DAN’S THE MAN

DAN’S THE MAN

12)Quiz HQ sent a reporter to the London Marathon. No standing by the road for Dan Brewer. He changed into his running kit and raised thousands for his local hospice.
Dan writes “The London Marathon broke a world record on Sunday for the largest number of finishers and the largest number of spectators. Like many sporting events now, the emphasis seems to be on ‘the bigger, the better’ and in terms of crowd support, giving opportunities to runners and the money raised for charity you would have to agree this is a good thing. The organisation required for such a big event must be an enormous undertaking and from a runner’s point of view seemed very impressive. From free train fares for runners on Sunday, to lorries taking kit bags from start to finish, to the wave start to spread runners out, the multiple start lines and all the water stations & volunteers, it’s an incredible operation.

The one downside is for supporters trying to see their friend/relative from multiple places on the course, as the sheer number of supporters in London can be problematic as the day progresses, as queues & busy tube stations build up, making quick transitions from one mile location to another extremely challenging.

On Sunday, the heat was an added complication to pacing strategy for runners to consider. Go too quickly and risk ‘blowing up’ but go too slowly and risk the feeling of frustration that there was a better time for the taking. For me, it was the former which made miles 18-26 extremely uncomfortable, forcing me to take 60-90 seconds extra per mile and will my legs to take that extra step. The pace I ran to start with wasn’t particularly unrealistic, but it’s likely the heat took its toll & affected me more than I’d hoped it would. Eilish McColgan suggested that this might also have been the case for many of the top British athletes and prevented them from going quite as quickly as they’d hoped. The heat did not stop Ethiopian Tigst Assefa from breaking the world record for a women only field of marathon runners. So YES, her time was well under your target time of 2 hrs 17 minutes. Just how difficult were the conditions for the vast majority is shown by her winning margin of almost three minutes. Unlucky for you NO quizzers; everybody except Tigst finished outside the time.

Experienced marathon runners tell me that everything has to go right on the day in order for them to achieve their target time, and for them there will be another marathon around the corner to try and strike it lucky. For many on Sunday, it would have been their only time, so judging their effort in conditions they wouldn’t have faced in training was an added hurdle to overcome. This is where the crowd play their part and having hundreds of people call your name in support and give you encouragement is fantastic. The atmosphere on the course is incredible, with choirs, DJ’s and the number of spectators making it seem like the equivalent of a 26 mile football stadium entrance. For runners it feels very personal (especially if you have your name on your vest) but then you remember these people supporting are energetically cheering on 56,639 other people as well over several hours.

All runners will have their own personal story/targets around their marathon run. There is a real community feel to running races, with the majority of runners not able to contemplate winning, so a win for them is the personal achievement, the money they are raising & the stories behind their chosen charity. As a result the warmth of the day is incredibly special to be part of with no egos and a real sense of warmth from everyone to each other. It was fantastic to be involved in a day where there was so much good being done by so many people, where they are giving themselves to run, support or volunteer whilst thinking about those less fortunate than themselves. “

13)You had to dig deep into obscure corners of the Internet to find out which country had won the World Mixed Doubles Curling and when you got there, it was to discover that this was a rare wipeout with not one quizzer choosing the winners, ITALY. A wipeout! I blame the clown who writes Quiz Tips for not researching relevant information. Not a fluke for the Italian pair were the reigning Olympic champions; not a fluke for the Italians won every one of their nine round robin matches. Many quizzers went with Scotland, the silver medallists, who gave the Italians their toughest test of the tournament until a disastrous seventh end. And in third place came Australia! You what! Is there no way we can keep the convicts in their place? Just warming up for the Ashes.

14)The World Snooker Championship became the ultimate former champion v first timer battle proposed by the question. For the old timers came Mark Williams, one of the celebrated Class of’92,a three time champion and the oldest ever finalist. He’d beaten fellow Class of’92 veteran John Higgins in the quarters. Ronnie O’Sullivan came out of partial retirement to reach the semis. But neither Ronnie or Mark could handle the FIRST TIMER, Zhao Zintong.
Zhao beat Ronnie 8-0 in one session, Mark 7-1 in another. Mark prolonged the match into a final session but only by winning four frames in a row with Zhao needing just the one. Zhao had had to come through qualifying to reach the main draw after a ban for betting on matches, though not for throwing matches. Betting a perennial problem in sports popular in Asia as we cricket fans know. There were seven Chinese players in the last 32.Zhao is the first Chines world champion. He won’t be the last.

16)Manchester City in the Cup Final AGAIN; so predictable! Except it wasn’t. Sometime in the late Autumn, the team that had dominated English football for a decade overnight looked fallible. If Pep had hair, he would have tried to pull it out, so inexplicable was the fall off form’s face. At about the same time in Autumn, Crystal Palace had won only one of their first fourteen games. Just as suddenly as City’s fall, Palace started winning, chock full of dazzling talent, must haves for a Fantasy manager looking for a bargain.
The bookies of course made City big favourites. Perhaps they had not seen City rain 26 shots on hapless Southampton’s goal without scoring. The passing and possession stats so beloved of modern analysts were overwhelmingly in City’s favour. The only statistic that ever really counts, ONE goal scored by Palace on virtually their first visit to City’s half.
Most quizzers had hoped for a more free scoring game and will have found quite inexplicable Haaland’s decision to hand over penalty taking duties, perhaps a tell for City’s lack of confidence. A matter of debate too as the heroic Palace keeper stayed on the pitch after a controversial handball.