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An inspiring Olympic trio

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    An inspiring Olympic trio

    These three South African athletes have great back stories:

    1. Wayde van Niekerk. He is being trained by an old white-haired granny. That is just supercool, though I wonder what more he might he capable of if he was trained by a top-qualified coach.

    Van Niekerk comes from a gangster-infested area, and though that doesn't make him unique, he nevertheless would have faced many temptations to join a gang.

    His mother was an athlete of some talent, apparently. She said she couldn't fulfil her talent due to apartheid. She refused to take part in mainstream codes, but affiliated with the anti-apartheid South African Council of Sports.

    2. Caster Semanya. The shit that poor woman has had to put up with! Imagine being told that you're not really a woman (if you are one), even having your genitals questioned. In that cloud of sexist and, I'd aver, racist poison, Caster has kept her dignity.

    If she wins gold, I hope it will obliterate the tears she surely must have shed about the brutality with which she has been treated.

    3. Luvo Manyonga, who won silver in the long-jump... Four years ago he was leaving behind a promising career in athletics to become a tik (meth) addict, falling prey to a drug that is destroying South Africa's youth. He got banned in 2012 for 18 months.

    Just as he started to get things straight again, his coach and mentor died in a car crash in 2014. On the way to the memorial Mayonga bumped into some of his tik friends. He missed the memorial and took up the tik pipe again.

    Incredibly, he resumed full training only a year ago, and returned to competition only this year.

    #2
    An inspiring Olympic trio

    Nice idea, G-Man. I'm not sure anyone can compete with those three, but to save a nil thread, three nominations from Argentina...

    1. Juan Martín Del Potro, who due to injury, followed by injury, followed by injury again, had played what felt like about three sets in the previous twenty years before arriving in Rio, and who proceeded to dump out Novak Djokovic in the first round before going all the way to the final where, in spite of looking utterly exhausted by the end of the first set, he still managed to take a set off Andy Murray (only the second set Murray lost all tournament).

    He's been rewarded for his brilliance with a wildcard for the US Open, which he won back in 2009.

    2. Santiago Lange, who won gold along with partner Cecilia Carranza in the yachting on Tuesday, having recovered from lung cancer recently.

    3. If I can be allowed a coach, Julio Olarticoechea, the 1986 World Cup-winner who six months ago was managing the Argentine women's national football team. That in itself can't be an easy job in a country which entirely ignores women's football at the expense of the men's game. Earlier this year the Under-20 men's side found themselves without a manager and Olarticoechea agreed to step in to help out. And then after the Copa América Centenario, fed up with not having been paid for months and with the farcical levels of disorganisation, Gerardo Martino and his entire coaching staff stood down, and Olarticoechea was given the Olympic men's managerial job by default as the only coach still under contract to the AFA.

    He came in a couple of weeks before the tournament started and found a lot of his first choice players weren't released by their clubs, but he kept joking with everyone and smiling and laughing, even after the team (and he himself) had their things stolen from their hotel after a pre-tournament friendly in Mexico, and came across throughout as someone who just wanted to enjoy being at the Olympic Games. Not on the same level as the other two, but when the AFA needed a patsy for a seemingly impossible job, he made himself available with tremendous good grace. I wish everyone in Argentine football was as selfless.

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      #3
      An inspiring Olympic trio

      Oksana Chusovitina is a 41 year old gymnast who is now in her 7th Olympics. She made the final of the individual vault.

      Adam Peaty won the 100m Breaststroke, and broke the world record. As a child, he had an acute fear of water.

      Monica Puig. Her run was brilliant, and she beat Muguruza, Kvitova and Kerber, so no fluke. Not bad for someone who has never got beyond the 4th round of a slam.

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        #4
        An inspiring Olympic trio

        Although they aren't particularly heart-tugging stories or indeed, overcoming adversity, I liked that Namibian cyclist who did the Time Trial because he was offered a place and Justin Rose, who spends most of his year molly-coddled and flying around the world wrapped in cotton wool, but quite clearly Got It when it came to not only his own participation in the Olympics but his enthusiasm for the experience of being part of Team GB. That Gold Medal was a) won in a magnificent match against Stenson and b) clearly meant as much to him as a major title.

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          #5
          An inspiring Olympic trio

          On behalf of OTFers over 40, I'll nominate Martin Marinov.

          He won medals for Bulgaria in the 1980's, emigrated to Australia and is now a canoeing coach. Aged 49.

          He decided to get back in the boat, and qualified (or picked himself?) for Rio. I watched his heats and he came last, by a mile. He was like those 100m sprinters on the track from tiny impoverished nations, finishing 30 metres behind the rest. Except, he's representing Australia, so he's supposed to be getting medals, not a sympathetic round of applause. He made the sport look really hard, which it obviously is, for the rest of us.

          So he's either wonderfully deluded or he knew he was hopeless but had a go anyway. Hat doffed, sir.

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            #6
            An inspiring Olympic trio

            Sam wrote:
            2. Santiago Lange, who won gold along with partner Cecilia Carranza in the yachting on Tuesday, having recovered from lung cancer recently.
            Wow, that is impressive. And, indeed, inspiring.

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              #7
              An inspiring Olympic trio

              I'm assuming that Yusra Mardini is a given, here?

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