Residents of a 17-story tower block near the Olympic Park have no right to challenge an unprecedented decision by the army to deploy high-velocity missiles in a residential area, a high court judge has ruled. Read more here on the Guardian.
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CC photo #192: Shade occupied at Shanghai 2011
That feeling, when you just have to wait a couple of minutes for the bus, but the sun is blazing and the humidity so high that you are soaking before that. Pál Joensen and Jón Bjarnason at the Shanghai 2011 World Championships.
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NBC, Google Plan Summer Olympic Cyberattack Battle
NBC and Google are conducting “war games” in at least three countries to prepare for the possibility of hacker attacks or hardware malfunction disrupting the online streaming of the Summer Olympics. Also, water on my mill, online broadcast turns out to be actually boosting TV viewership.
For example, some feared that an online broadcast would cannibalize TV viewership, said Rick Cordella, senior vice president for digital media at NBC Sports and Olympics. But NBC found that streaming online content actually created “pre-air buzz†and encouraged more people to watch a taped broadcast on television.
Read CIO Journal via GoSwim on Twitter.
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Just a guy wakeboarding down the main streets of Irkutsk
Awesome, title says “Wakeboarding the central streets of Irkutsk” (Siberia, Russia)
Via Buzzfeed
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Turkey to seek Guinness recognition for Derya Büyükuncu’s 6th Games
The Turkish Swimming Federation will seek Guinness recognition for swimmer Derya Büyükuncu, who will compete at the Olympics for a record sixth time in London this year. “Very few athletes have the privilege of competing six times in Olympics, and Derya will be the first swimmer ever to accomplish it,†Federation chair Ahmet Mazhar Bozdoğan said.
Yup, him and Lars Frölander.
Read Hürriyet Daily News
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India’s Olympic berth goes to Gagan under strange rules
Get this, India’s single Olympic berth in swimming has been granted to Gagan AP Ulalmath despite of him not being among the four that have made the Olympic invitation time, nor having qualified in the actual event. The thing is, when the four that had made the invitation cut weren’t invited by FINA, India reverted to have a swimmer selected under the ‘universality’ quota, where one of the requirements is for the swimmer to have competed at the last World Championships. Which Gagan had, while the four others as far as results goes better qualified hadn’t. Showing up at the World Championships apparently overrules swimming the actual event, as Gagan has been invited to compete in the London 2012 men’s 1500 freestyle despite him swimming only the 400 and 800 at Shanghai 2011, while Saurabh Sangvekar who actually made the 1500 Olympic invitation time is sidelined. India could have had two Universality spots if only they had sent a woman also to the World Championships, note to self: “Show up at the Worlds!”. Read for instance The Times of India and see the SCAQ Blog.
(Woouw, tough day in the ‘related video’ department)
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Technical problems at Bristol Olympic training pool
The mechanism has failed that controls the bulkheads in the less than 5 months old pool at Hengrove Park Leisure Centre in Bristol, where Kenya’s Jason and David Dunford arrived to train this weekend. Divers are for now lifting them manually, so that the pool can be used both as a 50m pool as well as two 25m pools, the Dunfords saying that they are able to do “around 90%” of the training that was originally agreed. Read more here on BBC Bristol.
(Mark Foster dancing at the opening of the Hengrove Park Leisure Centre pool)
((struggling to find related video :-P ))
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CC photo #191: Laure Manaudou exits the Rijeka 2008 pool
It had this feeling of a final exit, when Laure Manaudou on the last day of the Rijeka 2008 European Short Course Championships didn’t qualify for the women’s 200 backstroke final, placing 3rd in the prelims but also third of the French, her ‘only’ medal the bronze in the 100 backstroke. But no, after retiring in September 2009, she returned to competitive swimming in September 2011, and qualified for the London Games in 2012.
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Nick Fazah freediving with Seal
Nosy buggers, them seals.