Like the torch, this discussion seems to be generating more heat than light. And it seems to be confusing the, unfortunately financially necessary, commercialism with the spirit of the games, including the torch relay.
Living in Morley, I was a bit miffed that I would be carrying it in Leeds and not one of the Morley legs. I was even more miffed that I would have to be at Leeds Town Hall for 5.15am to start the day off at 7.17am. When I was interviewed by Radio Leeds at 6.30 at the foot of the town hall steps, there were already about 300 people there, including a large contingent from our Kids Saturday Bike Club, some of whom had ridden there about 4 miles from north Leeds. The Leeds Youth Orchestra were there playing a suitable range of music, inc. Chariots of Fire (just as the interview started
). By the time I came out again, at about 7.10 the entire front of the town hall was jammed and people were standing on the central reservation in the middle of the Headrow and on the pavement on the other side, probably a couple of thousand.
Ok, I milked it, with both arms aloft, the cheers were pretty deafening and heartfelt and people had turned out early on their way to work.
And it was great, so there
Even where people weren't lined up several deep on the pavements, people on their way to work stopped and applauded. I handed over to a French Swiss bloke working over here, who was hearing impaired, spoke four languages and could lipread in all of them. As each of us got on the following coach, we applauded each other, including a woman who coached football in a really rough area of Leeds, Jane Tomlinson's son, Stephen, people who worked with disabled, disadvantaged, the elderly, charity fundraisers and who mostly made me feel a bit of a fraud - but only a very small bit. And the atmosphere on the coach was great and not the least bit cynical.
The streets in Hunslet and Beeston, not the greatest areas of Leeds, were full, schools were out in force - with their home-made torches - elderly couples at their front gates, kids in hoodies, ethnic and religious minorities, even drivers held up by the procession were leaning out and smiling, waving and using their phone cameras, all applauding and waving. And the support staff said that it had been the same all over the country.
And the short distance (300m on average)? It was carried by all kinds, including a former world veteran triathlon champion and coach with bone cancer, people in their 70s, 80s and 90s (one was 100), physically handicapped people in wheelchairs and so on, so how far should each leg have been? Certainly not the 2+miles I ran when I carried the Queen's Message for the opening of the 1958 Cardiff Commonwealth Games
Since then, I've been invited to show the torch and talk about it (and the day) at schools and Leeds General Infirmary children's ward and education area; the kids on my street were dying to look at it and be photographed holding it; we ran a mini-Olympic Torch Relay round our cycle circuit last Saturday and every kid and their parents wanted to have their photos taken with it.
What a pity that all these people didn't look at it all with the same sense of clear headed logic that you lot have.
Or, to put it another way, what a load of mean, miserable, small-minded, moaning, mithering, complaining, whingeing anti-torch relay griping many of you have posted.
So there.
