Poor Paula

Sport Watching Paul Radcliffe stop in exhaustion earlier in the Women's Marathon portion of the Olympic Games shows yet again that no matter how much the media and even we ourselves build up our athletes to be something other than human, they are just like us. As usual the BBC's coverage (despite worried asides from Steve Cram and Brendan Foster) built her Gold up as a forgone conclusion, much as the Men's Coxless Fours had been yesterday. It add pressure to the athletes to perform and I wonder if on this occasion it contributed to this athletes disappointment. It certainly contributed to ours.

[As an aside, though I would like to point out that in the main the BBC's coverage has been great, especially on Radio Five Live. It's just on the odd occasion when I've wished that they could be a bit more cautious.]

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