The Most Glamorous Sport?

 You Be the Judge
   Sports are not well covered in MM, so I will offer something short since you may be tired of reading about the Stanley Cup. The following headline was encountered the other day and I wonder what you might think the sport would be that is referred to:  "The Straight-Laced Control Freak Who Conquered the World’s Most Glamorous Sport".  A hint: it is not the one being played for the Stanley Cup. This particular headline was in the Wall Street Journal and it refers to FI - Formula One. Another headline raises the question about the "most glamorous sport" and suggests it is E1 which is electric boat racing: "The F1 of the Seas Returns! Prince Albert of Monaco Presents the Trophy to the Winners of the E1 World Championship (so is this the most glamorous sport in Europe?)" Although the latter headline appears in the Tattler, not the WSJ, I think the photo it presents favours E1 as the winner.

  If you would rather google on about this subject, than watch hockey, other suggestions for most glamorous sports are horse racing, figure skating, polo and even snow polo - "Where else would you see horses galloping on ice at altitude, while wealthy spectators glug Krug champagne?" Personally, based on the photo above, I will vote for Tom and the Prince who do look rather glamorous, don't you think?

The Bonus:

   F1 may be glamorous, but it is also popular:  "The average television audience for a Formula I race is around seventy million people – four times that of the typical N.F.L. game." That quotation is from, Sports News From Elsewhere in MM, where you will also find this one: “American Money Has Discovered Indian Cricket: Billion-dollar investment funds and N.F.L. ownership groups are among those angling for a foothold in the Indian Premier League." 

Sports News From Elsewhere

    I recently offered you "News From Elsewhere" which gathered stories you may have missed. Now you are presented with sport stats unrelated to the ones you watched this weekend. These activities are more exotic (with the exception of soccer) than the baseball, football and hockey you watched, and the stuff about soccer will at least give you something to talk about when the World Cup starts. As well, learning about these sports will prepare you for the TV future, when the major sports you used to watch have disappeared from the major networks. 

Formula 1

 "Last year’s Mexican Grand Prix attracted three hundred and seventy thousand spectators. The Singapore race runs through the city at night. (Drivers can shed six pounds in stress and sweat.) The average television audience for a Formula I race is around seventy million people – four times that of the typical N.F.L. game – and the best drivers earn around soccer star-salaries and lasting fame. When Ayrton Senna, a three-time world champion was killed in a race, in 1994, the Brazilian government declared three days of mourning. A million people waited in the heat to pay their respects, and many spoke of their saudade – an inexpressible state of longing for  something that is gone."

The above is from this very interesting article: “The Sporting Scene: In Reverse: Driving to Survive at the Top of Formula 1.” Sam Knight, The New Yorker, Oct. 31, 2022.

Cricket

These data are from this piece: “American Money Has Discovered Indian Cricket: Billion-dollar investment funds and N.F.L. ownership groups are among those angling for a foothold in the Indian Premier League. The returns, not the sport, are the draw,” Mike Jakeman, New York Times, Nov. 1, 2022.

“When we first started looking at cricket, we were by no means experts,” Scheiner said. “But the more we studied it, the more we realized it felt like the N.F.L. did 20 years ago.”

That was why, in June 2021, RedBird bought a 15 percent stake in Rajasthan Royals, a team that competes in the Indian Premier League, for $37.5 million. The money that has poured into the league over the past 15 months suggests that RedBird got a bargain.

Four months after that deal closed, an I.P.L. expansion team sold for $940 million. Eight months after that, the league negotiated new television and digital broadcasting rights agreements worth $6.2 billion.

At more than $1 billion a year, that means India’s top cricket competition — a closed league with only 10 teams — now generates annual broadcast revenues on par with top leagues like the N.F.L. ($10 billion a year), England’s Premier League (about $6.9 billion) and the N.B.A. ($2.7 billion).

On a per-match basis, in fact, the I.P.L., whose season lasts only two months, now ranks behind only the N.F.L....

And suddenly a lot of people want in."

The World Cup 2022

"Qatar, the smallest country to ever host the World Cup, has poured more than $220 billion into preparations for the event, erecting miles of highways, a metro system, a new airport, stadiums and high-rises.

Dire working conditions for migrant laborers in Qatar came under fire after scores of them died on World Cup-related construction sites....

The country has produced eight new stadiums with soccer pitches covered in grass flown in from the United States and outdoor air conditioning systems that can lower the temperature by more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit (11 degrees Celsius). Last month, Qatari officials announced the addition of 30,000 rooms to meet the surge in demand for accommodation, including some on cruise ships and traditional wooden boats known as dhows….

An estimated 1.5 million international visitors — around half of Qatar’s total population — will pour into the country over the month long event, which is typically hosted across multiple, major cities. Qatar is about the size of Connecticut.

Housekeepers in one ritzy hotel in West Bay, one of Doha’s upscale neighborhoods, will be tasked with cleaning 80 rooms a day — up from the usual 20, they say. When asked if he thought the newly minted metro could handle thousands of drunk fans, the station agent at a stop in the neighborhood smiled, shook his head and muttered “no way” between exaggerated coughs.

They have announced entertainment, including beach clubs, carnivals, futuristic light shows and two month long music festivals. One involves D.J.s performing on a 50-foot-tall, flame-flowing mechanical spider borrowed from the Glastonbury Festival in England and reminiscent of a futuristic alien tank from the video game Halo."

The above is from: "The World Cup Is Weeks Away. Will Qatar Be Ready?

As sports fans prepare to flood the tiny Gulf nation, cranes and loaders are still running hard — as is criticism of Qatar’s human rights record and exploitation of workers,"  Christina Goldbaum, New York Times,  Nov. 4, 2022

The Bonus:

   What does F1 mean? Here is the answer: "The “formula” of Formula 1 refers to a set of rules, first enshrined after the Second World War, to bring some order to the urge to race dangerous cars on the asphalt of foreign cities". 

  Qatar may not be a welcoming place for some. From my earlier post about the Olympics in Rio, I learned this: "Qatar: Sharia law in Qatar applies only to Muslims, who can be put to death for extramarital sex, regardless of sexual orientation." For attitudes about such things in other countries see: "Rainbow Flags and Olympic Ones." 

   While covering sports for you, I ran across another example of an aptronym from the wonderful world of boxing.

The headline: "Former Heavyweight Boxer Charged With Trafficking $1 Billion of Cocaine," New York Times, Nov. 2, 2022.

Spot the aptronym:

"Goran Gogic helped move vast amounts of cocaine from Colombia to Europe using U.S. ports, prosecutors said. One haul was among the largest cocaine seizures in U.S. history, they said.

Lawrence A. Hashish, a lawyer in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who said he represented Mr. Gogic, said that the charges “came as a surprise.” Mr. Hashish said his client had traveled for a boxing convention in Puerto Rico and that there hadn’t been an outstanding arrest warrant before his arrival in the United States."

Sources: 

  They have been provided above, but if  you don’t know what a GOOGLY or LOLLY is, or the difference between a JAFFA and a PERHAPSER, see: “15 Corker Cricket Terms, Deciphered," Angela Tung, mentalfloss.com, May, 5, 2016.

  If you have forgotten what "aptronyms" are see: "Aptronyms" 

A Gumball Rally

 From Toronto to Miami

  Given the current emphasis on DIVERSITY and my tendency to be contrarian, I like to occasionally offer an entry about something other than books and libraries. It is for those reasons that I now present to you some information about wealthy (mostly) white guys driving very fast in very expensive, gas-guzzling vehicles. “The horror, the horror.” 

   Surprisingly, some of this information was taken from the staid Globe and Mail, which issues from Toronto the Good, but you likely averted your eyes from the horrifying headline below, which is one of the few in the last several months that wasn’t about an apology or Hockey Canada. Homogenised reading is not good for you and it is interesting to learn that other things are happening.

“We’re Absolutely Not Going to Stick to the Speed Limit: Gumball Rally Gets Ready to Peel Out of Toronto After Showing off Cars,” Mark Richardson, June 1, 2022. The subtitle is: About 100 Pricey Cars Will Depart Toronto Headed For Detroit En Route to Their Final Destination of Miami for the Gumball 3000 Rally.

   If you are displeased by such antics, you should note that, like a walkathon, money is raised for charitable causes: 

“We’re trying to break the speed record in every leg of the race – that’s our goal,” said TJ Rinomato, a Toronto-based investment manager, driving with his best friend Will Brereton in a 1,000-horsepower Chevrolet Hennessy ZL1 Camaro. “Every mile an hour over the speed limit, we hope to raise a thousand dollars for that.”

Admittedly, more fuel will be required at the rally than at the walkathon.

“I flew up to Buffalo,” said Danny Creighton, a Florida real-estate developer driving a Dodge Ram TRX with Canadian co-driver and drag racer David Schroeder. “But the new fuel tank I put in started to have a valve issue. It started to leak fuel, so I had to send my plane down to pick up the guys who custom-made the truck in (Fort) Lauderdale, (Fla.), fly [them] back up, fly back for additional parts, come back up. We spent $50,000 in jet fuel yesterday. Then I drove it into Canada.”

Creighton’s pickup truck is hardly stock – it has six wheels on three axles and makes 800 horsepower. The new fuel tank is a 378-litre unit, additional to the existing 105-litre tank. “So when all the Ferraris and Lamborghinis are pulling over every 150, 200 miles,” he said, “the Warlord is just going to keep going down the track, cruising at 140 – rrrrrrr!” Those are American miles an hour he’s talking about, or 225 kilometres an hour."

“I think we’re getting somewhere around five miles to the gallon,” he added. Just for the record, that’s 47 litres per 100 kilometres. For comparison, a Honda Civic consumes around seven litres per 100 kilometres. 

The article also mentions that the celebrity, David Hasselholff is participating

and will drive a Pontiac Firebird and a Maserati. His luggage is travelling in a separate Cadillac Escalade. 

Sources: 

  I am sure the “Readers Comments” about the G&M, article will have addressed all the issues you also are stewing about and that there were likely very few which weren’t critical. If you go to GUMBALL3000.com, you can learn all about it and buy a deluxe edition of the book: 20 Years on the Road (£265.00).

There is also a Wikipedia entry for “The Gumball Rally.”

Some cities along the way welcomed the Gumballers. Here is the Nashville press release: “The Gumball 3000 Rally is Back With a Spectacular Route from Toronto - Miami, The 22nd Annual Gumball 3000 Rally arrives with a festival of Supercars and Superstars in Nashville on Monday, May 30 to make it a Memorial Day to remember!

They made it:

“Gumball 3000 Rally Arrives in Miami With an All-star soccer Match,” iCrowdNewswire, June, 2.

"The epic Gumball 3000 has been back in action for 2022, with an iconic line up of supercars and superstars setting the pace across North America. The rally will conclude in an epic finale in Miami on 3rd June as more than 100 incredible cars cross the finish line at David Beckham's Inter Miami stadium.

From the 27 May – 3 June 2022 the 22nd Annual Rally has travelled from Toronto to Miami. Over 100 cars – from Bugatti’s to Batmobiles – and 200+ personalities have taken part in this wacky-races-style road trip, driving 3,000 miles in just 6 days.

To conclude in true Gumball style, the rally finish will coincide with the inaugural Gumball Goodwill Charity Soccer match, taking place at the DRV PNK stadium on 2nd June. Ignition Casino will be sponsoring the match, with all the proceeds being donated to charity."

Post Script:

The Gumball Rally is not a race. Real men race in The Cannonball Run, from N.Y. to CA. It is done surreptitiously. The last time I checked, they crossed the country in about 26 hours and averaged 174 (KPH). See my post about The Cannonball Run.

The Bonus:

I happen to be reading the very good memoir by Simcoe-born Bruce McCall. The sentences below are found on p.196 when McCall mentions his friend Brock Yates:

"Yates, an automotive journalist and the nearest thing to Hunter S. Thompson I ever knew, crashed through life at speed. Brock founded the Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, a flagrantly outlaw sprint from New York to Los Angeles that attracted every nutbar car maniac in America. There were no rules. Miraculously, nobody got killed. It was typical of Yates. He flicked an anarchic finger at convention everywhere he ran into it, earning such a reputation for aggression that his nickname was the Assassin."

How Did I Get Here, Bruce McCall.

McCall is an illustrator and writer whose work is often seen in the New Yorker.

The Cannonball Run

During COVID

  The rain continues so I will continue posting. Some people do far more adventurous things. Like get a highly modified vehicle and hop in it in New York and see how fast they can get to California. Realizing that traffic is down considerably during this time of Covid, a few fellows decided to go for the record recently and did break it. The former record holders can surely argue that an asterisk needs to be placed next to the new one since the holders of the current one had an unfair advantage. 

   The new record is contained in the image above. It took the racers less than 26 hours to travel across the continent since their average speed was 108(MPH)/ 174(KPH).

   I recently posted about the earlier, pre-covid record which is noted above and was taken from the GPS device on the dashboard of the car. It took those fellows over 27 hours, even though they only stopped for 22 minutes.

Sources:

   See my earlier post which also provides information about the cross-continental record by bicycle - Racing Across America. 

   There are many articles about the very illegal race, but start with the Wikipedia entry for 

Cannonball Run Challenge. 

P.S.

   Clearly this is one of those "Don't Try This At Home" events. For the answer to the question you likely want to ask me, see: "Why Are We Glorifying Cannonball Runs, the Illegal Pastime of Thrill-Seeking Drivers?", Petrina Gentile, The Globe and Mail, July 21, 2020.