London Olympics 2012 travel tips
If you are one of the thousands of spectators who will be descending on London this summer for the Olympic and Paralympic Games you may be busy planning your trip to the capital with how you will be travelling to London being a priority. You may therefore find the following London Olympics 2012 travel tips useful.
Rail Travel
Great Britain has an extensive network of railways to London, which, as roads into London are likely to be heavily congested, may be one of the quickest and most convenient ways to travel to the capital. Throughout the Games shuttle buses will be available to transport visitors from the major railway stations to the Olympic Park and other venues.
National Rail tickets are also available to take spectators to their event and are offering passengers exclusive value fares to London from every station on the National Rail network.
By coach or bus
It is expected that approximately ten percent of spectators will travel to London for the 2012 Games by coach or bus. To cater for the thousands of passengers expected there is a total of 300 coaches providing offering express travel to both the Olympic Park and Weymouth and Portland, where the sailing events are being held.
Most of the coach and bus services put on for London 2012 will have wheelchair access.
For more information about travelling to this year’s Olympics and Paralympics by coach and bus, click here.
The London Cycling Festival
The Cycling Festival – A two-wheel equivalent of the London Marathon.
A new cycling event in London has been announced and will start in the summer of 2013. The two-day ‘Cycling Festival’, which aims to attract more than 100,000 cyclists to participate, will be one of the first sporting legacies in London, post the 2012 Olympics.
This fun event will be split into two different races, the first being held on day-one of the festival, whereby amateur 70,000 cyclists, will take to London’s free-from-traffic streets and ride past some of the capital’s most famous landmarks. The second race of the festival will be dedicated to professional cyclists, who belong to a club. The 35,000 participants will speed along the 100-mile Olympic race course.
Showing excitement about the London Cycling Festival is Mark Cavendish. In a statement about the new event, the world cycling champion referred to the Cycling Festival as being a ‘legacy’ for the 2012 Olympic Games.
“This is the ideal legacy not only for our world-class team of cyclists and paracyclists, but also for thousands of amateur cyclists who will hopefully be inspired by our performance at the Olympic Games,” said Cavendish.
“This event will be a fantastic opportunity to show Britain at its best and to share our Olympic cycling heritage,” added the world champion.
‘Freeze Frame’ – A modern take on a 19th century French classic and a tribute to Olympic Park workers
Georges Pierre Seurat was a 19th century French Post-Impressionist painter and was famed for creating a unique painting technique known as pointillism. One of Seurat’s most famous paintings, one of his two masterpieces, is called ‘Bathers at Asnieres’, an oil-on-canvas painting. The legendary painting was created in 1884 and is presently housed in The National Gallery.
‘Bathers at Asnieres’ was produced on a monumental scale, and is of a riverside scene in suburban Paris. The painting consists of several isolated figures either in the River Seine or on its banks with a background of trees followed by an austere boundary of the walls and buildings of Paris.
As a tribute to the workers who have helped construct the London 2012 Olympic Park, the Olympic Park’s artist in residence, Neville Gabie, has created his own version of the ‘Bathers at Asnieres’ painting, which he has named ‘Freeze Frame’. The thought-provoking painting, which adopts similar techniques to the one’s Seurat used, is part of the Olympic Delivery Authority’s (ODA) Art in the Park programme.
London’s ‘porange’ fashion to take centre stage in the 2012 Olympic Games
So the London Olympic year is finally upon us and with it a whole host of excitement, frenzy and, of course, gossip. With no aspect of this year’s Olympic Games going unturned, even the fashion traits of its staff is being speculated.
In celebrating the “best of British sport, history and fashion,” the Game’s organisers’ uniforms have been designed by Adidas, which says they were, “inspired by the heritage and culture of the UK, with influences ranging from the Grenadier Guards uniform to Henley Regatta fashions.”
Although the ‘influence’ of the London 2012’s organisers’ uniforms, which sport a purple and orange tracksuit top, is being disputing, with some believing that they have been influenced by the shocking ‘porange’ trend of last summer.
The term ‘porange’ made its way into London’s fashion terminology last summer when the likes of Cheryl Cole, Kim Kardashian, Jessica Alba, and Nicole Scherzinger, all stepped out donning brightly coloured purple and orange outfits.
As with most celebrity-endorsed fashion statements, fashion designers, the high street brands and fashion victims quickly evolved the ‘porange’ look, by selling and wearing the distinctively coloured outfits.
And now the sports brand Adidas are carrying the ‘porange’ trend into 2012 by kitting the 70,000 volunteers and 6,000 Locog staff for the London 2012 Olympics in porange-inspired uniform.
Five training tips for the London Marathon 2012
“The essence of the London Marathon is the way it combines elite, fields and the community runner, the fund-raiser and the person who simply wants to complete the race… because it is something they want to do,” Seb Coe, 2006.
Since it was first held on 29 March 1981, when 6255 runners crossed to finishing line, to more than 35000 people participating in the 2011 race, The London Marathon is arguably the most famous and popular marathon in the world.
Being the year of the London Olympic Games, this year, the London Marathon is exuding even more excitement and prestige than ever before, being held just several months before the Games begin.
If you are participating in this year’s highly anticipated London Marathon, you may appreciate some training tips for the London marathon 2012, this world-renowned sporting event.
Give yourself a goal
Even if you have never run a race before in your life, it is important that you give yourself a goal other than merely ‘crossing the finishing line’. Make your goal of what you hope to complete the London Marathon in realistic, and stick to it on the day of the marathon, this way, you will be less likely to start too fast and slowdown in later stages of the race.
Adopt an ‘all-round’ approach to training
According to many fitness experts, the essence of improving fitness levels lies within practising different types of exercise regularly. Of course running is important as you train for the London Marathon, but be sure to undertake other means of exercise, such as yoga, cycling and swimming, to help increase your fitness levels to their optimum.
Avoid weekly long runs
Traditional marathon wisdom always advocated including a weekly run in marathon training, although this is no longer the case. Many coaches are now advising that going for a long run week in week out in the run up to a marathon will only leave you fatigued and more prone to injury. This advice now is typically to go on a long run once a week but take every third or fourth week off.
