Woodward Slams Opening Ceremony

Sir Clive Woodward, the British Olympic Association’s director of elite performance, has criticised the treatment of the athletes during the opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics.

Woodward says the Beijing Games’ opening ceremony could have had a detrimental effect on athletes due to the fact they had to stand for the four-hour event without refreshment.

He said: ‘It was hot and there weren’t many drinks around. You don’t want this so close to competing in events.

‘It is something we will have to talk about after the Games. The opening ceremony was a long time for the athletes to be on their feet. If I was a coach in charge of a team, with that heat and that amount of standing around, I would think that it was a lot.

‘You don’t often do something like that a week or two weeks out from a big event. No athletes who were competing in the next 48 hours were there but for the others, and even for the officials, it was a very long time standing. It’s things like that we have got to have a good look at.’

Woodward will recommend a different approach for London 2012 in his post-Beijing report to the BOA.

Apart from their lengthy time parading inside the Bird’s Nest stadium, athletes were kept in a gymnasium for two hours before their march-past.

Big screens were provided but they were not turned on, so most missed the spectacular start to the ceremony, which many have described as the best ever.