One of the items on the news today dealt with the Olympic organisers deciding to hold the 2012 mountain biking tournament in Essex. Lots of behind hand guffaws at the thought of these guys and girls biking around some of the flattest parts of Britain. In fact there were e-mails and phone calls coming in to ask why it wasn't being held in Wales or Scotland where there are mountains? Well mountain biking does not have anything about mountains in fact a mountain biking website states:
The rules of cross country racing are pretty simple. In each of these races, the competitors from each represented country start at the same time and race their mountain bikes on a closed off-road course for about 2 hours. The first athlete to cross the finish line after a set number of laps on the course wins. It's about as simple as racing gets until you look at how demanding the race is on the body.
No mention of mountains anywhere... Also the games in 2012 are the 'London' games, not the 'Llandudno' games. Ah,one asks, if it is the London games why Essex ? Well large parts of Essex fall within the municipal boroughs of London as far out as Havering.