Discussion keeps the world turning.
This is Round Table. Hello, welcome to Round Table, where we serve up piping hot debates on the issues that Sizzle in China and beyond.
I'm your only. Today, we continue our fun discovery of the exciting emerging sports during the Paris Olympics.
And for this episode, we turn our spotlight to the dynamic sport of skateboarding.
Let's explore the origins, its journey to become an Olympic event and the specific roles and formats used in the competitions.
For today's show, I'm joined by you, Shun and Steve Hathorley.
Now grab your virtual compass and follow us to the heart of the discussion.
Get ready for Paris this summer, where tradition meets the cutting edge.
This year, we're thrilled to introduce a fascinating series of sports that will redefine the excitement of competition.
We will witness exhilarating heights of sport climbing, gravity-defined tricks of skateboarding and epic waves of kayak cross.
Join us as we celebrate the spirit of competition and see history in the making.
Experience the thrill of new sports in Paris.
Won't you miss a moment of it?
I'm loving this, Shun. You nailed it.
It's a great, great promo.
Every time I listen to it, I feel like I am sitting in the arena watching the games with my naked eyes, maybe with glasses, but just super excited.
It's a great experience.
You know, these Olympics only come around every couple of years if we talk winter, summer, winter, summer.
We have to wait a long time between these events.
I understand the sheer excitement and happiness in your voice.
And even if you're a hardcore of a certain sport, you're going to wait even longer.
So yes, super excited. We know that the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris fronts are mere days away and one of the sports making its second appearance at the Games is skateboarding.
And the event itself will take place between July 27th and August 7th at Palace de la Concorde.
And today on Roundtable, we're flipping and grinding into the high energy sport of skateboarding, an event that blends creativity, agility, and daring stunts.
So let's get up to speed on all the things we need to know before the event kicks off.
Perhaps we can start with a brief history of this sport.
If you had to guess where a skateboarding originated, where would you guess that would be?
I think the US. Because US is kind of a place that embodies a lot of pop and hip hop culture back then.
And then skateboarding is under that kind of a culture.
I was about to say on the street.
So a different direction of the answer.
I would say on the street with a lot of young kids playing around trying to invent some new games and they figure, huh, I'd like to serve.
But it's so far away from the sea.
How about we serve on the street?
You are absolutely right as a matter of fact.
And you're right too, Yushan.
It kicked off in California in the United States in the 1950s.
They say it's really tricky to pin down the very first skateboard and who started it on what specific day.
But what they do know is that the sport was created by surfers.
And the surfers wanted something to do when there were no waves to go surfing.
In the US it grew in popularity.
It peaked in around 1963.
There was a crash in the market around 1965.
Skateboarding was seen as kind of a fad in the 1960s and it kind of fell away from pop culture at that time.
But that changed in the early 1970s with the creation of skateboard wheels that were made out of urethane.
And this was a really big deal because before that the wheels on the skateboards were made out of metal or wood.
Which is fine if you have a completely flat surface.
But as you know on the streets or sidewalks it's not.
It's a little bit bumpy.
So these urethane wheels they brought the popularity of skateboarding back into American culture.
And then within a couple of years skateboarding finally began to make its mark in the UK and then the story continues on.
And actually for those snowboarders when they do not have snow when they're not in winter time and especially previously one the technology was not there for them to practice snowboarding in summertime in a indoor arena actually they practice skateboarding instead because these two sports feature certain skills that are quite similar to each other.
Yeah it's about balancing and moving the board back and forth.
So one was skateboarding added to the Olympics.
You mentioned it Holen in the opening when you said that it's making its second appearance because it first appeared at the 2020 summer games in Tokyo and it was added for the reason of adding a little bit of youthful energy to the summer Olympics.
Some youthful spirits, some spunk.
That's what the Olympic committee's been wanting with the addition of these new sports is that some of the sports have been around for a long time.
The classics right track and field for example.
So they wanted to introduce some youthful energy and boy did they ever because the athletes who are competing are so it's almost surprising how young they are.
Absolutely. But when you see them perform you see how good they are and you know that they are absolutely deserving of being in the Olympics.
There's no doubt about that.
Kakona Haraki of Japan was the silver winter silver medal winner four years ago.
She was 12. 12? She was 12 at the time.
There was another competitor Sky Brown of Britain.
She was 13 at the time and she ended up coming away with the bronze medal.
So the athletes who skate boarding are really really young.
Yes a Chinese skateboarder I think she's going to break the record of being the youngest participants in skateboarding in history in the Olympic event.
And yeah she is turning 12 but right now she is 11 and what is even more interesting is that on the closing ceremony of this year's Paris 2024 on 11th August which is her 12th birthday.
We're going to come back to Jengao in a little while.
Yeah you mentioned one of the youngest if not the youngest skateboarder.
She's one of the youngest ever in the Olympics altogether.
I don't think she has that crown of the youngest ever but one of the youngest ever for sure.
And also she is the youngest Chinese athlete to compete in the Olympics.
So that counts quite a lot.
Unbelievable. All right so here's how this works at the Olympics.
This is what you need to watch for when you see it on TV coming up very very soon.
So there's two different skateboarding disciplines.
They have Park and they have Street and in Park and Street they have male and female categories for both of them.
And there are a total of four skateboarding events at the Games.
You mentioned the dates already when we got started right.
So this is going to take place starting July 27th that will finish up on the 7th day of August and those are the two disciplines.
Now what's the difference between Park skateboarding and Street skateboarding?
Park takes place on a varied course combining bowls and bands to help the athletes gather speed and perform tricks mid-air.
So in the Park events athletes compete in 345 second runs and then they're judged on their ability to use the surfaces to gain height and perform a bunch of different tricks in the air and they end up getting their scores from that to explain what it looks like.
It reminds me of Big Air.
It's similar to Big Air.
Right. Yeah that kind of also I think freestyle skiing.
Yes. The way this is what I thought when I saw the location where they compete.
I've seen a big tub of ice cream and you've taken out about four scoops and then the skateboarders go down into the valleys and up over the ridges.
I don't know. Maybe I was just hungry at the time.
So that's what Park is and that's what it looks like too.
Street on the other hand, well just if you're near a window look outside if you're near your street.
That's how they compete.
So there's stairs and handrails and other obstacles that resemble what you would find on a street and then same thing they do their tricks there and the judges give them scores.
So it's a super exciting but also quite done to the earth kind of sport that you might be able to see around the corner in your neighborhood because these days I feel like in China I've seen a lot of young kids.
When I say young kids I don't mean 12 year old, 11 year old.
I'm talking about toddlers.
Wow. Well, two might be two young but three or four or five year old kids, they're already very skillful on their skateboards and they can do things that I cannot imagine myself doing and I would assume that it's partly because more and more young Chinese parents started to stress the importance of balancing, of taking a sport that you can enjoy not only in a sport competition but also in your daily life and for little kids maybe you know, learning to walk, learning to run, learning to skateboard, you're learning, learning, learning is not that strange to you whereas as an adult it's hard for me to balance on a skateboard.
Yeah, maybe learning a little bit later in life would be more of a challenge but for kids they have a lower center of gravity, right?
They're closer to ground.
Yeah, they're closer. And a lot of people ask, you know, when they see the ages of these skateboarding athletes, why are they so young?
You know, the average age of the women's street competition at the Olympics in 2020 was 14 years old and they say there's no science behind it, there's no particular scientific reason why young people are so good at this but the reason that they do love the sport is because from the Olympic Committee's point of view is because it's performed by young people which means it's attracting an audience of young people as well, it's fun, it's fresh, it's different from your typical traditional Olympic sports and that's why it's so popular.
That being said, keep your eyes peeled for Team Great Britain's Andy McDonald, he is turning 51 years old in Paris for the Olympics this year.
And pretty sure he has a young, young heart.
I would love to speak with him and see how he feels about competing against, you know, 14 year old or 11 year old or losing to one or also losing to one.
I think it is quite important that the experience to help you to master all of the skills during these kind of sports events but also of course even by looking at other sports like even e-sports, there are a lot of young athletes in these kind of sports events.
I think scientifically of course there are some physical strength on these younger athletes because they maybe react faster and they have better physical status.
So I think it's kind of reasonable that we are seeing more and more younger athletes in the event.
Well, there's the fearless nature as well, right?
Kids tend to be fearless and you know skateboarding looks a little bit daunting, doesn't it?
Yeah. Let's go back to the Chinese athlete, the very impressive Zheng Hao Hao.
She's 11 years old now. She's a nutrition as you mentioned having her 12th birthday at the Olympic Games and she got her spot during the Olympic qualifying series.
They held those in Zheng Hao and also in Budapest as well and of course she's done a lot of interviews since that time.
She said that moment felt like a dream come true of course, right?
Unbelievable. And then they spoke with her mom as well and her mom said that despite participating in a bunch of different skill training programs like music and chess and painting and dancing, all the typical things I guess that young students do in China and other countries too, it was skateboarding that really stole her heart and she got a skateboard from her parents on her 7th birthday.
So she's only been doing this for four years now, almost five years now.
And she said roller skating used to be my favorite sport.
But since I was introduced to skateboarding, well roller skating dropped to number two.
Oh, roller skating actually used to be also my favorite sport because we don't have that kind of ice rink everywhere in southern part of China then we because only have that kind of roller skating places or just squares to play.
But unfortunately I didn't get introduced to skateboarding them.
Who knows? Maybe you would have made it into the...
Maybe we'd be watching you on TV.
Yeah. And in the same time we're going to see that more and more kids are exposed to two different types of sports.
They can try not only these but also horseback riding or hockey, ice hockey and these young kids might be the future of the Olympic athletes that we're looking at.
We are looking at this 11 or soon to be 12 year old Zheng Haohao this time and next time someone will break the history.
And we're looking at some more fun interesting sports, emerging sports in the Olympics in this week's special series.
You're listening to Roundtable coming up next.
The 2024 Paris Olympics are introducing some innovative cooling strategies this summer.
The organizers initially plan to eliminate air conditioning in the Olympic village, relying on natural cooling methods like water flow and smart shading.
However, recent developments have seen the introduction of 2500 temporary cooling units, a mid-public pushback.
We'll explore the rationale behind this decision, its potential hurdles and its implications for the future of eco-friendly sporting events.
Stay tuned. Looking for passion?
How about fiery debate?
Want to hear about current events in China from different perspectives?
And tune in to Roundtable, where East meets West and understand it is the goal.
It's the hour of Roundtable with myself, Neil Holmlin, Steve Hatharly, and you should.
So you shouldn't. What is the latest development in the cooling strategy of the 2024 Paris Olympic?
Yeah, so originally designed without air conditioning, the decision of building an eco-friendly Paris Olympic village sparked heated discussion on monnetizens worldwide.
And raised concerns from various national delegations about the athletes' performance and results because maybe of the sleep of the athletes and the temperature of their rooms.
So according to reports from EuroNews after pushback from Olympic delegations, Paris organizers are now allowing countries to order portable air conditioner units at their own expense, which will be installed for the duration of the games, and it was announced that this week, 2,500 units have been ordered.
But it's still a little bit ambiguous because we're not very sure that it is ordered by the Paris organizer or the participating countries.
Yeah, but what we do know is that they have reversed course a little bit here.
The original plan. And we know about this, right?
We've seen it in the news a lot.
The Paris Olympics, what they wanted to do was make it really, really, really green and what that means air conditioning wise is that they wanted to go with this geothermal cooling system and all these different strategies to keep the athletes cool.
I think what it seems they realized, it's going to be hot.
And oh, definitely, actually according to local government, the average temperature in Paris is expected to exceed 34 degrees Celsius with peaks possibly surpassing 40 degrees Celsius and humidity levels close to 70%.
And this Olympics is being described as quote unquote the hottest in history.
So I get, I think I can understand both parties size on one hand.
You do want to find innovative ways to keep your surroundings friendly for human living or human requirements, especially when it comes to a huge sporting events like this.
We are talking about athletes, spectators coming from different parts of the world, flying, two Paris and appreciating this and enjoying this.
But on the other hand, you are also looking to make sure the quality of the games are held into certain standards.
So the dilemma is definitely there and I feel like I can appreciate the initiative at least.
So what was the original plan?
Mayor, the mayor of Paris, I think, and Hidalgo, is her name.
What was the original plan maybe a few months ago?
So actually, as you mentioned, they have these kind of green or methods, according to the Paris Organizing Committee, they have designed the buildings with this geothermal cooling system that pumps cold water from deep beneath the ground to keep indoor temperature at least six degrees Celsius lower than the outside and effective insulation and strategic orientation to minimize sun exposure, aiming to keep indoor temperatures between 23 and 26 degrees Celsius.
And also, of course, we know that the location of Paris is kind of not that hot, according to history temperature.
The coordinates of the center of Paris are 48 degrees, 52 minutes north, which is higher even in latitude than harbing and even Tiji harbing China.
These are two northeastern cities, northeastern parts of China.
And thanks to its proximity to the Atlantic Ocean, Paris has a temperature-oceanic climate with mild winters and cool summers and historical data shows that the average summer-temperature in Paris ranged between 17 to 25 degrees Celsius, and I think that is why they were so confident about the temperature of non-AC Olympic Village.
Yeah, I can understand, but there's just been evidence already.
And in Paris, as well, in 2019, Paris reached its all-time record high 42.6 degrees Celsius.
It's almost exactly five years to the date, as a matter of fact, from when the Olympic games are scheduled to begin.
So of course, that's five years ago, but we've seen it, right?
We've seen it in Paris. I do think that the initiative of trying to make the games as green as they possibly can is a good thing.
But when we're talking about athletes who have spent their entire lives for many of these people, invested so much of their own personal energy, their own personal money, it's not cheap to train to be an Olympic athlete, then you want to make sure that the athletes are performing at peak performance, right?
This is what the Olympics is all about.
So to ask those athletes to practice, perform, and prepare to be the best in the world, and then bring them to the event and say, sorry, it's a little warmer than you expected.
You sleep might be affected.
It doesn't seem very fair to me, and maybe I'm speculating.
Maybe that's what they were thinking too.
Yes, and these kind of discussion actually happened multiple times for different Olympic games.
We see that for Winter Olympic games, they're have been complaining about the arena being too cold to perform because they cannot get literally warm up, and their muscles are not functioning properly.
And it is also due to a lack of a heating system in the arena, but I think these kind of discussion, these kind of push back and initiative and adjusting a little bit is actually necessary in order to have a better Olympics and a better everything.
It's a compromise. It's a compromise.
Yeah, I mean, this is a little bit off topic, but I thought this was interesting.
Caitlin Trudeau is a senior research associate for climate science at climate central, and Caitlin said, I'm still just surprised at the timing of these Olympics as well.
We've seen, this is the quote, continuing, we've seen such deadly heat waves in the exact location at this exact time, many times in recent history.
So what some people are saying is we should be adjusting the time of the summer games to perhaps another month of the year.
Autumn game. Yeah, well, yeah, exactly.
I mean, it breaks tradition, of course, but with climate change, maybe summer suggesting that we need to break with this tradition.
But that's a little bit off topic from what we're talking about here.
And in the meantime, we're going to see some people are saying, well, picking AC as a way to solve the problem might be a little irrational because they're not the main carbon emitter in the whole thing.
But I do still appreciate this initiative.
I think you got to start from somewhere and a little by little, that's how we make changes.
Yeah, because we know that Olympics has always been a topic that we need to be greener.
We need to emit less carbon dioxide.
So we can see that, you know, the Paris organizers have been putting a lot of emphasis on make this Paris 254 greener.
According to Eero news, organizers aim to cap emissions at 1.75 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent for the games from July 26th to August 11th, followed by the parallel impacts.
And according to my climate, a climate and sustainability consultancy, this amount of pollution is comparable to that generated by approximately 1.3 million economy passengers flying one way from New York to Paris on Boeing 787 jets.
So it represents a significant reduction compared to the carbon footprint of past games anyway, because we can see that compared to real games, a significant reduction we can see from the 3.6 million tons produced.
So they are on the right track here.
And also we see that 95% of facilities are existing or temporary and the Olympic Village, one of the only two new structures we'll later serve as housing and office space.
And that is already a consistent principle for hosting cities of the of the Olympics, because we all see here in Beijing.
Well, after the 2008 Olympics and after the 2022 Winter Olympics, there are a lot of existing facilities being utilized and the new facilities are actually now being used for different purposes and serving the public as well.
It's one of the important things, right?
They want to make sure that if they're building these structures for the Olympics, that they're not just going to sit there taking up space when the Olympic events are finished.
Yes. So we look forward to see a greener Olympics.
Actually, we look forward to see greener and greener Olympics for the future.
