Saturday, February 12, 2011

Good News From Across The Pond

The much touted tug of war between West Ham and Spurs for who'd get the Olympic stadium after next summers 2012 Olympic Games was resolved yesterday w/ West Ham getting the nod.
As an ardent Spurs fan obviously this was a little close to home so to speak given Spurs didn't want to keep the track plus moving to East London from their native North London home seemed a bit of a stretch.
While I have no love for West Ham they at least were willing to keep the running track in the stadium which as a fan of track and field was a key issue.

London's only major track is at Crystal Palace,it was probably built in the late 60s early 70s and isn't even the main track facility in the country anymore,in 2005 London was slated to host the IAAF World C'ships however as the "track,no track" debate for the rebuilt Wembley stadium dragged on and the issue of building a new track at Pickets Lock fell by the way side and not only did London lose the chance to host{Helsinki was awarded the honour meaning they'd twice had the honour}but London was still w/out a major track facility.....cue the 2006 decision to award London the 2012 Olympics and the building of a new track stadium.
While there's only an outside chance of London hosting the 2015 WMA{World Masters Athletics}C'ships the prospect of the stadium being refurbished w/out a track put a serious dent in that but also London can now have a major world class track meet on the IAAF Grand Prix circuit.
As for my beloved Spurs,I hope we can find a new stadium in our native North London,moving to East London is a bit like saying the New York Giants and New York Jets are New York teams when they actually play in New Jersey,it's a bit of a piss take to call yourself the pride of North London when you ply your trade 5 miles up the road in East London.

While I doubt we've heard the last of this matter for now the track remains in the Olympic stadium and the proposed move from Upton Park to the new stadium is slated for 2014...it remains to be seen if "The Irons" are still in the Premier League given their current lowly position of 19th of 20 teams{the bottom three each year drop down to the Championship}
Since this is a running blog after all I ran 10 miles at lunch time to not only rid myself of the memories of my 800m on Thursday nite but also tack on another 10 miles to my 23 for the week and also begin to map out where and when my much needed repeats will fall in to my schedule.

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