Even without Magic Mo, athletics will always be pure gold
ThE World Athletics Championships in london were a brilliant showcase, highlighting what is so great about the sport — countries from most continents producing drama and spectacle. But what is the future of track and field, especially considering problems such as drugs, gender, IAAF incompetence and corruption? Boxing, cycling, weightlifting, baseball, bodybuilding and football have all been tarnished with similar abuses, and yet each sport survives. Mixed martial arts is the world’s fastest-growing combat sport and yet, like boxing, it can cause brain damage to your opponent. Yes, advocates of the sport will bang on about the grace, skill and spectacle, but nothing removes the fact that every fighter tries for a knockout and every medical book will tell you this causes brain damage. The World Medical Association called for a ban on boxing more than 20 years ago. Despite all this pressure, the sport is thriving. And what about road cycling? Drug taking on an epic scale was de rigueur in the past. lance Armstrong’s epic cheating makes sprinter Justin Gatlin look like a choir boy. The sport has been cleaned up, and we saw in the recent Tour de France that it is more popular than ever. Athletics doesn’t need a Usain Bolt or Mo Farah to create a shop window for the sport, because the sport is bigger than mere individuals. Ultimately, the chief asset of athletics is its simplicity. IF ThERE are to be no more bin collections until Christmas in Birmingham, bring in the Army and sack the bin men.
Alternatively, the residents should hire lorries, collect the rubbish, drive round to Unite hQ and the council offices and dump it all there. P. WEBBERLEY, Warton, Lancs.
Swift response
I AGREE with Amanda Platell about the Taylor Swift bottom-pinching incident.
Working for the chief executive of a charity, I went to collect a visitor, who I knew quite well, from reception.
We got into the lift and suddenly I felt his hand on my bottom. I calmly said: ‘Get your dirty hands off me!’
I didn’t say a word about it to my boss. I never suffered any trauma afterwards, it did not change my personality, and I certainly did not lose Who hasn’t run at some point in their lives? Who hasn’t tried to outdo their family and friends in a jumping competition, or tried to best their buddies in throwing the furthest? At its heart no particular equipment is needed, not even special clothes, so participation does not need any monetary outlay. how many sports can any sleep over it. What did upset me was he had the nicest wife, to whom he had been married for years.
Name and address supplied.
Lording it over me
WhEN it comes to this generation of pensioners ‘ hitting the jackpot’, Ros Altmann is certainly the expert.
By turning up for just a few hours a week at the bestresourced old people’s day boast that? The sport’st’ benefitsb fit and simplicity will outdo the gloom expressed by many commentators. As track and field legend Jesse Owens said: ‘Find the good. It’s all around you. Find it, showcase it and you’ll start believing in it.’ care centre on the planet — the house of lords — she will receive, tax-free, double what I have to live on for a week after making 40 years of National Insurance contributions.
P. ALLAN, Middlesbrough, N. Yorks.
No win for workers
ThE deal Port Talbot steelworkers agreed to puts the owners of Tata in a win-win situation. The group has DAVID VANDYKE, Shoreham-by-Sea, W. Sussex. lowered its costs over pensions, and might merge with a German steel company. This will mean a large cash payout and share options.
Meanwhile, the workers get very little reward for all their efforts, other than the pleasure of working for a foreign company.
I suspect there will be a lot of downsizing at Port Talbot in the near future.
RONALD BALL, Farnborough, Hants.