Citius, Altius, Fortius.

After four short years, it's time for the Olympics again. Not that you'd have guessed from the BBC website, where it appears that the £700 squillion they're spending on coverage has gone almost unnoticed.

I used to like the Olympics, I really did. I have great memories of watching them as a child. The diving pool at the Barcelona games, Derek Redmond pulling his hamstring, the British 4x400m team being individually shite yet collectively going for gold - all great memories.

Nowadays it's a bit shit, and I shall explain why i feel this way.

*warning...rant ahead....warning*

I'll ignore the shameless selling of the soul of the games to the highest bidder, offering the chance to be an 'official partner' to all and sundry like a cheap whore. I'll ignore it because it's caused by the main reason I think the Olympics is wrong. It's gone wrong because there's too many sports included nowadays.

They have to sell to as many sponsors as possible because the cost of putting one on is ridiculous, and the cost is ridiculously high because there's too many sports included nowadays.

The Olympics should be the peak of a sport, and if it isn't it shouldn't be included. End of.

Football should not be an Olympic event - there's the World Cup for that. Even then, to make it not like the World Cup they change the rules slightly. It's now an under-23 event, though you're allowed 4 players over 23 in your squad - which must include at least 5 left-footed players, two baldies and at least one player called Trevor.*

Likewise Tennis - what the fuck is that doing there? Baseball. Basketball. None of them should be there.

And then we move onto swimming. Swimming should be an Olympic sport, most definitely. What it shouldn't be is the biggest attempt to devalue a medal. Look at Steven Redgrave - five golds won at five consecutive games, and in rowing which is one of the most physically demanding sports to compete in. But swimming? It seems at every games there's at least one swimmer born with feet the size of dinner plates who wins 17 golds in the 50m, 55m, 60m, 65m, 70m, 75m etc. - made all the worse by the fact that there's four swimming 'styles.'

What utter nonsense. Think how many medals Carl Lewis would've won if there were 50m, 100m, 150m and 200m races. And then they did them all again, with hopping. Then again, with skipping. Then again, with jumping. Then again, doing 50m of each in turn**

It's just stupid.

Even cycling has got in on the act recently, with the introduction of a special event where 50 riders pootle around behind a WW2-era moped for an hour or so, then sprint for the last 10 seconds. Who invented that as a sport? And can I have some of what he/she/they were on? Or indeed - if you believe the BBC - can I have a chunk of the cash the Japanese gambling community bribed the world cycling authorities with to introduce it? Hmmmm....

It's about time we cut them down to a reasonable size and got back to what the point of the games was - Citius, Altius, Fortius.


*That rule was a bitch for the African sides, but a boon for Trevor Sodukowele, a balding, leftie Scotsman who'd been adopted by a Ugandan tribe as a small boy. Sadly, Uganda failed to qualify.
**Though such an event would probably resemble a cross between the triple jump and The Ministry Of Silly Walks sketch, I'll readily admit.