2008 Olympics Updates

Having competed at the last five Paralympic Games it will be a new experience for me to be a spectator in Beijing. However, as a commentator I will still be close to the action and be able to speak to the team each day.

Trying to pick out ones to watch from the incredibly strong British swimming team is difficult.

Just to qualify onto the team you had to be ranked at least sixth in the world and it is a team that topped the medal table at the 2006 IPC World Championships.

There will be some familiar faces in Beijing who seem sure to medal – swimmers such as Sascha Kindred, Nyree Lewis, David Roberts, Jim Anderson and Natalie Jones.

However 45% of the team are first time Paralympians and they are likely to be in the mix too.

The GB swimming team have maintained their success for the same reasons cycling and sailing were so successful at the Olympics – funding, planning, attention to detail and focused athletes and staff.

Since the release of National Lottery funding to cover more than just capital projects, British Swimming has been able to invest in the development of talented athletes.

Simply throwing money at something will only get you so far. Team members like current head coach Lars Humer focus on getting all of the detail right all of the time and this doesn’t happen by chance.

There will already be a four-year plan in place to move the team on far beyond Beijing.

As with most sports, the athletes put in all the hard work required to get into physical shape but here there is a real sense of team in the broader sense.

Each component of the support team from strength and conditioning to sports psychology, from sports science to the office admin support, everyone is focused and passionate about helping the swimmers be the best they can be.

However, the British team will not have it all their own way. Ukraine has a very strong team of predominantly visually-impaired swimmers and, with stars like Erin Popovich and Jessica Long, the USA will accumulate a substantial medal haul.

Few swimmers will be as dominant as South Africa’s Natalie Du Toit in the women’s S9 events and of course there will be a very strong team representing the host nation China.

There are a couple of races that I am particularly looking forward to.

The Men’s 34-point freestyle relay is always very exciting and although GB won gold in both Sydney and Athens they are likely to be pushed very hard by Australia, with Matt Cowdrey leading the charge.

However, my pick for the entire competition would be the Men’s S8 400m freestyle which will be on 12 September.

It will feature Britain’s Sam Hynd, who is the world record holder for the event and, despite it being his first Games, he will be favourite.

He will face one of the most talented swimmers in the world Xiaofu Wang who will have the home crowd behind him. It is sure to be an exciting contest.

Just a small part of me is envious of this year’s Paralympic swimmers. To race in such a beautiful pool like the Water Cube will be an incredible experience for them.

Thankfully, the larger part of me has come to terms with the fact that my time as an athlete has been and gone and now I can just enjoy commentating on their endeavours.

Here in Beijing, there’s no sign of Olympic fever abating. Chinese Television is still re-running highlights from the Games; crowds still gather around the perimeter of the Olympic Green to have their photos taken with a backdrop of the Bird’s Nest Stadium and there seems to be an Olympic souvenir store on every street corner doing a roaring trade. Even at Beijing Zoo, sales of the panda-like mascots seem as popular as visits to the real life Giant Pandas!

With the Opening Ceremony taking place next Saturday, Beijing is ready for Paralympic fever to take over. No sign yet of Paralympic souvenirs but the first tangible signs were the replacement a few days ago of all the Olympic banners that line the streets of the city with the Paralympic versions. Street signs have changed too with directions to Paralympic venues instead. For ‘Olympic Village’ read ‘Paralympic Village’.

When the Olympic medal table is swapped for the Paralympic version, it’s a near certainty that China will again top the table. They did so four years ago in Athens, so for the rest of the world, it’s a question of who will come second. Great Britain has come second for the last two Games. In Athens they won 35 Golds with a medals total of 94 and have been set a Beijing target by UK Sport of winning 112 medals. A stiff challenge! With Team GB having exceeded their Olympic medals target and achieved their best performance for a hundred years, one wonders how much extra pressure this puts on Paralympics GB.

In particular, the spotlight will be turned on athletics and swimming. Swimming have been set a lower target this time around, 41 as opposed to 52 medals won four years ago. The opposite is the case for Athletics who are expected by UK Sport to win 13 more medals than their Athens achievement of 17. They are hoping stars like David Weir can become multi-medallists and returning champions such as Danny Crates can repeat their Athens success. In swimming, David Roberts will be hoping to add to his tally of gold medals and beat Tanni Grey-Thompson’s record of 11 gold medals. The pressure, however, will be on all 206 athletes competing in 18 sports to deliver. Public interest and expectation will again be high with London 2012 on the horizon; a challenge for the team and for the BBC.

Following the successes of our Olympic coverage, our aim across all of the BBC’s output must be to put in a ‘Team BBC’ performance that does full justice to those of the athletes. We aim to feature the achievements of Paralympics GB and many of the other performances by the world’s top Paralympians; athletes such as South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius and swimmer Natalie Du Toit. Three distinguished former Paralympians join the BBC team for the Games – 11 time Paralympic Gold medallist Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, wheelchair basketball bronze medallist Ade Adepitan and swimmer Marc Woods along with familiar faces and voices such as Clare Balding, Steve Cram, Paul Dickenson, Eddie Butler, Nick Mullins and Bob Ballard.

BBC television coverage will be more extensive than ever before with six hours a day of live coverage, starting at 1000 BST, being streamed on the red button and broadband each weekday with a one hour highlights show on BBC Two at 1900 each night. At weekends, the coverage starts on the red button/broadband and then switches to BBC One or Two for the afternoon. All BBC One and Two output will also be simultaneously shown on the BBC High Definition channel. Both the Opening and Closing ceremonies will be broadcast live including the London handover moment on the final day.

BBC Radio 5 Live will also have a dedicated team in Beijing to provide news and commentary throughout the Games with the BBC’s award winning Disability Sport (currently renamed Paralympics) website providing news, features and blogs alongside live streaming. There are also teams from News and Nations & Regions providing specific content for all the BBC local tv and radio stations.

We’re looking forward to a great Games; another terrific sporting spectacle. As always, we’ll endeavour to convey the drama and excitement of world class sporting competition to audiences back home. We make no apologies for it but the BBC is ready to convey ‘Paralympic fever’ to the UK.