IT'S the start of an Olympic year yet again and I’m reminded how I grew up thinking that the Olympics was a quadrennial ─ a once in four years ─ event and that was all it was.
I remember it being a time when almost every television programme was pre-empted, including the news, to make way for the ‘live’ broadcast of the Games and, for the sixteen days between the opening and closing ceremonies, all everyone talked about revolved around the world of sport.
As a result of my current role as a content creator for the Olympic Channel, my eyes are open to the fact that the Olympic Games is actually a much longer and far more intricate process; it is essentially a four-year journey ─ one that starts when the flame is extinguished at the previous Games as all attention shifts to the following leap year at the next opportunity to shine at the world’s biggest sports event.
Thousands of athletes all around the world live their lives according to the Olympic cycle. Their training and competition schedules are planned in detail to ensure that they are at their very best during the Games.
It has a huge impact on their personal lives, with some even planning their families according to the cycle, ensuring that they give birth with sufficient time to recover and be at their best for the next edition of the Games.
Others choose to push through the pain and put off surgery, where possible, to ensure that they don’t lose training time or miss an opportunity to represent their nation at the world’s biggest sporting stage.
And we, the spectators, are not often privy to the stories that detail their struggles and successes in between the Games, and this was the exact thought behind the decision to set up the Olympic Channel by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
IOC President Thomas Bach had a vision to create a global media destination where fans can discover, engage and share in the power of sport and the excitement of the Olympic Games all year round.
As the Olympic flame went out at Rio 2016, olympicchannel.com was officially launched to become the flagbearer of Olympic stories and provide additional exposure for sports and athletes 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, in 12 languages, for free all over the world.
This is the reason I find myself living in Madrid, where the channel is based, for the past four years, learning more about the Olympic world each day, and helping to create stories about athletes from every corner of the world, including Malaysia.
It makes me proud to see our athletes’ stories being chosen on merit through the Channel’s original series content, for instance, Rio 2016 cycling bronze medallist Azizulhasni Awang, who was featured in an episode of ‘Gamebreakers’.
For the first time in history, Malaysia participated in the Winter Olympics and figure skater Julian Yee’s PyeongChang 2018 story was told though an episode of ‘Far From Home’.
Then, there was the podcast that featured diver and two-time Olympic medallist Pandelela Rinong as well as the countless pieces of content created surrounding Lee Chong Wei and many other badminton players who have excelled at an international level.
All of which have helped raise the profile of our athletes around the world.
It was here at the Olympic Channel that I truly began to appreciate the journey an athlete takes to prepare themselves for what is, undoubtedly, the biggest moment of their career.
When the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games was postponed last year, I could empathise with the athletes, who were not only locked down like the rest of us but had to endure another year of brutal training regimes, diet restrictions and personal sacrifices so they can peak at the right time for medal contention.
I could also understand why other athletes at the tail end of their career, who were looking for one last shot at Olympic glory, opted to announce their retirement and forego the opportunity for a last hurrah, mentally acknowledging that their bodies simply could not endure another year of strict physical training.
Likewise, we too at the Channel have had to rework our plans and our approach to Tokyo 2020. I knew at the start of last year that I was going to be in Japan for the Games. I don’t know if that will be the case this summer.
That’s alright though, because I know that no matter what I’m juggling to make things work in this post-Covid world, athletes have it much worse.
As we all reset our expectations, goals and desires for the year ahead, I’m sparing a thought for the athletes who have to dig deep and endure the extra training required to complement the hard work, sacrifice and determination they’ve put in over the past four years in order to be at their physical peak for the upcoming Olympic Games this July.
As we count down to the opening of the Games, I look forward to sharing more of my thoughts and observations during my time here, inside the Five Rings, in the weeks to come. ─ The Vibes, 16 January, 2021
Sanjeev Palar is a content creator at www.olympicchannel.com where fans can discover, engage and share in the power of sport and the excitement of the Olympic Games all year round. He produces features and ‘live’ programming with athletes from all around the world in both summer and winter Olympic sports disciplines.
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