stapfam

Friday and it was a 5am start to catch the train 30 miles away. We have local trains that would have done but by going inland a bit we saved $150 on 5 rail tickets. Got to London bridge station and the "New" building of the shard. It is tall but not that exciting. One thing noted though was the number of bikes outside the station. Thousands of them chained up and obviously used by commuters to travel in by train and finish the journey to the office in a quicker- cheaper and greener manner



By 8 am and we were at the complex and first thing I noticed was a sign saying "No bikes past this point"---and two bikes coming out of the complex. Not too many crowds at this time so time to get a pic of the Pringle-as the Velodrome has been nicknamed. I had come prepared with a good pair of walking boots and loose clothing and it was a 20 to 30 minute walk away. As soon as I was near enough to get a decent photo-I walked round and saw some of the other sights. Some of the Venues are not that spectacular so won't post them but the "Coca-Cola" Beat Box looked fun. The largest Mc Donalds in the world is here also but the complex is big. That 3rd pic of The Holiday Inn by the way is part of security. It was everywhere but to had to look for it and apart from the obvious signs of Police and army personnel- Security was high.




No time to look at everything as were were on the the Stadium to see the Athletics. On the way to it we saw thge Royal Barge but they weren't doing trips round the harbour and we couldn't find the ticket office for the Helter Skelter called the "Orbit". No idea what this is to represent or what it does or is- but it is there.



So time to get into the stadium and "Wow".Our seat were looking down the finishing straight and right by the Cauldron. It also gave the best viewing spot for the Javelin and just as well as two events were going on here.

stapfam

Views from our seat



Not too many there at 9:30 am but it did fill up. Plenty of time to get breakfast but the events that morning were two of the mens javelin- Long Jump for visually impaired women and Discus women in some class. there were also heats on the track for the evening finals but I am not kidding when I say that the Javelin was fantastic. First event and the world record was broken 7 times. Second event and it was broken 5 times. In the discuss a new world record was set and the long jump and on the final jump by the leader of the class- A New world record again. The track heats were in the main one person out front and the rest somewhere. But just to show- The crowds- the Stadium was around 95 to 97% full by the end. Unfortuante part was- we all wanted to stay till the end so there were 80,000 from the morning- 80,000 for the afternoon- all the other spectators so there were around 250,000 people all trying to get Lunch at the same time. That place was crowded. And just to prove I was there- I got the hat to prove it.



We had planned to get to brands Hatch to watch the cycling but had so much fun trying to get lunch and the cycling finished early that we just stayed at the Paralympics and savoured the day.

El Segundo

Good report and pictures. Looks like you had a great time.

overthehillmedi

Now if they only got their stuff together and combinded the two Olympics rather than segergated them life would be good.

stapfam

Sounds a great idea but many changes have to be made to accommodate some of the disabled competitors. And different rules are made aswell. Start blocks for the Para are not obligatory- Blind Competitors need certain safety rules and I can just hear the complaints about the blade runners ruining the track.

And on top of that- where would you accommodate double the number of competitors. Sounds great but the logistics would be impossible.

rm -rf

His carbon fiber hand cycle:
Ex-F1 driver Zanardi completes incredible journey after storming to Paralympic gold
The report

eja_ bottecchia

Thanks for the report and the photographs.

I wish I had been there myself.

Thanks and congratulation to you guys--you pulled off one of the best Olympic Games in recent history and now the Paralympics.

Are you going to the parade for Team GB, or is that over already?

stapfam

The parade is Monday but I will not be there. TV coverage will be good and I don't think the wallet will take another trip to London right now.

ThatBritBloke

Blimey! What does that thing weigh?

Bikey Mikey

Probably not a lot but look at the arms that guy has. Since his arms are what powers the cycle, he probably can crack walnuts with his biceps and forearms.

stapfam

Funny thing about the road cycling over here--There was none. All we had was a glimpse of the riders going over the line as they finished in the days round up. Track cycling was well covered with most events being shown in full but the road racing was non-existant.