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| Centre Cour |
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| Venus Williams warming up |
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| Maria Sharapova |
Woke up to find out my friend Max messaged me saying he had a ticket for
today and tomorrow at the Velodrome. Max
is a sprint cyclist for the German team.
It was a goal of mine to get to that venue and hopefully see him and the
rest of the team compete. What a sweet
hookup. Since I had plans for tennis
today I gave the ticket to Ryan for today.
He is a big cyclist fan and was like a little kid getting ready for
Disney World when I gave it to him. Work
before play. It's kind of funny I am
saying that because growing up I never would have agreed with that. I came into the gyms this morning to get some
work straightened out for the day before making the journey across London out
to Wimbledon. Tennis is a sport I have
always enjoyed ever since my playing days.
Coming into Wimbledon was a beautiful site. The venue is layered with vines and
flowers. It is by far the most
prestigous and quaint athletic venue I have ever been to. Seeing the schedule board that I've seen so
many times on TV was pretty neat. Our
tickets were for the semifinal matches on Court 1. That included women's doubles between the USA
and Czech, men's doubles between Spain and France, and Maria Sharapova and
Maria Kirilenko. The highlight of those
matches was the bet I made with Jen. She
picked Spain and I picked France. The
match ended up going 3.5 hours into a 3rd set with France coming out
victorious. Throughout the matches I
tried some strawberries and cream which is the thing you must have when
attending Wimbledon. It was delicious. Our entrance to the court was right next to
the giant video screen where fans littered the hills to see the other matches
going on. We were in and out watching
Federer/Del Potro, Serena/(whoever she beat), and Andy Murray/Djokavic. The Murray match was great because he is the
home favorite and to witness him winning with all the Great Britain fans was
very cool because everyone was ecstatic.
Hearing the home crowd get behind their country has been one of my
favorite things about these Olympics.
I've jumped on the Team GB bandwagon (behind Team USA of course) and
have been rooting for them. I've learned
a lot about a lot of their athetes and many sports that are popular here that I
would never see in America. To see the
'home Games advantage' in person is spectacular and makes me wish more and more
that the Olympics will return to the States soon. Some of the incredible performances by their
athletes have been really captivating.
That is the kind of stuff that can transcend and captivate a country and
many more athletes to come. Team GB's
medal count has increased dramatically because of it. Another spectacular event witnessed and site
visited. Once again things keep falling
into place. One week into the Games now
and the craving for more still exists.
The atmosphere is something I think everyone needs to experience at
least one time in their lifetime. You
can see and learn about the world by simply going to one place. That sounds quite easy right. Easy night tonight so I'll be ready to pick
up where I left off tomorrow.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Day of the XXX Olympiad: 8
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