How about Taupo for an Austerity Games?
So I come back to Taupo. Now some will say that Owen Delany Park only has a grass running track. Well, what's wrong with that? Retro is cool.
COMMENT mayor doesn’t even want the Olympics in her city because they can’t afford it.
And as for Budapest. Apart from the fact that we couldn’t possibly go to a country that has a canoeist who goes much faster than Lisa Carrington over 500 metres, there is the matter of prime minister Viktor Orban, known as the Viktator, a man who courts Vladimir Putin and erects razor wire border fences.
And so I come back to Taupo. Now some will say that Owen Delany Park only has a grass running track. Well, what’s wrong with that? Retro is cool. OK, so there wouldn’t be many world records, but can’t these Games just be about enjoyment.
The London Olympics of 1948, the original Austerity Games, chucked down some cinders at Wembley stadium to create a track. Jack Braughton, the Mo Farah of his day only not so fast, worked a half day on the building site in the morning, hopped on a bus and a tube to the stadium, and then ran the 5000 metres.
War was not long over and the world had a bit of perspective. The athletes brought their own towels, the French brought their own wine and the Canadians donated a couple of lengths of springy pine for the diving boards. £750,000 were allocated for the Games and they made a small profit despite the hand-out of free horlicks tablets.
Since then the Olympics has got fatter and fatter and is now in danger of eating itself. The mayor of Rio was booed. They couldn’t sell tickets for the closing ceremony, despite slashing prices at the last minute. They have sold 12 per cent of tickets for next month’s Paralympics. And still Bach blathers on about friendship, harmony, peace and the power of sport to unite the world.
So here’s the outline plan for Taupo. It is a perfect location for so many of the big outdoor sports like triathlon and mountain biking and the new one of ‘‘sport climbing’’. It’s got a fine golf course in place. But these are an inclusive Games, so we’re going to share the party with Tokoroa’s YMCA and Memorial Sports Ground and Rotorua, which has an outdoor 50 metre pool.
How about a partnership with Kathmandu over selling camping gear to the athletes’ village? It’s a New Zealand company. They could pay a share of the profits back to government. We would audition for local teenagers to officiate, because kids are often a lot more fair-minded than adults and they are bound to do a better job than the mob in Rio who incited protests across the sports.
Why not bring in Al Brown to organise some of the outdoor catering. He knows how to barbecue and he would be stoked to get involved. Ask countries to supply some specialty food. Argentina could import steaks. New Zealand’s scotch fillet is great, but these Games are about sharing, including roving TV cameras.
The team that wins the most gold medals could be required to supply a band for the closing ceremony. So thanks, USA, could you line someone up just in case you finish top of the medal table. And if it really has to be Springsteen, then I know how to lose gracefully.
At the opening ceremony athletes can duet on Steve Abel’s beautiful song . Only we will have a nationwide competition to choose a final more upbeat adjective than lonely. Mahe and Valerie – obviously they’ll still be competing whatever they say – can sing together,
‘‘Where is your beautiful heart? Not yet set free But how do you go these days? Hopeful I be.’’
And then Eliza Mccartney will pole vault over Lake Taupo and into the future. And yes, that last bit’s a metaphor, but the rest is for real if only we still knew how to think that way.