Friday, July 13, 2007

the fastest man on no legs

this sunday south african sprinter oscar pistorius will race 400m against a field of olympic and commonwealth champions at the sheffield grand prix. it looks to be a hotly-contested race, both physically and philosophically, because pistorious is running on carbon fiber blades.

a double-amputee, pistorius is known as "the fastest man on no legs" and is a paralympic gold medalist. this weekend he'll race able-bodied athletes in an attempt to qualify for the olympics... and to be treated like a plain old elite athlete instead of a disabled one. meanwhile, the IAAF, world athletics' governing body, is still waffling about whether pistorius' blades confer an unfair advantage, the general public quibbles about mixing abled and disabled athletes and in a recent poll run by Athletics Weekly magazine, 68% of readers said pistorius shouldn't be able to compete in the olympics.

kinda makes my flip-flopping on racing this weekend seem picayune.

4 comments:

fatmammycat said...

My favourite worrywart was this person.
"I think what's really at the core of some people's fears is that by allowing this guy to run then how could you stop superior bionic powered athletes in the future. The bionic man and woman were both technically disabled people but their technology made them superior.

I've no problem with Oscar Pistorius running but what about athletes in five or ten years time with super advanced prosthetics? How would you tell if they're disabled or superior?"

He must stay up very very late at night worrying abut all kinds of stuff. I mean, how DO you stop bionic people?

Mayrasmom said...

Show them some pictures of Carrot Top.
Sorry, couldn't resist-
Kath

FINN said...

maybe kath but there may be the occasional bionic person where that strategy will backfire totally. so i am thinking if bionic people are anything like zombies it's gotta be a head shot. Kill the brain, and you Kill the ghoul.

it may be simpler than that though. as someone with a goretex iliac artery and therefore semi-bionic i can testify that the following things will if not halt me then at least reduce me to a defenseless crawl:
-- too much lunch
-- a noisy fart
-- pix of becks in a speedo (dont tell me u havent seen themmm)
-- marinated carrots
-- the razored cheekbones of certain afghanis
-- TOO MUCH LUNCH

why did i eat that second sandwich.

good luck this weekend FMC.
be bionic yourself!

fatmammycat said...

Now now Kath, I know you want to fondle his curly watsits, don't be shy, there's plenty to go round. He is BRIMFUL of watsits.