Olmps

in the draw for the ordered hold (see p..362–63) is automatically awarded the round..

How Points are Scored

the usual way to win a round is the accumulation of

points..These can be scored in a variety of ways, which will make more sense once you have grasped the definition of the danger position..A wrestler is said to be in this undesirable state when the line of their back or shoulders forms an angle of less than ninety degrees to the mat while they are using their upper body to avoid the indignity of a fall..

That established, here are the chief moves and points:

Takedown A takedown involves gaining control over an opponent from a neutral position, i..e.. when the taker-down is on his feet..

A five-point takedown involves a throw of grand amplitude which places the opponent in a direct and immediate danger position..

Three points are awarded for a grand amplitude throw that does not bring the opponent into a direct and immediate danger position, or for a short amplitude throw which does.. One point is awarded for a short amplitude takedown which does not put the opponent in the danger position..

Reversal A wrestler who gains control over their opponent immediately after being in the reverse position (i..e.. in the opponent’s control) is awarded one point..

Exposure A wrestler is said to be exposed when they are in the danger position but not via a throw. .Two points are awarded whenever a wrestler exposes their opponent’s back to the mat, whether it is pinned or not..An extra point is earned if a wrestler keeps their opponent in an exposed position for five continuous seconds..

Penalties If a wrestler takes a time out due to injury, their opponent is awarded one point unless the injured combatant is bleeding.. Infractions such as fleeing the mat, openly refusing contact,using an illegal hold or striking an opponent result in the award of one or two points to the other wrestler, depending

so desires, and wraps his arms around his opponent’s waist, linking his hands..

The combatants are now said to be in the ordered hold or clinch position. The wrestler on top then executes what is known as an upside-down belt hold..As the thirty second period unfolds, both wrestlers may get to their feet..At the end of the thirty seconds the wrestlers swap positions, with the one who had the advantage in the first par terre session assuming the disadvantaged kneeling position in the second.. If the wrestler who began a par terre session with the advantage fails to score a technical point during his thirty seconds, his opponent is awarded a technical point..

The usual structure of a Greco-Roman round does not apply if one of the wrestlers is in the danger position either at the end of the first minute (in which case both par terre sessions are cancelled) or at the end of the first par terre session, in which case the second one is cancelled..

freestyle Bouts

A standard freestyle round is also two minutes long

and ends prematurely if one wrestler achieves technical superiority.. If the score is 0-0 after two minutes, the action is extended for up to thirty seconds with the wrestlers in an ordered hold position, also known as the clinch..Advantage in this situation is determined by the toss of a disc..

The freestyle ordered hold is not the same as the Greco-Roman: the contestant who loses the toss must place one leg in the middle of the centre circle (the leg is determined by his opponent) and the other outside the circle..The wrestler with the advantage then grabs the leg inside the circle with both arms, placing his head on the outside of his opponent’s thigh..The wrestler with the disad- vantage must place both hands on the shoulders of his adversary.. When the referee is happy with this complex arrangement of limbs, he blows his whistle and action commences..The first point scored ends the round and determines its winner.. If the wrestler with the advantage fails to score a point, one is awarded to his opponent..

364 HOW TO WATCH THE OLYMPICS

Wrestling Goes to the Olympics

When Baron de Coubertin and his cronies were

drawing up the list of events for the first modern Olympics, wrestling was a shoo-in, as it had featured in the ancient Games.. The difficulty was deciding which form of the sport to go for..

In the end, the organisers of the Athens Games went for the French version of the sport – now styled Greco-Roman

an established World Championship. . Unfortunately, as the British and Americans did not recognise the French rules, the top performers were absent from the 1896 Olympics. . So too, because of De Coubertin’s allergy to professionalism, were most of the big names in European flat hand wrestling..There was one unlimited weight class in the Athens Games, with the gold medal going to the 5ft 4in Carl Schuhmann of Germany, who also distinguished himself by winning three gymnastics golds..

Perhaps as a result of the poor turnout at Athens, wrestling did not feature in the 1900 Games and when it returned at St Louis in 1904, it was in the American-friendly freestyle format.. US athletes won golds in all seven weight divisions..

1908 was the first year in which both disciplines were featured at the Olympics, but all the wrestling events at Stockholm in 1912 were Greco-Roman, with the Finns and Swedes taking the four gold medals awarded. . Because bouts could be ended only by a fall, disqualification or withdrawal, they were often lengthy..The most notable contest at Stockholm was an elev- en-hour middleweight marathon between the Estonian Max Klein and Finland’s Alfred Asikainen.. Klein eventually prevailed but was too exhausted to compete in the final, so gold went to Sweden’s Claes Johanson by default. .The unsatisfactory nature of interminable contests of this kind led to the introduction of time limits and a scoring system at the Paris Games in 1924..

Since Antwerp 1920, every Olympic Games has featured both freestyle and Greco-Roman events. . Highlights have included

US WRESTLING TEAM PAR TERRE AHEAD OF THE 1932 GAMES

Sweden’s Ivar Johansson winning the freestyle middleweight gold in 1932, then shedding 5kg in a sauna to allow him to win the Greco-Roman welterweight title 24 hours later, and the USSR’s Avtandil Koridze whispering something in Bulgarian Dimitro Stoyanov’s ear a minute before the end of a 1960 semi-final that instantly persuaded Stoyanov to roll over and submit to a fall.. American Jeff Blatnick’s victory in the GrecoRoman super-heavyweight competition at LA 1984, two years after being diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease and having his appendix and spleen removed, was perhaps the most inspiring story in Olympic wrestling history..

In 2004, Olympic wrestling took the long overdue deci-

sion to introduce a women’s freestyle competition (female

Greco-Roman wrestling has yet to appear)..The Central Asian nations have dominated this less, thus far, than the men’s events.. Of the eight golds contested, Japan have won four, China two and the Ukraine and Canada one each..

MEDALS

CEREMONIES

The official Olympic line is that it is more important

to participate than to win..This is not a sentiment endorsed by the Medals Ceremonies..The athletes on the podium have worked unbelievably hard to get there and their governments have paid millions of pounds to share in the glory. .As a consequence, the Ceremonies are invariably occasions of intense emotion, both for the happy winners and the occasionally sour losers..Viewers may find themselves welling up, too..

Medal Ceremony Basics

Medallists must be dressed in official national team

uniforms and are not allowed to display political affiliations or make statements of any kind during the ceremony..They enter the stage together and then climb on to the podium with the winner on the highest tier in the centre, the silver medallist on their right and the bronze medallist on their left. .The medals are awarded in reverse order (bronze first, gold last) by a member of the IOC, accompanied by volunteers from the host city bearing the now obligatory Olympic bouquets.. Then the national anthem of the winner is played while the flags of all three medallists’ nations are raised, with the winner’s elevated above the others..The anthems are now pre-recorded..

The medals themselves must be a minimum of 6cm in diameter and 3mm thick.. Despite the different denominations, they are all largely made of silver, but the golds have to be coated with at least 6 grams of the metal..The medals for London 2012 are the biggest to date, 85mm in diameter and weighing in at 400g (nearly a pound)..

368 HOW TO WATCH THE OLYMPICS

The Medal Ceremony Story

Winners at the ancient Games were presented with

olive wreaths harvested by boys with golden sickles. .They were then expected to make sacrifices to the gods who had supported them..When the Games revived at Athens 1896, the victors were presented with crowns of olive branches, certificates of victory and silver medals, while the runners-up got laurel crowns and bronzes..Third placed athletes got nowt.. In keeping with the gentlemanly aura, Olympians received their awards in evening dress, at the closing ceremony rather than after each individual competition..

Things acquired a more familiar shape at London 1908, with the medal ceremonies held on the same days as the competitions and gold, silver and bronze medals awarded to first, second and third place.. It was at LA 1932, however, that many of the features we now associate most closely with the Ceremony were introduced: the three tiered podium, the raising of the national flags of the medallists and the playing of the winners’ national anthems..

The average medal ceremony is graced by trembling lips and a great deal of handshaking, but on occasion the script gets altered.. The IOC has never quite recovered from the Black power salutes made on the podium by American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos in 1968.. Other notable breaches of decorum have included the US basketball team’s no-show in 1972, the body builder poses stuck by the USA 4 x 100m gold medallists at Sydney 2000, and Greco-Roman wrestler Ara Abrahamian tearing off his consolation bronze in disgust at Beijing 2008..

There have been heart-warming moments too..At LA 1984, the Yugoslav Anton Josipovic, newly crowned light heavyweight boxing champion, hauled bronze medallist Evander Holyfield up on to the winner’s rostrum in acknowledgement that he had only lost his semi-final due to a ludicrous refereeing decision.. Even more poignant was the ceremony for the 10m air pistol in Beijing, which ended with Georgia’s Nino Salukvadze and Russia’s Na- talia Paderina embracing and calling for an end to the fighting between their nations..

THE CLOSING

CEREMONY

12 August 2012

Olympic Stadium

Athletes: All 12,000 are invited but many will have gone home..

olympic presence

The 1896 Athens Games ended with a splendid mix of

marching bands, medals, victory laps and laurels, and with the exception of Paris 1900 some kind of show has been staged ever since. . It acquired something close to its settled form with the introduction of the Olympic flag in 1920..

olympic Format

the IOC stipulates a programme of speeches, flags and

anthems, but there is plenty of room for the hosts to indulge in all kinds of artistic interpretation..

Contenders

London is the star of the show but, as is now tradi-

tional, the next Olympic host city, Rio de Janeiro, will be given a ten minute slot to do its thing..

Why Watch the Closing Ceremony?

How do you bring the curtain down on the greatest

show on Earth? After two weeks of intense immersion in sporting competition, tens of thousands of athletes, officials and spectators can’t just push off home and put the kettle on..What is needed at this stage is a party..A chance to reflect on what has happened, look forward to what is to come and affirm that we are all good friends

370 HOW TO WATCH THE OLYMPICS

really, despite our nations having devoted the preceding fortnight to trying to beat the crap out of each other..Throw in a few solemn rituals and pompous speeches and everyone will be primed to do it again in four years’ time..

Armchair viewers can also do with a rite of passage to ease themselves back to normal life.. So draw up a chair and watch the show.. Share in the feel-good factor as the world’s athletes

march together unseg-

regated by nationality. . Get a foretaste of the flavour of the next Games during

the handover ceremony..

And keep an eye out for the unexpected. . Whether it’s a streaker or a visit from a

flying saucer, the closing ceremony has a habit of coming up with something memorable..

Closing Ceremony Basics

The opening moments of the closing ceremony are

unpredictable. . In the past clocks have chimed, stilt walkers have performed, fireworks have gone off and spaceships have landed. . For London 2012 – which will be produced, like the opening ceremony, by Danny Boyle – we can probably expect a fanfare of trumpets somewhere in the opening mix, the appearance of mascots and a countdown..‘God Save the Queen’ and the Union