| Title: | The Sports Factor |
| Material Description: | Radio transcripts |
| Year: | 1999 |
| Creator Home Page: | http://www.abc.net.au |
| Original URL of this page: | http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/sportsf/index/SportsFactorChronoIdx.htm |
| Notes: | Australian Broadcasting
Corporation. Radio National Sports Factor home page |
At next year's Games, Australia will compete in HANDBALL for the very first time. An enormously popular spectator sport in many parts of the world, handball is virtually unknown in Australia. National team members SHELLEY ORMES and TRAVIS HARDMAN give us the lowdown.
And we'll also find out about INTERNATIONAL RULES FOOTBALL. This month, Irish Gaelic
footballers play Australian Football League players in a Test series in Australia.
Ex-Gaelic footballer and Aussie Rules champion JIM STYNES explains the hybrid game they'll
be playing.
Plus, a
new documentary by John Pilger "Welcome To Australia" uses sport and the Sydney
Olympics as the means by which to draw attention to race issues in Australia. Amanda Smith
speaks to COLIN TATZ, who's book "Obstacle Race - Aborigines in Sport" forms the
basis of the documentary, and Aboriginal leader and former soccer player CHARLES PERKINS.
SIMON TATZ, sports advisor to Senator Kate Lundy, Shadow Minister for Sport, says that we have to demand much higher standards of behaviour from sports people than we currently do, because as public figures they have an obligation to behave ethically on and off the field.
And SIMON LONGSTAFF, from the St.James Ethics Centre in Sydney, has been advising the International Olympic Committee on how they might clean up their tarnished image, with just twelve months to go to the 2000 Games.
Plus WILLIAM BAKER, who's delivering the 1999 New College Lectures at the University of
New South Wales, "If Christ Came to the Sydney Olympics", looks back at the
religious influences on Pierre de Coubertin's invention of the modern Olympics.
What role can and should sport play in contributing to the protection of human rights? And what can sportspeople achieve in drawing attention to humanitarian issues, that others may not?
We'll hear from Australian Governor-General, SIR WILLIAM DEANE; plus former Australian
swimmer CHLOË FLUTTER, who runs the Sporting Goodwill program for the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees; American sport and civil rights activist RICHARD LAPCHICK;
ANDRE ODENDAAL from the Transformation Committee of the United Cricket Board of South
Africa; Olympic gold medallist, Canadian and Mohawk ALWYN MORRIS; and DARREN GODWELL from
the Indigenous Community Foundation in Australia.
Plus, alternative ways to improve your sport. In particular, the
influence of Eastern philosophies and martial arts on Western sports. Amanda Smith speaks
with a basketball player turned Zen archer, and a golf professional who uses tai chi and
Zen Buddhism to teach people to find their "inner swing".
Plus, last days Chez Collingwood. Amanda Smith speaks with past players
PETER McKENNA and BOB ROSE, as well as fans and commentators, about Magpie identity, sense
of place, and the demise of Victoria Park.
And in the Australian Football League, sex is bad for football, when it comes to appointing a woman to the AFL Commission. Chief football writer at The Age newspaper, CAROLINE WILSON, details the internal machinations that are working to keep this power base of football an all-male domain.
Also this week, we meet two Australian athletes on their way up, World champion
pole-vaulter EMMA GEORGE and the most successful Australian in the history of American
baseball, DAVID NILSSON.
But television sports presenter JIM WILSON says we don't need a republic to have a sense of who we are. He agrees with the Minster's comments.
Plus, the 20th anniversary of a suburban cricket club that was founded for the precise
reason of mixing politics with sport.
But a ruptured ACL isn't just the curse of the professional player. It's can
also happen to a "weekend warrior". This week, we trace a year in the life of
one such amateur basketball player - from injury through physiotherapy, surgery, and
rehabilitation. And finally, his first, nerve-racking game, back on the court 12 months
later.
And with many years experience coaching young players, DENIS BAKER says the problem with children's sport is not the children, but their parents. A range of children and parents discuss the "ugly parent syndrome".
RICHARD TINNING, Professor of Physical Education at Deakin University, tackles some of
the problems that coaches are facing teaching "new kids" in "new
times". While JUNE FACTOR, who researches and writes about children's folklore and
games, suggest that it's a mistake to channel young children into organised sport - they
learn more about co-operation and tolerance by playing their own games.
And, Australian tour veterans PHIL ANDERSON and STEVEN HODGE will explore the history of the Tour de France and explain why it holds such a privileged place in European sport.
Also, the President of Cycling Australia, RAY GODKIN talks about the trouble Australian
cycling is having attracting sponsorship in the wake of last years tour.
Friday, July 16, 1999
The Manchester United Machine
On the program, Francis Leach talks to Sky TV's MARTIN TYLER about what makes United the
best club team in the world.
ALSO, KEVIN ROBERTS, Editorial Director of Sport Business magazine will discuss how
Manchester United has become an economic powerhouse and PETER BROOKES, Managing Director
of MUTV will tell how he fills a television channel with nothing else but Man U.
This program tracks the development of this improvisation - from folk games, to the formation of the Football Association in 1863, to the spread of soccer around the globe.
The Transcript of this Program is not Available on the Internet
This week we trace the development of billiards, along with snooker and pool, from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and "The Magic Flute", to Whispering Ted Lowe and "Pot Black".
The Transcript of this Program is not Available on the Internet
However, Club de Petanque d'Adelaide, another South
Australian club is much less concerned with the game's French connection. The FERAL AUSSIE
BOULISTS play every Sunday morning come rain or shine, with scant attention to rules and
conventions. Nevertheless, they regard their version as a serious sport, and serious fun.
The
World University Games get underway in Majorca next month. This may be the last oportunity
for a large Australian team to be represented, if funding for university sport is
diminished by voluntary student unionism. Past and present competitors discuss the value
of the World University Games: former Australian swimmer and Olympic medallist ROB
WOODHOUSE, and SIAN MUNRO, who's an Olympic hopeful in the fencing discipline of epee.
Also, Australian footballer
KATE LAWRENCE, and rugby player KELLY MEREDITH talk about the pleasure and satisfaction of
playing full body contact sports. And from netballers DAVID WARD and SCOTT DONAGHIE, their
move from football and basketball, to netball.
PIETER DU PLESSIS, from Omega Electronics, discusses developments in sports timing from the turn of the century.
For GERALD LAWSON, author of "World Record Breakers in Track and Field
Athletics", and MATTHEW ENGEL, editor of the "Wisden Cricketers' Almanack",
sports records and statistics provide a sense of order, and a metaphor for progress.
And another veteran of the
circuit, the American commentator and journalist BUD COLLINS discusses why he thinks men's
pro tennis has been ruined, and why he prefers the women's game.
According to JANET CAHILL, author of "Running Towards 2000 - the Olympic Flame and Torch", in the past the choice has often been highly symbolic or highly political.
And GEOFF DICKSON, sports lecturer at Central Queensland University, considers who or what Sydney Games organisers might choose to celebrate, reconcile, or make a statement about in our Olympic Games.
Plus, RON CLARKE, the runner who lit the flame at the 1956 Melbourne Games, recalls how
he almost ended up as a burnt offering in the process!
Throughout the century, boxing has been an incredibly popular sport in Australia. So, why is pro boxing on the ropes? We hear from ex-world champs JOHNNY FAMECHON and JEFF FENECH, current boxer BEN ROCKY HORRA, promoter JOE CURSIO, ringside doctor JOHN JURY, trainer HARRY MARTIN, and crime writer and boxing fan PETER CORRIS.
Plus, rugby football's battle for possession. JOHN NAURIGHT, one of the research
consultants and talking heads in "The Union Game", a new four-part series about
to screen on ABC-TV, discusses why rugby, as it spread through the British Isles and
settler societies, became in some places an elite sport, while in other places it became a
mass sport.
Dancesport, in other words competitive ballroom dancing, is a formally recognised sport. But according to TONY TILENNI, executive member of Dancesport Australia and the International Dancesport Federation, it still has a long way to go, particularly in Australia.
And, those who participated in the Australasian Bell-Ringing Championships, held
recently in Adelaide, do consider the competitive form of what they do to be a sport.
Plus, sports media academic DAVID ROWE looks at why the Nine Network is dropping their long-running weekend sports magazine programs.
And the return to coaching by the world's most experienced and successful netball
coach, JOYCE BROWN.
Plus, School for Superbikes with KEITH CODE. Amanda Smith visits one of his training days at the Phillip Island race circuit.
And Australian swimmer, IAN THORPE, a world champion at 16, talks about his life
swimming up and down pools, and his involvement with the crisis counselling service,
Lifeline.
ROLAND PERRY, author of "Bold Warnie", delves into the past, present and future of Australian cricketer Shane Warne.
And VINCENT LAUWERS talks about competing in the Melbourne to Osaka yacht race. Like
all ocean races, it's a gruelling challenge. For Vincent, being paraplegic adds just a
little more challenge.
Under a Federal
government initiative called "Living in Harmony", a number of sports
organisations are developing projects to encourage diversity and inclusiveness in their
sport.
Also, for Passover, Jewish sports scholar GEORGE EISEN discusses why Jewish tradition and culture tend to undervalue and belittle Jewish achievements in sport.
Plus, the ex-Mormon stand-up comedian who's taken up the sport of hammer-throwing.
SUE-ANN POST plans to compete in the 2002 Commonwealth Games, and she's collecting jokes
along the way.
Amanda Smith
speaks with fans of the National Soccer League team the PERTH GLORY, the SYDNEY SWANS of
the Australian Football League, and the National Rugby League's MELBOURNE STORM, about
what's turned them on to the new game in town.
According to racing writer LES CARLYON, the real punters in the racing game are the ones bidding at yearling sales. But thoroughbred consultant ROSS DU BOURG has a breeding theory that he reckons guarantees success. He's into in-breeding.
Mary Lou Jelbart spends a day at the Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale. She speaks with a range of people including trainers COLIN HAYES, PETER HAYES and BARBARA JOSEPH, about how they try to predict a champion.
Plus equine reproduction specialist ANGUS McKINNON discusses the sexual politics of
horse-racing, and why artifical insemination is still banned from the breeding of
thoroughbreds.
Also, sports historian and writer JOHN HARMS surveys the rich vein of poetry about Aussie Rules - an inspiration for poets like Bruce Dawe and Philip Hodgins.
And staying in an arty mode, a new play being performed in a swimming pool, about
pioneering Australian swimmers Fanny Durack and Annette Kellerman.
And motor-sports commentator WILL HAGON takes us back over the history of Formula One and Grand Prix racing, and its appeal as a spectator sport.
Plus, a look at how Salt Lake City is faring under the stigma of Olympic corruption
scandals.
The Sports Factor travels to Queenstown
to find out why this place has become, in the words of one local, "a magnet for
lunatics and lateral thinkers". And to try to work out what makes ordinary people
want to throw themselves off bridges and down rivers.
We
speak with Skateboarders RONNIE ROBERTS, who's always on the look-out for new places to
skate and ANGUS SMITH who explains the origin of sentences like "he caned himself on
this gnarly slam".
Amanda Smith is joined by
three guests: ANDREW JENNINGS, a vehement critic of the International Olympic Committee in
his book "The New Lords of the Rings"; LIBBY DARLISON, the executive director of
WomenSport International and a member of the IOC's working group on women and sport; and
ALFRED SENN, historian and author of the soon-to-be published "Power Politics and the
Olympic Games".
The Sports Factor investigates the difficulties that new design applications have presented for sports like golf and tennis.