T he 2024 Paris Olympics is almost over, and what a whirlwind few weeks it has been. Records have been broken, and hearts, too. We’ve cheered on household names – Simone Biles, Rafael Nadal, Katie Ledecky – and learned a suite of new ones.
There was Julien Alfred, the first gold medallist from St Lucia and, as the winner of the 100m race, the fastest woman on Earth; Arshad Nadeem, the record-setting javelin thrower and Pakistan’s first gold medallist in 40 years; and in cycling, the British team sprint trio, Katy Marchant, Sophie Capewell and Emma Finucane, who showed that three really is the magic number when they broke a trio of world records on the way to gold. And that’s before we even get to the stars who won the internet . But let’s just take a moment to think of the Olympic heroes whose names we don’t know.
I’m not talking about the coaches, physios and sporting associations working away in the background, or the thousands of Olympic volunteers who toil behind the scenes. No, I’m talking about us, the sofa Olympians – the spectators who, every four years, step up to the plate to demonstrate our unique set of skills: watching obscure sports we’ve never heard of and talking to our friends and families about them as if we are experts. Sofa Olympians actually share a lot of qualities with athletes.
I say this from experience, as a sofa gold medallist myself. Endurance is key. You can’t just watch the final of, say, competitive bouldering; you need t.