Olympic Tweets of the Week: Vanquished Spartacus, Wasted Wiggins, Phinney fun and Samuel L Jackson

August 7, 2012 kittyfondue 2 Comments

Funny, cruel, odd, personal … you get it all on Twitter. Each week, we’ll have a rundown of some of our favourite tweets. Here are the tweets for the week ending 5th August 2012.

Gracious in defeat

There were a couple big stories this week but as I’m in charge of this column, I think you’ll all guess what was the biggest story of the week for this Kitty. Yes, it was Fabian Cancellara‘s brave defence of his Olympic time trial title. [Brace yourself, folks. Here we go … – Ed.] After crashing on Saturday, hopes that Spartacus would bounce back and ride onto the top step of the podium were just that: hopes. But his final placement on the day (seventh) in no way reflects the grit and majesty of his ride. Here’s how he – and the Twitterati – reacted to his ride on Wednesday.

Finding his #InnerVoigt

Jens paid homage to his teammate as well.

I’d like a transfer, please

Rumour has it that both Fabs and Jens will go back to Bjarne as both are out of contract by the end of the year and, let’s face it, RadioShack and the Schlecks have pretty much imploded, so why would they want to associate with either? But there are other transfer rumours going around: the most interesting being those surrounding various members of Sky.

More on these developments as they come … should be interesting for next year!

Wasted Wiggins

He’s stayed at peak form for, oh, how many months? He’s won everything going. I would want a drink after all that too. [Does anyone still want to worry if he’s peaked too soon?!? – Ed.]

Although this picture looks like he got drunk and then got accosted by a C-list boy band.

This next tweet is one of the funniest I’ve ever seen. If you recall a few months ago, there was a spate of John Terry sightings … well, he struck again during the TT. It’s a wonder Wiggo didn’t blast him with a few f’s and c’s before throwing him off the bike…

And here’s some food for thought … This next tweet makes me want to dig out my Sisters of Mercy CDs and have a This Corrosion festival … [Hey na, hey na na … – Ed.]

The future is bright. The future is Phinney

You all know how I love that cheeky ‘Hollywood’ Phinney. He seemed to love London – even without an #OlympicLoveStory. And London, I suspect, loved him. So here’s a little Twitter synopsis of his time in the capital.

Even Fabs loves Phinney. You know what, though. Fabs is 6’1″. How tall is Hollywood???? Or is he standing on a box? Or is Fabs standing in a gutter? Seriously, how tall is that kid? Has he stopped growing? (Oh, you know what, I just googled it – he’s 6’5″! I never knew that!!)

Is it just me, or does that picture look like a fashion shoot for Esquire or GC? Unbelievable how good Marcus looks in those lederhosen!

And now we go off piste …

Tweeting about sport is so much fun. There’s nothing better than sharing your enthusiasm for what you’re watching with the Twittersphere. Well, who knew that Samuel L Jackson, yes, Samuel L Jackson would become required reading for anyone who loves sport, Twitter, imaginative spelling, imaginative swearing and the world’s coolest actor. Here are a few of his gems from his Olympic viewing. BEWARE: he swears. A lot.

The most amazing thing about this set of tweets!? That someone would have the AUDACITY to correct this man! WTF? I think, however, they should hire SLJ to tweet the Tour. Can you imagine it?

“WHAT was THAT? That little French guy jumped all over the MUTHACYCLINPHUCCAS and grabbed that stage by the BALLS! And his TONGUE was just LOLLIN OUT!”

Hmmm, I might tweet the Vuelta in pure Jackson style! [Uh oh – Ed.]

Random Tweets of Beauty

I collect tons of tweets for this column and never ever use them all. But there are some that, although they don’t fit with any of the themes, are just too good to leave behind. No order, no connections, just good clean fun.

This one is my favourite: Kolobnev’s smile, the strange composition and, most of all, the little kid with the big bumblebee backpack. Fabulous.

That’s it for Olympic Tweets – keep an eye out for our Eneco Tour coverage and, of course, the Vuelta from the 18th onwards. Hope you had a great Olympics!

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Inside the Olympics with Tony Gibb: Bagging medals, blagging seats

August 7, 2012 Tim Leave a comment

We’re proud to have access to former world silver and Commonwealth Games bronze medallist – and now Eurosport commentator – Tony Gibb, who is providing us with a daily insider’s view of life in and around the Olympic velodrome. Here’s his view of Sunday’s action from the velodrome – and the main Olympic stadium.

Another medal for Clancy

Track World Cups last three days, occasionally four, while the World Championships last five days. At those we have the five Olympic events plus a scratch race, individual pursuit, kilo/500-metre time trial and men’s Madison. So why, why oh why has the Olympic schedule taken six days? The sessions have been short, very short. I just think we could have had it all wrapped up a bit quicker, and quite a few of the riders who I have spoken to feel the same.

So when I got to the track tonight, I saw the track manager. I asked him what idiot decided it would be a good idea to kick Brad out the other day. He said that would be me. Well, that was an awkward moment! Anyway, we discussed it. He told me it was holding up worldwide TV pictures. I told him it wasn’t. We disagreed and walked away from each other. Never liked him anyway!

So back to the bike racing, There was just one round of the sprints today. Like I said, it all could have been wrapped up much quicker.

But tonight belongs to ‘Red’ Clancy. Okay, so he had a howler in the scratch race, but Glenn O’Shea far exceeded Ed’s troubles by at times looking like he had just finished the men’s triple jump, the size of the squares he was pedalling. Elia Viviani and Bryan Coquard were head and shoulders above the rest in the elimination race, as they had been all year, but despite Clancy’s best efforts of taking out Lasse Norman Hansen by knocking him off he took a lap in the scratch and held his own in the elimination. The Dane posted the fastest time in the pursuit, and with Clancy PBing with a very close second it was all set for a final showdown.

The Dane held on in the kilo, Viviani went out very fast and parked in the bus stop, Coquard held his own for silver and Clancy produced a time only two-tenths outside Sir Chris Hoy’s winning time and Olympic record from Athens. With three team pursuits and the rest of the omnium events in his legs in the last four days. Machine!

In other news, GB admit that they have round wheels without magic dust in them, the French still accuse their own national wheel sponsor and French brand Mavic of colluding with GB to have placed 17 hamsters inside each disc wheel to run furiously when needed to assist in setting world records. Oh and the hot pants have been proven to just be McLaren F1 tyre warmers painted blue.

Star-spotting at the 100 metres final

Apparently this Gerrard bloke is quite good at football?

In other, other news, and the highlight of my games so far, through furious blagging and copious … Sod it, I’ll just admit I lied through my teeth and wangled my way in to the 100 metres final! My good friend Will Carling was watching so I made some lame excuse to the purple t-shirt on the door that I just wanted to say hi to Lisa and then managed to hot seat my way around until 21:50 and see the most popular event of the Games.

Usain Bolt delivered but sod that, I was sat behind the Queen (well, Dame Helen Mirren), Steven Gerrard and somewhat amazingly just across the stairs from the one and only Lionel Messi! I have to admit I was slightly star-struck, but only slightly though! Normality will resume tomorrow.