please empty your brain below

Yes - what a great location. My wife took me to the Olympic show jumping and - not really understanding the finer details of the sport - I spent most of my time admiring the view and hushing our young baby...
fwiw, I think cycling takes some beating for both atmosphere and excitement, so maybe this wasn't ideal as a follow on! We've seen Paralympic dressage twice in 3 days. The first time was qualifying and it rained a lot. Had we not paid, I suspect we'd have gone home. Second time we were fortunate enough to see Natasha Baker take gold, hanging on to a high score for 2 hours. Like you, I had no idea how the scoring worked, but the 'will they, won't they' of watching other athletes scores made the event more gripping.

But both times we went, Greenwich Park was 1/3 full at best, despite supposedly being sold out.
What do you think was causing the queues? We had no problems getting in a for the fairly quiet Modern Pentathlon.
You seem to suggest the footbridges were the bottleneck - are they keeping large numbers off due to instabilities? Or was it a security hold up?
Oh yes - forgot to say that there were no queues for the full-to-capacity Olympic showjumping. Perhaps fewer ticket/security checks were open?
Shame - I was hoping you'd been to Piccadilly Circus Circus yesterday.

Lots of pictures here: http://www.facebook.com/SecretCircusLondon

It was really fantastic. Still, I guess even you, DG, can't be everwhere at once!
Have you - or indeed anyone else - had a day pass at the Park or Excel? Any pointers to getting the best view of the action? I heard most venues are packed, with long queues.
I was so moved watching Sophie Christiansen on the telly last night, incredible ... no stirrups! I used to be a racehorse jockey so am horsey enough to understand these achievements and also the bond they will have with their horse. Fantastic.

Very excited to be in the stadium yesterday morning, I finally got to see the Cauldron, in fact, was seated right next to it. Aled Davies in front of us doing his discus. What a day.
I was at the same event, I'm a non horsey person as well but I was lucky enough to have one of my friend who practiced for several years and who was able to explain me some interesting stuff about this sport. Especially the huge need of having your hips + your legs to properly "pilot" your horse.
She told me the event wasn't an amazing performance if you consider it as profesionnal riders, but if you keep in mind that they had -at least- no legs, that was absolutely mind blowing.

Small information she gave me : when horses are urging their speed, the rider is supposed to stick to the saddle, which can only be achieved if you can control your lower body. This explain why some of them were having little jumps, which seems nothing but actually make them pull on the reins. A horse is naturally stopping if you pull the reins, so they have to train to separate a pull saying "go on buddy" to a pull saying "halt there please"

Anyway, the sight was gorgeous indeed and I really enjoyed my afternoon there.
Thanks for the coverage of the whole olympics/paralympics and the 7 years pre games period
I was in the Olympic Park on Saturday with "real" tickets and saw the queues for the day pass venues, so before Sunday (when I was there on day passes) I did some research which paid off in spades, especially as the Sunday was busier than the Saturday.

First, check the schedules for the day, probably print out and take with you. Then, get there early - aim to be at the park for 8:30 and you can choose your venue. We saw TeamGB win their first Goalball heat that way. Next, be prepared to change your plan if the signs are showing "no day pass seats" at a given location, although frankly I reckon you can get in anywhere if you arrive midway through a session and stay through the next. Leave your preconceptions about any sports at the door, prepare to be amazed and inspired in equal measure.

Oh, and personally I went for Court No 1 in the tennis rather than centre court, no hectoring "lets play some games" compare, much more intimate setting.

Oh, and dg ... "Some thought the hijacking of Greenwich Park for Olympic purposes would be a disaster". SOME thought the whole games would be a disaster, if I remember commenters from your early years posts on the subjects. I wonder where they are now?? One message I'd like to send to all of them: You were so, so, very wrong, you miserable bunch of whingers.
Olympic Park Day Pass tip (I was there on Saturday and saw Tennis and Basketball).

Don't necessarily believe the giant signs. They all said "Eton Manor no day pass seats available" but we were there must of the afternoon and it was somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 full. There are two courts with large stands, and the rest have small stands.

Also, with the Basketball, we were there for the evening session (2 games) and the first at 6.30 was totally packed, but the second at 8.45 was only 1/3 full. Don't know whether most people weren't interested in sport that late, or whether as far as the organisers and games makers at the entrance it was still "full"despite so many people having left.
Thanks for the Day Pass tips. I've got one for later this week, so all advice gratefully received!

And no, I didn't get to Picaddilly Circus Circus, although I did watch the feathered finale live on the website, and blimey yes, that looked unforgettable.
Day Passes - Most people only stay for a game, so turning up before the next game starts (ie in the middle of a session) is a good way to get in.

Ignore the big yellow signs, they're not updated very quickly. The totem signs are much more accurate, but even better, ask the Games Makers.

I was there on Saturday and I had no trouble getting in anywhere, but I did see that during the afternoon session everywhere displayed as full. If anyone was queueing during this time, I don't know.

Generally though, if you want to know more, speak to the Games Makers. They were very clued up on patterns from previous days and happy to help.

If you are able - Do they say this before the anthems in the Olympics too?
As above - it seems quite easy to get into the different venues with a Day Pass. Yesterday Goalball was maybe 3/4s full, Tennis less than half full and Basketball about 3/4 full for the GB game, less than half full thereafter. Only football i couldnt get into - and i'm sure that would have been ok with a short wait.

FWIW i thought Wheelchair Basketball was the most fun, Doubles in Tennis was better than Singles from what i saw.
I just got back from seeing the Archery at the Royal Artillery Barracks.

The gold medallist in the Men's W1 Compound only had one arm, so held onto the string with a release aid held in his mouth, then pushed forward with his other arm. The silver medallist in the Men's Open Compound had no arms, and used a brace across his shoulders to hold the string, and pushed the bow forward with his foot (pulling a tab on the release aid with his mouth). Despite their lack of two arms, both archers were able to regularly place arrows in a ten ring only 12.2cm in diameter that was 70m away.


Other Day Pass venues (besides the minor courts at Eton Manor, I didn't try the main one so not sure about that) had segregated seating for Day Pass holders and people with tickets for that specific session, in order to assure space for the latter. They apparently used to do that for Archery at RAB, but since there is always some room (the stand behind the shooting line is pretty big) they've stopped doing that and just let everybody in together.

Another difference is that they make a concerted effort to file everybody into every seat in each row to try and have everybody crammed into the good seats nearest the archers (the other venues just let you pick whereever you want, so there are lots of small gaps between groups). That really helped the atmosphere, but did prevent you having any choice in what kind of view you wanted.
Bear in mind that the segregated seating isn't guaranteed though - they completely suspended that on Saturday by the end of the first sessions, although if you had a ticket you were still entitled to a seat.
Didn't the British girl who won today control her horse by flexing the muscles in her bottom and whispering? Amazing.

I really don't think the TV coverage has shown off the London venues to their best. Where were the crane shots of Horseguards, Greenwich, Lords, Woolwich etc showing the venues in their wider context? Watching the archery at Lords I felt it could have been anywhere.
I've just come back from a Day Pass at the Paralympics, and successfully got into all four venues listed on the ticket. Of course, I wasn't really interested in the sport, so I had no qualms about simply turning up whenever and arriving in the middle of a game. I didn't meet any crowds, and didn't have to queue once - indeed, all of the venus had large banks of empty seats, although that may have been because Team GB (or whatever we're supposed to call them now) were elsewhere. (In the case of the basketball, while I was watching Australia and Italy battle it out, the commentator was providing regular updates on the score in the match she wished she was narrating - Britain vanquishing Japan miles away in North Greenwich.)

A certain element of luck came into it as well. The first event I went to was goalball at the Copper Box (and I can confirm as a result that babies truly are the nemesis of all silence-requiring sports), which also happened to be the first venue to stop admitting Day Pass holders. Other than that, keeping an eye on the time to make sure you get into a venue before it closes for the night is good practice.

Basically, if you have a Day Pass, you've already admitted that you're not there because you actually want to see the sport, and I don't think you can realistically expect to see many games from beginning to end. It's more of an unprofessional pot-pourri sort of ticket than one for the enthusiasts, or bloggers hoping to write match reports.

By coincidence, I did witness an epic two-hour wheelchair tennis doubles tussle between the USA and Israel in Eton Manor, but it's mainly a case of getting what you're given. The prize for the most amusing game I saw today goes to the seven-a-side football match between Russia and the Netherlands. I turned up to that with only fifteen minutes to go on the clock, thinking that I must surely be too late to see any goals being scored. When I arrived, the Netherlands were 5-0 down. By the time I left, the score was 8-0, and the ball had barely entered Russia's half. A marvellously unambiguous drubbing.

A hint on getting into some venues - the Basketball Arena, Riverbank Arena, and Eton Manor have banks of seats on all four sides, but an entrance on only one side. Most people aren't intelligent enough to walk around the outside of the arena to the distant seats. I had almost an entire side of the stadium to myself in the Riverbank. If you were at that match, you probably saw me - I was on the top row, immediately beneath the scoreboard.
@Darren, Kirk: In some of my venues (not all) I was obliged, as a Day Pass holder, to go through a certain gate at the entrance. That was the limit of my obligations - after that, they just let me have the run of the place. It wasn't as if they were running short on seats, anyway!
Perhaps some of the pre-Olympic whingeing was a natural kneejerk reaction to excessive hype. As the Guardian put it, back in April, "...already you can smell the excitement in the air, because it's being wafted in by gigantic corporate excitement blowers."
Thanks for the hints, everyone.
Further Olympic Park Day Pass tips (I was there on Tuesday):

If you are there in a day when it is five a side football, the seating capacity is the lowest in the Park, so if you want to see it, either arrive early or expect to queue. The session I was in was pretty much totally full, but it did feature GB vs Iran. The capacity of the seven a side football is loads higher.

Whilst football and goalball have seasons and schedules, tennis at Eton Manor is a bit more up in the air, depending on how long each match takes to play. We went there after seeing goalball in the morning and football in the afternoon, and despite arriving two hours before the tennis was scheduled to finish for the day (at 8pm) it was mostly all finished already, so we ended up catching the last game or two in 3 different quarter finals, which was quite cool.

If you have a baby, DO NOT BRING IT TO GOALBALL! The sport requires absolute silence, and at least two idiots brought occasionally screaming babies in with them. Five a side football also requires silence, but as it is outside, the temporary stands are noisy, the coaches and guides are all shouting and plans sometimes fly overhead, you don't quite need absolute silence.
@Darren: It sounds as if we went to the same goalball match! China versus Canada? I kept wishing the referee would deliver a personal admonishment (instead of just repeating "Quiet please") to the idiotic parents to embarrass them in front of the whole audience, because they certainly didn't seem sufficiently embarrassed by their babies being the only noisy thing in a vast stadium.
Oh, wait, no, scratch that - you went on Tuesday, and I went on Monday. Oops.
I went to the goalball Saturday - Canada vs Sweden. There was a crying baby there too, but thankfully it had considerate parents who quickly took it outside.

There was an awful lot of "Quiet please" from the referees, almost as many as if you were watching Andy Murray at Centre Court - and the over-excited crowds you get there










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