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The Games of the XXXI Olympiad - Russian Free Zone TBF

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How on earth did GB get so prolific at the Olympics?

It's unnerving. This Games and the last, duking it out with super powers in the medals table. And what's happened to the Germans - their Teutonic efficiency used to carry all before them, now they're getting sand kicked in their face by Brian Britain.

Surely Lottery cash doesn't cover all this as an explanation?

The cash, the humiliation in Atlanta, and proper talent trawls over 20 years appear to be paying off.

The lottery funding alone dwarfs anything any other country, (US and China aside), lob at their sports bodies.

The rowing organisation are at every freshers meeting at Universities for just one example. Looking for likely candidates to join the programme.
 
The cash, the humiliation in Atlanta, and proper talent trawls over 20 years appear to be paying off.

The lottery funding alone dwarfs anything any other country, (US and China aside), lob at their sports bodies.

The rowing organisation are at every freshers meeting at Universities for just one example. Looking for likely candidates to join the programme.

The Lottery is defo a major part of the answer. It's bomb proofed British sport from the world wide recession which must have hit all but the Americans, Germans and Chinese hard in terms of cash going to their Olympic event teams.

Also I just think that British sport (led by the cyclists) is throwing off the inferiority complex it struggled with for decades and decades. The mentality is a winning one now and that - as long as finance is there - will ensure a legacy.

I'm not remotely patriotic about any of this success, btw. I just think it's an incredible development. When we were kids mate GB were lucky to come back from any Games with 4 golds and a bar of rock.
 
That is so true. It was a genuine world class one off, (Coe, Cram, Thompson, etc), and a few bits and bobs.

Now, it is a well oiled, targeted, and ruthless process. Love it myself.
Olympics I can remember and gold tally for GB:

Montreal 3
Moscow 5
LA 5
Seoul 5
Barcelona 5
Atlanta 1
*lottery funding comes in
Sydney 11
Athens 9
Beijing 19
London 29
Rio 15 atm
 

Olympics I can remember and gold tally for GB:

Montreal 3
Moscow 5
LA 5
Seoul 5
Barcelona 5
Atlanta 1
*lottery funding comes in
Sydney 11
Athens 9
Beijing 19
London 29
Rio 15 atm

I didn't realise that Athens was relatively poor.
 
I didn't realise that Athens was relatively poor.

Athens was the nadir that prompted, iirc, John Major to turn the lottery cash on. Or start the lottery even. Either way, it does show what planning, detail, and targeted funding can add to actual talent.
 
There has been a fundamental change in psyche and tolerance of "failure" from the British public that has driven the athletes to perform better. Even at collegiate level, the States would never had tolerated our "thanks for coming, you've done us proud" rot that our swimmers produced four years ago. Adlington's "swimming is the hardest sport out there" tosh was ripped apart and it caused a hell of a lot of reviews and improvements.

British cycling "rode along" on the wave of the golden generation we really started to see in Beijing and now has a programme that is utterly unrivalled. Some pretty unsavoury stories have since emerged in the run up to the Games but that's the atmosphere now - win at all costs and if you're not thick skinned enough (though the line has been well passed) get out of the way.

Johnson- Thompson's treatment from the old guard on the weekend was savage - if Inverdale had said it rather than Denise Lewis he'd have been rightly on the the first flight home. But that's it now - underperform and there's no hiding place.
 

Athens was the nadir that prompted, iirc, John Major to turn the lottery cash on. Or start the lottery even. Either way, it does show what planning, detail, and targeted funding can add to actual talent.

I think you mean Atlanta. Athens was 2004 :)
 
There has been a fundamental change in psyche and tolerance of "failure" from the British public that has driven the athletes to perform better. Even at collegiate level, the States would never had tolerated our "thanks for coming, you've done us proud" rot that our swimmers produced four years ago. Adlington's "swimming is the hardest sport out there" tosh was ripped apart and it caused a hell of a lot of reviews and improvements.

British cycling "rode along" on the wave of the golden generation we really started to see in Beijing and now has a programme that is utterly unrivalled. Some pretty unsavoury stories have since emerged in the run up to the Games but that's the atmosphere now - win at all costs and if you're not thick skinned enough (though the line has been well passed) get out of the way.

Johnson- Thompson's treatment from the old guard on the weekend was savage - if Inverdale had said it rather than Denise Lewis he'd have been rightly on the the first flight home. But that's it now - underperform and there's no hiding place.

I'm pleased with this attitude. If we're going to give them so much money, they better darn well deliver.
 
I'm pleased with this attitude. If we're going to give them so much money, they better darn well deliver.

It clearly works. And included in the deal is the support, the income, the expertise, everything to maximise the talent. If you, or your sporting body dont deliver, the tap gets turned off.

IIRC several bodies muttered when lottery funding was stopped; weight lifting I think, or maybe basketball. Tough. We gave you everything you asked for, aint good enough, we are lobbing your cash at the Gymnasts. Soz.
 

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