The host country always puts pressure on its athletes to win a bucket of medals and Great Britain was struggling in the early days. On Friday at the rowing venue, Eton Dorney, the unfamiliar cries of "GB, GB" rang out as Britain took a gold and two bronze to excite the large crowd. The only highlight was a "smashing" victory in the women's double sculls (two oars for each rower). Put together with some swimming successes and British dominance in the track cycling and "Team GB" moved up the medal standings.
One of the British women, Katherine Grainger, has a PhD in homicide. That would only be a masters in the U.S.; PhD requires study in mass homicide.
A highlight of the day of rowing was the crowd encouragement of Issaka Djibo of Niger, a swimmer who was instructed by his country to take up rowing. That was three months ago and he came to the Olympics because Niger won the lottery among smaller nations to have a place. Djibo was far outclassed, but gained much fanfare for his effort.
Djibo finishes!
Hockey is played on a carpet-like artificial known to U.S. football fans. The big difference is that the surface is flooded to make the ball move faster and limit bounces. A major plus is the resulting surface is more player friendly by eliminating what footballers know as "rug burns." The colors are new for the sport - blue surface, pink boundary and yellow ball to improve visibility. Known to the aficionado as "smurf turf", the colors are very agreeable for the spectators. Here South Africa and Spain go at it, ending in a Spanish victory.
Hockey is an extremely fast sport with fluid action. The stick blade is about the size as an umbrella and about as long. The sport has always been considered a women's game in the U.S., but many parts of the world it is played seriously and growing as a spectator sport.
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