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Current issues affecting the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

2008-06-24T01:04:00.000-07:00

Week9 Term2

One of the many things affecting the 2008 Beijing Olympics is the pollution. Government workers in Beijing have been forced out of their cars and onto the pavements in a bid to clean up the air of the world's most polluted city ahead of the Olympic Games in August.
The Beijing city government announced today that it had ordered half its cars off the road ahead of the Games in seven weeks' time. The selected government and Communist Party cars will be banished to garages until July 19, when a second regulation kicks in that will cut traffic levels in half. The city's 3.3 million drivers will then be allowed to use their vehicles only on odd or even days, depending on their license plate numbers.
Chinese officials hope the move will assuage international concerns over the poor air quality in the city. Satellite data from the European Space Agency has shown the Chinese capital and neighbouring provinces to have the world's highest levels of nitrogen dioxide, which can cause fatal damage to the lungs.
In April, Olympic chief Jacques Rogge warned that outdoor events over one hour in length might have to be postponed if conditions are poor because of the risk to athletes' health. The marathon, road cycling, triathlon, race walking and open water swimming are the events most at risk.

What are the games included in th Beijing Olympics?

2008-06-16T02:13:00.000-07:00

week8 term2

Athletics Archery Baseball Badminton Basketball Boxing Canoeing Cycling Equestrian Fencing Field Hockey Soccer Gymnastics Handball Judo Modern penthalon Rowing Sailing Shooting Softball Swimming Weightlifting Table tennis Taekwondo Volleyball Wrestling Triathlon Tennis

What sport is included in the 2008 Olympics?

2008-06-10T04:03:00.000-07:00

Week7 Term2

These are the sports that people from all over the world are participating in for the 2008 Olympics:

Aquatics -Swimming-Diving -Synchronized Swimming-Water Polo Archery Athletics Badminton Baseball Basketball Boxing Canoe/Kayak Flatwater
Cycling Fencing Football Gymnastics Artistic Gymnastics Rhythmic Gymnastics Trampoline Handball Hockey Judo Modern Pentathlon
Rowing Sailing Shooting Softball Table Tennis Taekwondo Tennis Triathlon Volleyball-Beach Volleyball Weightlifting Wrestling

What is the tradition of the Gold, Silver and Bronze medal?

2008-06-10T03:17:00.000-07:00

Week6 Term2

At the 1896 Athens games, the first of the modern era, the tradition of giving medals began. The winner was awarded a silver medal, with the second-place finisher being given one of Copper, this was in the ancient Olympic days. Now, in the present we give the medals in a different order. These medals are worth a lot, they are made of real Gold, Silver and Copper.If you come first in an Olympic game you would get a Gold medal, if you come second in an Olympic game you would get a Silver medal and if you come third you will be rewarded with a bronze medal, this is a bit different to the ancient Olympic days.

2008-05-30T02:51:00.000-07:00

week5 term2

The Olympic Flame or Olympic Torch is a symbol of the Olympic Games.[1] Commemorating the theft of fire from the Greek god Zeus by Prometheus, its origins lie in ancient Greece, when a fire was kept burning throughout the celebration of the ancient Olympics. The fire was reintroduced at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam, and it has been part of the modern Olympic Games ever since. The torch relay of modern times which transports the flame from Greece to the various designated sites of the games had no ancient precedent and was introduced by Carl Diem, with the support of Joseph Goebbels, at the controversial Berlin Olympics as a means to promote Nazi ideology

The symbolism of the olympic ring

2008-05-30T02:38:00.000-07:00

week4 term2

The emblem of the Olympic Games is composed of five interlocking rings (blue, yellow, black, green, and red respectively) on a white field. This was originally designed in 1913 by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympic Games.
These five rings represent the five parts of the world which now are won over to Olympism and willing to accept healthy competition.
What do the five rings on the Olympics emblem stand for?
The five interlocking rings represent five continents or major geographical areas of the world. The five main regions: Africa, the Americas (North and South America are combined), Asia, Europe and Oceania.
As it says in the Olympic Charter, the five-ringed symbol "represents the union of the five continents and the meeting of athletes from throughout the world at the Olympic Games."

THE OLYMPIC MOTTO

2008-05-14T00:54:00.000-07:00

The olympic motto is "Citius, Altius, Fortius." These three Latin words mean "Swifter, Higher, Stronger."

BEGINNING OF MODERN OLYMPICS

2008-05-05T04:41:00.000-07:00

NAMRATHA REDDY TERM 2 WEEK 2

The Olympic Games[1] is an international multi-sport event subdivided into summer and winter sporting events. The summer and winter games are each held every four years (an Olympiad [2]). Until 1992, they were both held in the same year. Since then, they have been separated two years apart.
The original Olympic Games (Greek: Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες; Olympiakoi Agones) were first recorded in 776 BC in Olympia, Greece, and were celebrated until AD 393.[3] Interest in reviving the Olympic Games proper was first shown by the Greek poet and newspaper editor Panagiotis Soutsos in his poem "Dialogue of the Dead" in 1833.[4] Evangelos Zappas sponsored the first modern international Olympic Games in 1859. He paid for the refurbishment of the Panathinaiko Stadium for Games held there in 1870 and 1875.[4] This was noted in newspapers and publications around the world including the London Review, which stated that "the Olympian Games, discontinued for centuries, have recently been revived! Here is strange news indeed ... the classical games of antiquity were revived near Athens".[5]

ANCIENT OLYMPICS

2008-05-01T02:54:00.000-07:00

NAMRATHA REDDY WEEK 1 TERM 2.

Ancient athletes had a way of capturing peoples eyes. There were many well known and worthy Olympians. During the Olympic season you may hear from people that the Olympic games are too "professional." Here are some famous Olympians and there description.

MILO OF KRONTON:

.Milo was an ancient Olympic wrestler and won in boys wrestling in the 60th Olympiad 540 BC. Nobody has a way to possess strength, but Milo had an enormous value of strength in his body. Milo was born in southern Italy and crowned Olympian no less than six times

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Olympics/

The ancient Olympics began in 776BC that grew to an event to be worldwide cooperation and friendly competition. Did you know that women were forbidden to participate in or even observe the games? Any woman discovered there could be thrown off a cliff! The women (young, unmarried ones) competed in a separate series of foot races called the Heraea, named in honor of Hera, the queen of the gods.

Swimming was not part of the ancient Olympics games and neither were there any world records.

Why did the athletes compete in the nude?
The truth is that no one knows. According to one story, it began when a runner lost his loincloth and tripped on it. Everyone took off his loincloth after that. But ancient historians have traced it back to initiation rites—young men walking around naked and sort of entering manhood.
We know how fundamental nudity was to Greek culture. It really appealed to the exhibitionism and the vanity of the Greeks. Only barbarians were afraid to show their bodies. The nude athletes would parade like peacocks up and down the stadium. Poets would write in a shaky hand these wonderful odes to the bodies of the young men, their skin the color of fired clay.
But other cultures, like the Persians and the Egyptians, looked at these Greek men oiling one another down and writhing in the mud, and found it very strange. They believed it promoted sexual degeneracy

The olympic games origanally contained one event: the stadion race,a short sprint measuring 180 and 240m.