Torch Archives - Aberdeen Voice

Olympic Spats & Strops – Part 3

Aug 092012

Dave Watt presents the third article of a series of three concerning ‘strops and arguments’ in the olympics.

“May joy and good fellowship reign, and in this manner, may the Olympic Torch pursue its way through ages, increasing friendly understanding among nations, for the good of a humanity always more enthusiastic, more courageous and more pure.”
– Baron Pierre de Coubertin – founder of the modern Olympics. Athens 1896.

1948 Olympiad London.

Although World War II was over, Europe was still ravaged from the war. When it was announced that the Olympic Games would be resumed, many debated whether it was wise to have a festival when many European countries were in ruins and people were near starvation.

To limit Britain’s responsibility to feed the participants, it was agreed that they would bring their own food. No new facilities were built for these Games, but Wembley Stadium had survived the war and proved adequate.

No Olympic Village was erected; the male athletes were housed at an army camp in Uxbridge and the women housed at Southlands College in dormitories. Germany and Japan, needless to say, were not invited to participate.

It was a generally good natured Olympiad, apart from US protests after their relay team was disqualified and the second placed British team had to give up their gold medals and received silver medals – which had been given up by the Italian team. The Italian team then received the bronze medals which had been given up by the Hungarian team.

1952 Olympiad Helsinki.

A total of 69 nations participated in these Games, up from 59 in the 1948 Games. Japan and Germany were both reinstated, but getting back to normal, the strops began with only West Germany providing athletes, since East Germany refused to participate in a joint German team.

The Republic of China, listed as “China (Formosa)”, withdrew from the Games on July 20, in protest at the People’s Republic of China’s men and women being permitted to compete. Israel entered for first time.

The US won 40 golds and a total of 76 medals with the new participants the USSR coming second with 22 golds and a total of 71 medals which just goes to show what you can do if sport is open to the entire population instead of being the preserve of a few toffs.

1956 Olympiad Melbourne.

In Europe, the USSR, suspecting the resurgence of fascism in Hungary, invaded the country, while the British and French attacked Egypt in order to regain control of the newly nationalised Suez Canal.

As a sign of protest 6 countries withdrew from the Olympics. The Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland withdrew because of the events in Hungary, while Iraq and Lebanon withdrew because of the conflict in Suez.

Less than two weeks before the opening ceremony, the People’s Republic of China also pulled out because the Republic of China (Taiwan) had been allowed to compete. Although the Games were not cancelled, there were many episodes such as the water-polo match between Russia and Hungary which turned into a major aquatic ruck.

On the plus side, East and West Germany were represented by one combined unified team.

Strangely, as the quarantine laws did not allow the entry of foreign horses into Australia, equestrian events were held in Stockholm in June 1956. The rest of the Games started in late November, when it was summertime in the Southern Hemisphere.

The Butterfly event in swimming was “invented” for the 1956 Games after some swimmers had begun to exploit a loophole in the breaststroke rules and rocketed past their more traditional opponents.

The Soviets dominated the Olympiad, winning 98 medals with 37 gold , while the Americans won 74 medals with 32 gold.

1960 Olympiad in Rome.

This proved to have a disappointing lack of strops apart from the ludicrous spectacle of Formosa representing all of China yet again. The points of interest were Abebe Bikila of Ethiopia winning the marathon bare-footed, to become the first black African Olympic champion; and a relatively unknown US boxer called Cassius Clay winning the boxing light-heavyweight gold medal.

Soviet gymnasts won 15 of 16 possible medals in women’s gymnastics, and the USSR won 43 golds, 29 silver and 31 bronze medals, comfortably topping the medal table.

1964 Olympiad in Tokyo.

In 1964, the IOC banned South Africa from the Games over its policy on racial segregation. The Sharpeville Massacre two years previously had been too much even for the UK and the US, who had been cheerleading happily for the South African state up until this point. The ban continued right up until 1992, following the abolition of apartheid in South Africa.

The US & Soviets shared the medals table, with the US winning more golds (36) but the USSR winning more medals overall (96 to the US’s 90).

Yoshinori Sakai, who was born in Miyoshi, Hiroshima on the day that it was destroyed by an atomic bomb, was chosen as the final torchbearer.

1968 Olympiad in Mexico City.

The 1968 Olympiad came during a turbulent year. Soviet tanks rolled into Prague, the US was fully involved in a full scale war against the Vietnamese and the country was riven internally by the repression of the Civil Rights movement culminating in the murder of Martin Luther King.

Only a few weeks prior to the games, the Mexican government had carried out a massacre of workers and students in the Plaza de las Tres Culturas, known as the Tlatelolco massacre. At one point there was serious speculation as to whether the games should go ahead.

East Germany and West Germany competed as separate entities for the first time at a Summer Olympiad, Formosa became Taiwan and continued to represent mainland China – at least in the eyes of Avery Brundage, president of the IOC.

However, the creation of the most iconic symbol that was to represent the 1968 Olympiad for all time came about because of the struggle of black athletes in the US.

Amateur black athletes initially formed OPHR, the Olympic Project for Human Rights, to organise a black boycott of the 1968 Olympic Games. OPHR was deeply influenced by the black freedom struggle and their goal was nothing less than to expose how the US used black athletes to project a lie about race relations both at home and internationally.

OPHR had four central demands: restore Muhammad Ali’s heavyweight boxing title, remove Avery Brundage as head of the International Olympic Committee, hire more black coaches, and disinvite South Africa and Rhodesia from the Olympics.

Ali’s belt had been taken by boxing’s powers-that-be earlier in the year for his resistance to the Vietnam draft. By standing with Ali, OPHR was expressing its opposition to the war and opposing a campaign of harassment and intimidation orchestrated by the IOC supporters of Brundage.

The wind went out of the sails of a broader boycott for many reasons, partly because the IOC re-committed to banning apartheid countries from the Games and also because some black athletes were unwilling to sacrifice their years of training on a point of principle.

However, On October 16, 1968, black sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, the gold and bronze medalists in the men’s 200-meter race, took their places on the podium for the medal ceremony wearing black socks without shoes and civil rights badges. They lowered their heads and each defiantly raised a black-gloved fist as the Star Spangled Banner was played. Both were members of the Olympic Project for Human Rights.

Supporters praised the men for their courage in making their stand.

Some people, particularly Avery Brundage, felt that a political statement had no place in the international forum of the Olympic Games. In an immediate response to their actions, Smith and Carlos were suspended from the U.S. team by Brundage, and banned from the Olympic Village.

Those who opposed the protest said that the actions disgraced all Americans. Supporters, on the other hand, praised the men for their courage in making their stand.

Peter Norman, the Australian sprinter who came second in the 200m race, and Martin Jellinghaus, a member of the German bronze medal-winning 4×400-meter relay team, also wore Olympic Project for Human Rights badges at the games to show support for the suspended American sprinters.

Norman’s actions resulted in a reprimand, his absence from the following Olympic Games in Munich, despite easily making the qualifying time, and a failure of his national association to invite him to join other Australian medallists at the opening ceremony for the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney. Rather more creditably, Tommie Smith and John Carlos acted as pallbearers at Peter Norman’s funeral in 2006.

The Olympic Ideal – The Middle Years

History, Sport No Responses »

Aug 032012

Dave Watt presents the second article of a series of 3 concerning ‘strops and arguments’ in the olympics.

May joy and good fellowship reign, and in this manner, may the Olympic Torch pursue its way through ages, increasing friendly understanding among nations, for the good of a humanity always more enthusiastic, more courageous and more pure : – Baron Pierre de Coubertin – founder of the modern Olympics. Athens 1896

After some discussion in which the Germans put in a spirited bid Stockholm in Sweden was awarded the 1912 Olympiad with the unlucky Germans being promised the 1916 Games.

Stockholm introduced a series of firsts to the Olympics with the introduction of a electronic timing, a public address system and female athletes in the swimming and diving competitions with the last innovation causing an Australian journalist to worry that the sight of women in bathing suits might incite lust amongst the spectators causing them to behave like ‘primitive blacks’.

The Swedish organisers banned boxing on humanitarian grounds but introduced the highly militaristic pentathlon in which the future megalomaniac George S Patton finished a disappointing fifth despite a diet of raw steak, salad and opium.

The usual growls and snarls began at the opening ceremony with the Finns opting out of the Russian team, the Czechs marching separately from their fellow Austro-Hungarian subject races and the Germans tramping around in formation eliciting boos and cries of ‘Prussian Militarism’ from the Swedes.

The usual racism was also on display with the US’s commendably diverse team being the subject of protests at non-white athletes ‘violating the Olympic ethos’ by having too much melanin in their skins.

Owing to World War One (having been unsuccessfully marketed as the ‘War to End Wars’ and the ‘War for Civilisation’ but eventually having to settle for the more prosaic ‘Great War’) the Berlin Olympiad didn’t materialise. The Germans consoled themselves by invading Belgium where, according to Allied propaganda, they bayoneted babies, raped nuns, shot civilians and threw poison gas around willy-nilly by way of endearing themselves to the locals.

Not surprisingly, the 1920 Olympiad, held in war-damaged Antwerp was rather low key and the Germans along with the Austrians, Turks, Bulgarians and Hungarians were all banned for picking the wrong side in the war and the Soviet Union was banned for presumably not having anyone closely related to Queen Victoria running their country.

The first five were also banned from the 1924 games as well (not that the IOC are ones to bear a grudge) but the Soviets were sportingly allowed to eventually compete in 1952 whereupon they wiped the floor with every other country in the medals haul until they returned to the wonderful paradise that is free-market capitalism in 1990.

Having participated in a four year bloodbath the few participants in Antwerp games were pretty matey all round with the US bagging most of the medals and the newly independent Finland coming second with the legendary Paavo Nurmi taking three track golds.

The 1924 Paris Olympiad. Eh…Eric Liddell not running on a Sunday, Harold Abrahams, Chariots of Fire, men running along beach in vest and pants, blah, blah blah.

While this delightful piece of Anglocentric nostalgia was going on the Finns bagged thirteen gold, thirteen silver and five gold medals which isn’t bad for a country which has roughly the same population as Scotland but is obviously less devoted to Scotch pies and crap lager.

Needless to say, the usual deranged elements in the European press obligingly attributed the Finns success to the ‘wild mongol strain’ of their savage ancestors.

Love and international understanding reasserted itself when a Frenchman severely thrashed an enthusiastic American fan with a cane during the Franco-American rugby match and William DeHart became the first black athlete to win an individual gold amidst the usual grumblings about non-whites participating.

Having pocketed two Olympiads the French decided to outsource the Olympics to Amsterdam in the Netherlands in 1928 which saw the introduction of the five rings Olympic symbol for the first time.

The huge US team garnered most of the medals despite being managed by another megalomaniac in the shape of Douglas McArthur who kept the athletes marooned on board a liner/prison hulk from which they were only allowed ashore to compete.

The re-instated Germans, having presumably promised that they would behave much better in any future wars, performed exceptionally well with eleven gold, nine silver and nineteen bronze medals, coming second in the medals haul.

Not surprisingly, this led to protests by impoverished and hungry people turning up bearing banners proclaiming ‘Groceries Not Games’.

After ‘some discussion’ the Olympic committee settled on Los Angeles for the 1932 Olympiad which saw the introduction of the first Olympic Village and the first major anti-Olympic protest over the games being held at all. In 1931, with a million unemployed in California and soup kitchens springing up all over the state, a massive press campaign gulled local voters into voting for huge funding for expanding and improving the Olympic facilities.

Not surprisingly, this led to protests by impoverished and hungry people turning up bearing banners proclaiming ‘Groceries Not Games’. One can sympathise with their point of view – I mean, what kind of idiots would spend millions on a pointless sports junket in the midst of a huge recession and massive poverty………..?

Thirty four nations turned up including a rather unpopular entrant in the shape of Japan which was engaged in the conquest of Manchuria at the time and attempted to hijack a a formidable Chinese sprinter resident there to run for their puppet state of Manchukuo.

The sprinter, Liu Changchun refused to run replying that “he would never betray his own nation to serve others like a horse or a cow” which is obviously not the view of the Scottish footballers in Team GB.

Predictably the US won forty-one gold medals but the surprise teams were the Italians who came second in the medals table and the Japanese who dominated the men’s swimming events.

Berlin 1936. When Germany was initially chosen to host the 1936 Olympiad it was a liberal democracy but by 1935, with the games one year off, Germany was a Nazi dictatorship with the racist Nuremberg Laws banning Jews from all aspects of civil life and attacks on their shops homes and persons becoming ever more frequent and ever more violent.

Consequently a great deal of soul-searching went on, particularly in the US, about the morality of sending a multi-racial team to the Berlin Olympics. There were campaigns for a boycott of the games both in the US and Europe while the Germans fudged the implications of their racial laws and hinted that Jewish athletes would be eligible for selection.

From the Nazis’ point of view Brundage was the ideal choice

However, as they were banned from participating in the qualifying events as they weren’t members of German sporting clubs having been expelled early in Hitler’s reign this wasn’t very likely.

Eventually, the IOC in the US sent Avery Brundage to discuss the situation with Hitler’s ’regime. From the Nazis’ point of view Brundage was the ideal choice as his bigoted and racist views permeated the Olympics (a bit like a polluted stream running through a children’s play park) for nearly forty years.

On arriving in Germany Brundage set out the ground rules early on by proudly announcing that he was a member of several clubs that barred Jews from their membership thus indicating that he wasn’t going to be too hard to deal with.

Despite Hitler’s previous assertion that the Olympics were ‘a plot by Freemasons and Jews’ the Nazi regime was very interested in holding the games and assurances that multi-racial teams would be welcomed and treated equally were forthcoming.

This turned out to be quite genuine and black athletes like Jesse Owens and high jumper David Albritton were accommodated in the Olympic Village whereas they weren’t allowed to live on the campus where they studied at Ohio State University.

The Jewish athletes competing for Germany was more problematical when the world-rated Gretel Bergmann (classified as a full Jew by the Nuremberg laws) was told that her qualifying jumps were not of sufficient quality to allow her into the national team. As she emigrated to the US and won successive trophies there it’s a pretty fair bet that she could have qualified for the rather poor German womens high jump team if she’d jumped while carrying her week’s shopping.

A compromise was reached whereby blonde haired, green-eyed Helene Mayer, rated as only a half-Jew and resident in the US was allowed to compete as an honorary Aryan for the duration of the games where she won a silver medal.

In a little known attempt to “clean up” Berlin (which would surely endear him to the leader writers of a certain present-day local rag) , the German Ministry of the Interior authorized the chief of police to arrest all Romani/Gypsies and keep them in the Berlin-Marzahn concentration camp during the games.

Protests about the games in Britain were more subdued and Harold Abrahams, winner of the 1924 100 metres, undertook a lot of work to persuade fellow Jews in the country not to boycott the Nazi games. Presumably, he spent much of 1945 removing these particular endeavours from his CV.

Anyway, the Berlin Games went ahead with forty-nine nations competing, Germany winning 89 medals, including 33 golds and the whole event was wonderfully filmed by Leni Reifenstahl who was very pleased with her cinematic efforts until she discovered that Hitler was a Nazi in 1983.

Contrary to popular belief about the Berlin Olympics Hitler did not actually snub Jesse Owens. Hitler had greeted all the winning German athletes on the first day with a handshake and some Fuhrerly chit-chat but was told by the Olympic Committee that he either had to personally greet all of the winning athletes or none of them and he chose the latter course.

Consequently we can excuse Adolf from that particular breach of good manners – however, on the down side, there is just that little matter of fifty million war dead.

Old Susannah No. 81: Alphabet Soup Leftovers And Dogs’ Dinners

Aberdeen City, Opinion 2 Responses »

Jun 142012

Aberdeen Voice’s Old Susannah continues her romp through Aberdeen City Council’s A to Z of services, and considers two very different ‘Mr Smiths’, and dog’s dinners. By Suzanne Kelly.

Tally Ho! The burning issues of the past week include Olympic torches and scorching internet debate following Annie Lennox’s article in the Guardian. In this piece Lennox suggests that Aberdeen might have some issues and that the City Garden Project is ‘a dog’s dinner.’

In the first place as Mr Tom Smith (ACSEF, City Garden Trust, guru of truth, etc. etc.) points out, Annie doesn’t have all the facts. Mr Smith will be happy to supply them to her. This will be a historic first, considering ACSEF’s previous economy with said facts. But what a result! Tom Smith’s kindly offered to meet Annie! I bet she’s wondering what to wear to any such meeting and is all nervous and excited. Who could blame a girl? (Do I get a meeting invite as well, Tom, seeing as I was head of one of the official referendum campaign groups?).

I’m happy to admit I don’t have all the facts, either – I keep asking for them, but I still don’t have them. For one thing, I don’t know what comments people wrote on the voting slips when the six shortlisted designs were on show. At the time comments and votes were requested (and paid for by the taxpayer). Somehow, a private company, Aberdeen City Gardens Trust, seems to have the votes. Tom is one of the people with access to them, and won’t let us see the results. It wouldn’t be helpful, you see, to release this information.

I also don’t know the concrete web’s final business plan and its financial projections. I also don’t know what the architectural drawings specify in any detail. I don’t know what went on at the many meetings held to further the web. I only have ‘redacted’ (that’s with the details hidden) minutes of all those City Gardens Projects meetings you and I paid for (we’ve spent at least £600k on consultants and services for the granite web – you know, the project which won’t cost us a penny). Call me over-cautious, but before I’d agree to borrow £90 million and commit to spending £140 million on a plan with no details, I’d want something a bit more concrete (excuse the expression).

I also don’t know the latest on Mr Smith’s front page P&J story from when he claimed UTG supporters were ‘harassing’ him and his family, and illegally hacking into his email. You would have thought that had laws been broken, he’d have raced to the papers with the update. Otherwise, it just looks like a cynical manipulation of the press close to the referendum vote. But all in all, I admit I don’t have these minor little facts.

But never mind the facts (which we’ve been asked to do so far) – once Tom’s had a word with Annie Lennox, she’ll be joining ACSEF, moving to Union Terrace and supporting the web. Rumours that she has switched PR companies to Aberdeen’s BiG remain unconfirmed.

But Ms Lennox’ calling the Granite Web ‘a dog’s dinner’ in the Guardian was hardly fair. Firstly, if you tried to feed such slop to a poor dog, it would slink away howling into the night, and the Scottish SPCA would step in, like they did to Dumfries & Galloway’s NHS supremo, one Mr Michael Keggens. Because of his busy job and busy life, Keggens left his elderly dog without food and water, locked in the house for days. Easy mistake to make I’m sure.

The Scottish SPCA were alerted to the dog barking, and found the poor thing alone in the house, caked in muck with not even water to drink. Feeding the dog and returning a day later, the Scottish SPCA found the situation hadn’t changed. Apparently living things need food and water, but you can’t expect someone high up in the NHS to know details like that. Remember this the next time you hear of an elderly or infirm patient suffering dehydration. (PS – the Scottish SPCA is desperate for help just now, as are New Arc and Willows – if you can spare anything, please think about it).

Back to Mr Smith, well a Mr Smith anyway. Old Susannah had a sudden urge this week to re-watch the old Jimmy Stewart film, ‘Mr Smith goes to Washington.’ Yes, it’s heavy on the sentiment and American values. But the gist of the plot is this: a corrupt, wealthy circle of small town businessmen and elected officials are milking the taxpayers; they have a crooked construction scheme (for a dam – a granite web would have been too far-fetched even for Hollywood). These crooks have been sucking up public money, conspiring, and hiding the facts of their self-serving plans from the electorate. This somehow sounds familiar.

In comes naive, honest Mr Smith, newly elected to the Senate, where people expect he will just do as the villains tell him to do. He eventually finds out about all the corruption, and fights it (and he wins). By the way, one of the most powerful weapons which the wealthiest crooked businessman has is his ability to dictate to the local press what to cover, how to cover it, and what to leave out of the news.

In the end ‘people power’ and truth win out over greed, corruption and manipulation. I guess that’s Hollywood for you. I’m still stumped as to why I thought of this film and wanted to see it again, but it will come to me.

Before I continue with my search through Aberdeen City Council’s A to Z of ‘services’, I’d like to say that I’m greatly looking forward to next Saturday’s (23 June) party in Union Terrace Gardens, courtesy of Common Good Aberdeen. Hope to see you there. And congratulations on the unanimous decision for a cafe in UTG to be run by Common Good Aberdeen volunteers, with 100% of profits going to improving the gardens. A result in the truest sense.

I would also like to say a sincere thank you to the Guardian for its investigations, and to Ms Lennox (who can’t win – she gets it in the neck if she says anything, and gets it in the neck if she doesn’t. But I dare say she knows what’s important and what she’s doing, and petty, small-minded criticism can’t stop her. More power to her, as they say).

Now back to Aberdeen City’s A to Z of services.

M is for Marischal College: – Result! ACC gutted this building, fitted it out with new furniture for some of the council staff, and boasted widely how wonderful it was – it only cost around £60,000,000 and it ‘came in on time and under budget’. You can’t say fairer than that, can you?

Of course we never got to see a list of what the alternatives for council office space were (Old Susannah did do a FOI, knowing there is a ton of empty space owned by ACC out there – but was told this information was top secret). Marischal may have been under budget, but what the budget was for other solutions was never disclosed.

Marischal workers are also under something else, and it’s not budget. The problem I reported earlier with leaking toilet pipes hasn’t entirely been solved. It must be kind of stimulating – you never know what’s going to land on your desk if you work at Marischal.

N is for National Fraud Initiative: – No, it’s not an initiative to strip the taxpayer of as much money as possible, it means that:-

“…Aberdeen City Council is required by law to protect the public funds it administers. We may share information provided to us with other bodies responsible for auditing or administering public funds, in order to prevent and detect fraud.”

We’ll have to wait and see if the new administration can do as well as the previous one at preventing fraud. Let’s see – we had Councillor Cassie and his little financial embarrassment. We had ‘care’ workers stealing from their elderly clients, we’ve had social workers buying themselves goods with our money; we’ve had people at the council offices taking their work home with them (in the form of embezzled funds).

There is a saying: steal something small and you’ll go to jail; steal something big and they’ll make you a legend. Steal an entire Victorian Park and put it into private hands to manage? They’ll make you an ACSEF member.

O is for Open Data: – As the Council tells us,

“Open data is about increased transparency, about sharing the information we hold with the wider community to build useful applications.”

There is a link to this open data –

“We now have a linked data repository, available at: http://linkeddata.aberdeencity.gov.uk/ which provides a number of data sets as linked data. “

Please do be my guest and visit this link. But if you’re looking for any controversial data, I’m not sure this will be much help to you.

P is for Package Holidays: – the City is giving us advice on consumer protection regarding package holidays. Result!

I wonder whether the previous Lord Provost did a package holiday when he went on some of his essential world-wide trips in order to save the city some money. His visit to Nagasaki clearly worked wonders, and I hear the Japanese want to get rid of some of their tedious green space to build granite webs.

There was a tartan created to commemorate the visit as well. While we were spending all this money on his designer jeans, clothes, travel, portraits and so on, we sensibly have just auctioned off some of the artefacts from Thomas Glover House. Glover, you may recall, was for all intents the man who most helped to open up Japan to the outside world, and his house in Aberdeen was a monument to him and his travels.

I wonder if they’ve sold the doorknobs, light bulbs and light switches from the Glover house yet?

Q is for…. nothing: There are no entries. Nothing about quality of services, quality of life, nothing. That’s because things are so good, there’s nothing left to say. (X has no listings, either, FYI).

R is for Rats: If any of you have read the previous columns about the city’s A to Z of services, you will suspect correctly that this link takes you back to the city’s exterminator services. The city will happily kill rats, rodents, insects, and a whole host of critters for you, for a fee. And as we sadly know, they’ll shoot deer.

Next week: Expect an update on the Tullos Hill deer slaughter story, the remainder of the alphabet, and a return to definitions as normal.

PS – I have learnt a great deal from the online debate sparked from the Guardian’s Annie Lennox story. But most importantly, I’ve learnt you are not allowed to criticise a place unless you live in it. Therefore, let’s have no more carping on about the situations in Syria, Iraq, Tibet, Myanmar, DRC, and so on. Glad that’s settled.

Have your say in the comments box below.

City Roller Girl To Carry Olympic Flame

Aberdeen City, Featured, Sport No Responses »

Jun 072012

By Fred Wilkinson.

The Olympic Flame will be carried through Aberdeen City on Monday 11th June, arriving in the City around 6.25pm at Peterculter, and making it’s way to the Castlegate via Milltimber, Cults, Mannofield, Holburn Street and Union Street.

Among the runners will be Scotland Roller Derby international and Aberdeen team captain, Carolyn Mackenzie, who will run with the flame around 6.33pm from a section of the A93 near Coronation Road to the Milltimber Village sign.

Having previously published articles on Europe’s fastest-growing sport, Aberdeen Voice were delighted to hear of Granite City Roller Girls being represented in the ceremony and eager to know how Carolyn was feeling about her involvement.

“I am absolutely thrilled and overjoyed and really looking forward to the event.” announced Carolyn proudly.

“Part of the reason why my application was successful is the work I do with Aberdeen’s only Roller Derby league – Granite City Roller Girls. We are a nationally competitive league which was established in 2008 and we have been competing since 2010.”

Carolyn was originally nominated through the Diet Coke campaign by an ex-skater, Jenna Hunter, in recognition of her commitment to raising the profile of Roller Derby as a sport, and for her motivational role in the local team. In addition to the captaincy Carolyn also has the role of Head of Training for the team.

Carolyn explains:

“I am always looking for ways to put power into the team and try my best to inspire others to achieve their full potential. I’m forever scouting the internet, watching national and international teams and watching the regional play offs in USA online to keep up to date with the newest strategies.

“I’m also forever trying to persuade coaches from other successful leagues to train with us and trying my best to attend boot camps. On top of this I like to look up to other established full contact sports to see why they have become so successful and trying to do the same for our team and Roller Derby .”

In recognition of her hard work and commitment, Carolyn was one of two Aberdeen skaters selected to compete as part of Team Scotland at the inaugural Roller Derby World Cup in Toronto last December where the Scots finished 11 out of 13.

Carolyn commented:

“The World Cup was an eye-opener as some of the girls who were competing on the USA team have been skating longer than I have been alive! We also beat Brazil and Argentina to secure 11th place, something many Scottish teams can’t boast”

Carolyn will not be alone as she takes her turn carrying the Olympic flame on Monday. Fellow Roller girls are understandably proud of Carolyn’s achievements and are excited at the prospect of cheering her on along the route.

Team-mate Kirsten Reid told Aberdeen Voice:

“Granite City Roller Girls are immensely proud of Carolyn, one of the privileged to have been selected in this once in a lifetime experience of carrying the Olympic Torch.

“Carolyn is an inspiration to all her family and friends with the achievements she has made in the last year. With all the hard work and dedication to her sport, this is a lovely way for Carolyn to be rewarded. Well Done Carolyn, carry that torch with Pride, you deserve it and we love you.”

Carolyn added:

“A lot of them are coming to line the streets to watch my run which is pretty emotional. We are a tight-knit group, and the team has gone though such a tough time so far in 2012 that it’s so nice to have something positive to do.

“Everyone is really happy for me. Some lucky souls are away on holiday at the time and will be watching me from Spain and USA.”

It has indeed been a tough few months for Roller Derby in Aberdeen. At the moment, GRCG have no venue locally to compete.

They were housed at the Beach Leisure Centre for over a year, and hosted many national leagues there, competing with teams from as far afield as Leicester.

The first ever Scottish Tournament was held at the BLC back in 2010. However, early this year the BLC refurbished its flooring, and despite no damage having been caused by the skaters, they were informed that we could no longer use the venue.

Having explored many alternatives including schools, colleges and Aberdeen Sports Village, GCRG are still trying desperately to secure a suitable venue in order to continue developing the local league and the sport in general. Carolyn fears that the situation could have a profoundly negative impact on the future of the sport locally.

“The members and volunteers of Granite City Roller Girls have built this sport up from nothing, and being a relatively new and misunderstood sport we have struggled to reach the level that we are at today.

“Roller Derby is a recognised sport and follows rules and infrastructure like any other sport. There are rumours that our governing body the Womens’ Flat Track Derby Association will be creating a European League in the very near future and our aim is to be able to one day compete in it.

“Without the experience that competitive play brings (and the funding that spectator fees generate) there is a very real possibility that the momentum behind the team will cease and the game will keep rolling forward without us. “

Roller Derby is played on an oval track, with a 10 ft clearance zone around it. Adding areas for spectators and team benches the space required for Roller Derby is the equivalent of a double sports hall – 8 badminton courts – 1221m2- circa.13,000 sq.ft.

The existence and availability of such spaces is only part of the problem faced by GCRG, as Carolyn explained:

“We have been making enquiries into warehouse spaces around Aberdeen, but with Aberdeen being the Oil and Gas Capital of Europe, these spaces all come with a price, and a not-for-profit organisation like ours just cannot compete with Multi-National Companies.

“Our dream is to have such a space though and we believe it is possible.

“Apart from a warehouse, any venue with wooden or concrete flooring of this size will be suitable. I know there are some schools that have sizeable halls but whether they are as big as we require is a different story.

“As members of Aberdeen Sports Council we have been given some excellent advice on approaching potential new venues which includes talking to schools which is something we are very keen to do.”

If any one has any leads or knows of some way they can help they can contact carolynmackenzie@hotmail.com or use the www.granitecityrollergirls.org contact form.

Footnote:

Roller Derby is a full contact sport played on quad roller skates – predominantly by women. It is played on an oval track, each team can have 5 players on track at any given time – 4 blockers and 1 jammer.

The jammer wears a star on her head and her role is to score points by passing each blockers hips. The blockers role is to prevent the other team scoring points by physically blocking the jammer and also to assist her own jammer in scoring points by blocking the opposing blockers. It’s one of the few games where offence and defence are played simultaneously.

More about Roller Derby here.

Want to wish Carolyn well? Ideas regarding a possible Roller Derby venue? Use the comments box below. Note – All comments will be moderated.