With the Winter Games winding down in the blink of an eye it will be time to refocus on London and the Summer Games of 2012. A couple days ago I was reading the paper when my wife interrupted with news that pole dancing is being pushed as a new Olympic sport.
I laughed and said, “That’s hilarious. Where on earth did you hear such a thing?”
“On the radio.”
I looked at her. She was wearing her radio face: dead serious. If my wife hears it on the radio, she believes it. If I say it, she doubts it. There is a clear line of demarcation at home when my wife rates her sources.
“Sounds like two deejays zooming their listeners,” I said. “Pole dancing is not going to be an Olympic sport.”
Perhaps I spoke too soon. Curious, I went online and guess what: There’s a strong, growing lobby to add it.
I should know by now to never underestimate the modern Olympic movement, nor predict what half-baked “sports” it will invent in order to expand the Games and inspire TV ratings, which helps drive revenue.
“People would watch it,” my wife said, adding, “You would. You know you would.”
Her comment was a smart gambit; it headed off my chance to lie and deny.
My wife has a very valid point. Men would watch pole dancing. In record numbers. All around the world. They do now anyway, even though it’s not on TV. TV ratings lure advertisers. Ad revenue means big money. Big money means the IOC cares. Guys wouldn’t just watch pole dancing. We’d even buy tin lunchboxes decorated with Olympic pole dancers. More money. Hence the logic of the IOC pondering the brass menagerie.
At first I dismissed the pole dancing idea but now I think it makes a lot of sense. It meets all criteria for a mass appeal Olympic sport: everyone can do it, costs to train are minimal, some clearly are better at it than others, instant celebrities would be made, and uniforms could be outstanding. Tampa, I predict, will be home to the U.S. Olympic training center. It sort of already is.
At the risk of flagellating a well-beaten horse, a side benefit would be that Tiger would be more inclined to play golf at the Games. He has pole dance experience but could not be a judge; it would not be fair since he already knows the contestants.
Golf should be in the Olympics and will be in 2016 and 2020. So should bowling, billiards, and Texas Hold’em. Snooker is perfect, as are darts.
Before you protest, compare these events to synchronized swimming. I would also add a slingshot competition and paintball. And dancing. I would not add singing, baking, typing, or tanning (unless tanning was a beach volleyball qualifier).
I enjoy watching the Olympics very much even though four years seems a long time between competitions. For some reason those four years seem far longer than the five between colonoscopies. I guess that’s good.
I enjoy the Winter Games more than I used to because now I live in Colorado, where snow is good and sliding is fun. Concussions from face plants are not fun, so it’s a kick to watch the pros eat snow although I’d rather see them taste it every other run like me instead of falling just once every four years.
The Winter Games are ten times better since modernizing with remarkable aerial performers like Shaun White and Speedy Peterson. But the games still lack what should be its ultimate competition, a new event that answers the one big question current games do not: Who are the world’s greatest frozen water male and female athletes?
I propose a winter decathlon. A blend of speed and slalom skiing and snowboarding, along with race and precision skating, ski jumping aerials, snowboarding, and navigation sports like luge or skeleton. Top it off with the final two events, the grueling endurance of Nordic combined, which requires the finesse and courage of ski jumping with gut-busting cross-country skiing.
From that decathlon would rise the world’s greatest winter Olympians, extraordinary athletes who’ve earned the right to ascend to the summit of a great Olympian’s true Olympus: a guest judge for pole dancing.