THE OLYMPIC GAMES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 44, 15 October 1912, Page 6

THE OLYMPIC GAMES.

. .. BRITAIN NOT UP TO THE STANDARD. THE REASON , WHY. A correspondent of the oversea Times who was present at the games at Stockholm and paid some attention to the methods of training, accommodation of competitors, etc., say’s the investigation of the causes which have produced such a disagreeable result involves consideration of a good many things. “In the first place,” he declares, “our ideal is not the Olympic ideal. We have, in fact, never brought ourselves to take the Olympic games seriously. To be entirely frank, they have not appeared to us to stand for the best in amateur sport; and it is undeniably true that the Olympic Stadium cannot have, - and probably never will acquire the atmosphere of Lord’s, of Henley, of Cowes, or Wimbledon, or Queen’s Club on the day of the University Sports. As long as we place our own events first and take part in the games only more or less incidentally and as it happens to suit us, so long must we be at a disadvantage as "compared with those countries which are concentrating their efforts through the whole four-year period in bringing to the scratch their perfect strength in every competition which the new Olympiad will offer. Our strength, also, begets weakness in another way. If we had not played our games so much and organised them so thoroughly in the past, wo -should not now have governing bodies, which, while so useful (both in organising sports at home and as guarantors of a certain standard of amateurship) have, by allowing their sensitiveness and jealousy to weigh with them, been a serious embarrassment in securing representation at the games by our full strength. The constitutional weakness of our Olympic Council has been the subject of much discussion. For the present it is enough merely to note that in England our central Olympic authority is inherently inefficient. It has also shown itself quite incompetent to see that such representatives as wo did send to Stockholm were either properly trained or rightly cared for during the progress of the games. The idea, which has obtained currency, that the majority of them neglected training altogether, is untrue and unjust to the men. It was unfair to our men and unfair to our national interests. It is not the Olympic management under which, if wo are to compete at all in the future, we can hope to compete successfully. It is, again, to our disadvantage, from the Olympic point of view, that in Great Britain

we attach so much larger importance to game© than we do to pure athletics. As a nation wc do not think much of track athletics. When wo produce, as not seldom we do produce, an athlete of the first rank, it is more or less by accident. The circumstances are dif-i ferent on the Continent and in the United States. And if we neglect truck j athletics, still more do we ignore gym-! nasties. Wo may believe, and rightly, 1 that the discipline of our games is bet-: ter for us as a people than the dis- i cipline of the track or gymnasium. Development of muscle by no means breeds either initiative or reson reef illness in a man. The most beautifully developed gymnast, indeed, is often peculiarly gauche and inept at everything hut his own speciality. In the background, of course, is our national disinclination to subject ourselves to discipline. Few of us would care to-see England take its games quite in the American spirit, and the admiration which we feel for those splendid hands of Scandinavian gymnasts is not nn-

ramgled, in the case of most of us, with a certain shamed contempt. But the choice is now plainly before us whether we shall hold to our present ways,- or whether we shall go with the rest of the world. It is, as the Americans would say, ‘up to us’ to decide. We have been pre-eminent in the field of sport in the past; but a new tribunal with new standards lias boon set up, and if wo cling to our old traditions we must be content to be ranked by that tribunal not even first or even second among the nations. If wc would hold our place we must conform to the new standards, adopt the new methods, and' meet the world on even terms under the new conditions. AVe may question if the Olympic ’Games are good either in their influence on the spirit of sportsmanship or in their effect on international relations of a

■larger kind, AVe may regret that the games were ever" instituted. But, if we withdrew from them now, we should inevitably he regarded as having done so in petulance and for the mortification of defeat. AVe can continue to compete in our present random way, and be satisfied to let the world think of us as only ‘second raters,’ in the field of sport. Or we can set ourselves to take the games seriously, and ,by proper training, with enthusiasm and bettor management bring our men and teams to the post in something like the condition and spirit which characterises the Americans. To attain all this will require a much

larger popular interest in the Olympic ■Games than has, been awakened so far; and that popular interest must he made manifest in the ■subscription of ample funds. It is a matter entirely of our own ’ choice and for ot?r own decision.” .