, are all regular tools. How much of the 2005 Ashes did I actually watch? I spent most of the terrifying last day trying to find anywhere in Clapham it couldn't get to me. I went and sat in the corner of the local library for an hour at one point desperately trying to get the time to pass quicker.
And for many great sporting moments I've been in a field in Dorset or somewhere, desperately refreshing my phone every minute for the latest news. And there are different versions of the thrill of sporting triumph. In some ways, the moments I woke up, switched on my computer, and found out that Joe Calzaghe had defeated Bernard Hopkins in the night or that Andy Murray had one a titanic battle against Djokovic in the US Open final, were almost as thrilling as the events I've lived every second of. Sometimes it's the result, the numbers, the facts that are the thrill, sometimes it's the experience.
In many of those extraordinary matches between Nadal and Federer of the mid-2000s which took tennis to a new level, I really didn't care which of them won, I just wrapped myself up in the magnificence of it all. Whereas, due to holidays, nervousness, etc, I saw very little of Ian Bell's three Ashes-winning centuries in the summer of 2013 (aah, such innocent, halcyon days) but that doesn't mean they weren't a huge delight to me.
I want to talk about the different meanings that sport has for me, how I respond to it, what aspects of it are important. It's not the same for every sportsperson or sports fan. I genuinely believe, for example, that when David Gower talks about statistics not really being important, he means it. Maybe he doesn't even know his own test batting average (I do, it's 44.25). I, however, remember what my batting average was in the Colet Court Under-13 season (67.67, thanks). I remember my times, my wickets, my goal records, I live through the numbers, I always have done. Perhaps, in my own life, if I could have let go of the numbers and just relaxed, I'd have been a lot better.
So there'll be lots of statistics in this blog which will be meaningless and boring to you, and rightly so, but I want to reflect that they are very often the joy for me. Not always, sometimes the joy of sport will have nothing to do with numbers, but often.
So, I've got four strands, and I'll probably have 10 in each strand, so 40 moments/events in total (though I might easily extend that if I feel the urge) and I'll probably mix it up, have one of one sort following one of another etc.
I don't think there'll be any rankings, I'm not really trying to say what "the best" is in this case. I'm really trying to make sense of sport and all that it's meant to me.
I'll start with something fresh obvious ... coming right up ...
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