Let The Games Begin

In this episode of "A Pane In The Glass Podcast" we take a thumb nail walk through the Olympic Charter. You will learn some aspects of this quadrennial sport festival that might surprise you. I also discuss how the IOC protects its brand. The 2026 Scotties Tournament Of Hearts is in the rearview mirror. I share some thoughts on what I heard and saw. The sound bite this week is for parents of young athletes and it's about whether a young person should play many sports or concentrate on just one. It’s a must listen for all parents (and grandparents)! I break from  tradition in the sign off portion of the episode. I hope your ears will like it!

Chapters

• 0:45 The Olympic Charter
• 8:35 Brand Protection
• 11:25 The 2026 Scotties In Review
• 21:55 For Parents Of Young Athletes

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:21

Welcome to another episode of a Pain in the Glass podcast. This is your host, Bill Shearhart, Chartered Professional Coach with Coaches of Canada, coming to you from Southern Vancouver Island on the ancestral land of the Wassenick First Nations. As mentioned at the end of the last episode, at least a portion of today's episode is going to take a look at the Olympic Games from a generic perspective. What are the Olympic Games? How are they governed? And each sport's role in the Olympic movement. And there's no better place to begin than with the Olympic Charter. And this is a fundamental document that governs the Olympic movement. You can think of it as the constitution of the Olympic Games. The charter is a set of rules, principles, and bylaws adopted by the International Olympic Committee, the IOC, and it defines how the Olympic movement is organized, how it operates, and how the Olympic Games are conducted. So what does it cover? Oh, first of all, the fundamental principles of Olympism. These include promoting peace, human dignity, nondiscrimination, fair play, and the educational value of sport. Rules and responsibilities of key bodies, such as the IOC, National Olympic Committees, known as NOCs, International Sports Federations, and Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games. The rules of the Olympic Games, including how host cities are selected, how the Games are organized, and who is eligible to participate. Protection of Olympic symbols, like the Olympic rings, flag, motto, anthem, and the term Olympic. I'm gonna have more to say about that aspect of the charter a little bit later. And the last point, athlete participation and conduct, including eligibility, rights, and obligation of athletes and officials. So why does the charter matter? Well, it ensures consistency and fairness across all Olympic Games. It protects the rules and integrity of the Olympic movement. All Olympic bodies must comply with it, and disputes can be resolved based on these rules. So, in short, the Olympic Charter is the legal and ethical foundation of the Olympic Games and everything connected to them. For a sport to become an Olympic sport, it must meet criteria set by the IOC, that was the International Olympic Committee. The process is selective and evolves over time, but the core requirements fall into several key areas. They are, first of all, governance by an international federation. The sport must be governed by a recognized international federation. For curling, of course, that's world curling. This federation must enforce standardized rules worldwide, comply with the aforementioned Olympic charter, and follow IOC's policies on ethics, anti-doping, and good governance. Number two, global popularity and universality. The sport must be widely practiced internationally. So the minimum participation requirements, and these are approximate, men's sports that must be practiced in at least seventy-five countries and on four continents. For women's sport practiced in at least forty countries and on three continents. These exact thresholds may evolve, but they're universally essential. Third, compliance with anti doping rules. We certainly have heard about this over the well, I can say the decades. The sport must fully comply with the World Anti-Doping Code, commonly known by the acronym WADA. The governing federation must have testing programs, sanctions, and enforcement mechanisms. Fourth, Olympic values and ethics. The sport must align with the Olympic principles, including fair play, athlete safety, gender equality, nondiscrimination, and integrity and transparency in governance, spectator appeal, and media value. The IOC evaluates whether the sport is engaging and understandable to audiences, appeals to younger demographics, has broadcast and digital media potential, fits modern attention spans and presentation formats. And this criterion has become increasingly important in recent decades. Number six, cost, complexity and sustainability. The sport should require reasonable infrastructure, not impose excessive costs on host cities, preferably use existing or temporary venues and be environmentally sustainable. seven safety and athlete welfare. Risks must be manageable and well regulated. Clear safety standards must exist for training and competition. Even if a sport meets all criteria, inclusion depends on the total athlete quota, the balance between individual and team sports, gender parity, and diversity of sports on the program. Number nine, Olympic versus host selected sports. Well, there are two pathways here. First of all, core Olympic sports. Permanently on the Olympic program, such as athletics or swimming. Reviewed periodically. Now, additional host selected sports. Host cities can propose sports for their specific games. For example, skateboarding, surfing, and sport climbing were sports that were selected for the Tokyo 2020 Games. But these sports must still meet all IOC standards. And number 10, IOC decision process. First of all, International Federation applies for recognition. Sport may be added to the Olympic Program Commission's review. The IOC Executive Board recommends inclusion. The IOC session vote decides for final approval. And so in sport, a sport must be internationally practiced, well governed, ethical, safe, affordable, and appealing. And it must be within the IOC's strategic vision for the game. I mentioned that I would make a comment about the International Olympic Committee's protection of its brand. There probably wasn't a better example of that than when the Winter Olympic Games were hosted in Canada in Vancouver. The venue for the ice hockey was the arena where the Vancouver Canucks, the NHL tomb representing Vancouver, plays its games. It took several days, uh more than uh just a week or so, I think it was almost two weeks, to completely sanitize the facility from all sponsorship. The IOC wanted the decor, if I can use that term, to be strictly Olympic decor. And one can certainly understand that. I mean, they have every right to protect their brand. But I found it very interesting for Canadian curlers and curling fans that the curling trials to determine the men's and women's teams that will that would represent Canada in Milana Cortina, it was not the Olympic curling trials, even though it was really the Olympic curling trials, but Curling Canada could not use that name because it was not an Olympic, an IOC event. It was Curling Canada's event. Now we rewind a number of years ago when I was involved with a team in the United States and their quote unquote Olympic curling trials were in Omaha, Nebraska. And when I got there, the word Olympic was all over the place. In fact, I have a hat that says Olympic curling trials, Omaha, Nebraska. Now apparently, if I'm in error on this, I will stand to be corrected. But the reason that the American Curling Association was able to call it the Olympic Curling Trials was because they paid a fee to use that name. So again, very protective of the brand, and uh rightly so. Well, that's my take on branding. I want to share some observations from my coach. As I watched virtually all the games from the Scotty's Tournament of Hearts, the 2026 version from Mississauga, Ontario. Of course, congratulations to Team Anderson. They were Team Canada because Rachel Holtman, who was last year's Scotty's Tournament of Hearts champion, was not able to participate because she's in Italy getting ready for the Winter Olympic Games. It was a great gold medal game. I mean, talk about right down to the wire. There were some great shots. Probably the most memorable was uh Carrie Anderson's in-off to score one in the tenth end, which of course uh moved the game into an 11th end, where Team Anderson was able to steal a point and win the championship. In the tenth end of that gold medal game, even though Team Laws did not win the Scotties, they put on a clinic of how to place guards. And I wish I could clip that segment of the tenth end, because that's exactly how to do it. At the time, they had shot rock uh in the four-foot circle, close to the button, as I recall, and they attempted quite successfully, I might add, to try to, with one rock, guard as much of the path to that shot rock as they could. It's probably the most misplayed shot in curling, and people who have followed the podcast know that I've referred to this on a number of occasions. But we saw an off-the-charts example how to do it. And I think they did it three times, might have even been four, but I'm pretty sure it was three. And the guard was placed perfectly. And if you remember that tenth end, or if you have an opportunity to see it again, you will know that they played that shot correctly. And what made it correct? All the guards had to be brushed into position. So often I see teams attempting a critical guard, and in doing so, the skip or the third places the brush in the right spot given the amount of curl. The person who delivers the rock hits the brush, and then this is where things start to go south. The team hopes that the rock stops in the right spot. History shows my participant observation shows that when guards are missed, they almost always miss because they curl too far. And when they curl too far, many times they join other rocks who are already guarding that rotation to the shot rock. So instead of having three rocks, they now have four rocks. If you leave an agonizingly small port along with those rocks that are already in play, it's better than having a guard curl too much and then join the other three. So here's how you do it. And it's all on the person who calls the shot. The skip or the mate, whoever happens to be holding the brush, takes enough ice so that not to sound like a broken record, the brushers must brush the rock into position. If you play it like that, the execution tolerance actually is to be a little bit narrow, so to speak, that the the rock doesn't quite get up to the spot. But remember, as I said, most of the time there are already rocks on the other rotation, so that's okay. You've left that agonizingly small port. That wasn't the case with team laws. They didn't have that luxury, they had to position those guards perfectly, and they did. What a great Scotties for curlers and teams for which that Scotty's in Mississauga was their first one. They all put on a great show, and certainly the future looks very bright. Uh, I have contacted some of those skips, and we've talked about getting them on the podcast in the not too distant future. I don't want to write any checks I can't cash, so I won't tell you who they are, but I'm very excited about that because I want to congratulate them sort of live and in person. But uh again, it was a great, great Scotties with an eye to the future. Now perhaps the downside. I received within less than twenty-four forty-eight hours, a number of listeners who expressed, and I must say that I concur with their concern, if I can put it that way. I'll put it in plain English. They feel, and me included, they feel that when a team goes through the round robin, I think you know where this is headed, when a team goes through the round robin and the playoffs gets to the gold medal game undefeated, they should have to be beaten twice. That should be their non-elimination game. Now I know that they played a non-elist non-elimination game early on, but it wasn't the final. And when I hear that, well, their reward is to get the color of rock and last rock advantage, that's what they've earned by going undefeated. Well, I'm sorry, that's not good enough. It just isn't good enough. So when a team goes undefeated all the way through to the final, they should have to be beaten twice. Now, I know that there are sponsors and TV contracts and all that goes with that, because if you do that, you may not know when the gold medal game is going to be played. I get that, but precedent was set at the curling trials because it was the best of three. So it seemed okay with sponsors in TV that there may not be a final game at such and such a time. It might go, obviously two games for sure, but it might go to a third game. They seem to be able to accommodate it then. So my listeners and I feel that that's the way it should be. Now I'm really not sure in history of the Scotties how often a team, say in the last 20 years, I'm sure that my friend Gary Gertz, Jerry Gertz, I should say, might weigh in on this and bail me out. I don't know how many times teams have gone through the round robin and the playoffs and got to the gold medal game. I'm not sure how often that would apply. But uh I really hope that uh those powers that be might consider. And I'm going to ask the players, those those uh skips uh uh and a coach uh when I get them on the podcast how they feel about it. Uh, if the players don't mind, I'm a big believer in okay, we're there for the customers, and if the players don't mind putting it all on the line if they're undefeated, well, that's okay. But I have the funny feeling that there's a certain team in Manitoba feel that now the gold medal game should be played. They were one and one, and now is the rubber match. Well, that's how we feel. Those listeners, a moi. During the Scotties, I think a very unfortunate word was used, and it was late in the event. There were teams that were playing their last game or two, and they had no way of making the playoffs, and they were labeled as spoilers. Well, talk about fingernails on a chalkboard. I'm gonna state right now on this podcast, I would I would never want to hear that word again. Ever, ever, ever. That is so demeaning. Those teams are trying to win a game. They're trying to win a game because they have pride of performance. And they've got people at home that are counting on them to give their very best effort to win a game. And to say that they're just trying to spoil someone else's path to the playoffs or whatever, that is I I can't think of anything that's more demeaning than that. So if this gets to the ears of commentators, I hope that I can change their minds that that word never, ever, ever gets used again. No one plays to be a spoiler. Uh they're playing, these teams that are already out, they owe it to teams that are counting on them to play the best that they can be, because they again, it's the pride of performance for the entire field. So uh I when I heard that, I bolted off my couch and uh clenched my fist. That's how strongly I feel about it. So never, please, never ever use the word spoiler. I know how much you enjoy sound bites, so for this penultimate. Episode for season number four of a pain in the glass podcast. One more to go, and we'll be starting season five. And this soundbite comes from Healthy Sport Parents. And I've used uh this person's uh sound bites uh previously, and I really like this one because it's all about whether it's better for an athlete, a young athlete, to concentrate on one sport as opposed to playing many sports. So let's hear what he has to say.

SPEAKER_00: 22:47

Yes, we know that playing multiple sports for kids at young ages is the best thing for them athletically. But if we live in one of those areas where we have a large high school or a large middle school, we know the competition to make those middle and high school teams is going to be pretty fierce. And when we look out the window and we see Johnny and Jimmy and Young, and they're all specializing at these early elementary ages, and our kid doesn't, that fear of falling behind is real. We see them getting better, we see our kid playing multiple sports and we don't know what to do. That is the untalkable tension that parents are living in. What I want you to know is that in most sports, kids can catch up. In most sports, there will be time as they grow into their bodies where they have a developmental leap and they catch up with those kids who specialize early. Yes, they might be behind for a little bit, they might not make the middle school team in seven grade, they might not make an eighth grade, but a lot of those kids who start specializing early are going to burn out and quit, or maybe they will change sports and there will be thoughts. It is a harder road to play multiple sports at young ages, it's gonna go slower as well, but ultimately I believe doing that is better for your kid holistically than specializing early. That's it. I totally understand the pressure you're feeling from coaches and clubs and looking into the future, and I understand why you're going to specialize early. Make sure you're doing it for your kids' goals, not out of your fear and your insecurities of what might happen down the road. I know these kids are young, but they're smarter than we give them credit for. Sit them down, go for a walk, whatever it is, have a conversation with them about what they want, and then lead them to their goals, not out of our fears.

SPEAKER_01: 24:52

Well, I'd like to know how you feel about that subject. Should young athletes play a variety of sports, or should they really concentrate on just one? That's the opinion of a coach from a group that uh works with parents of young athletes, and that's his take. Well, what's your take? And if you'd like to express it, the easiest and best uh and most anonymous way to do it is to click on the hyperlink uh at the end of the show notes. Uh tell me how you feel. I have no idea who you are. Well, it's let the games begin, for sure. It's going to be exciting. I love the Olympic Games, whether it's summer or winter. Uh just can't wait to watch. And the Paralympic Games, because they are hand in hand. I'm a big fan of the Paralympic Games, so it's not just Olympic Games. The music that you heard at the introduction to today's episode is John Williams' well-known Olympic fanfare. And I'm gonna do something I've never done before. Usually my sign-off music after I wish you well and look forward to the next episode with those wise words of that great North American philosopher Charlie Brown. Don't focus too much on things that make you sad, because so many things can make you happy. But this time I'm going to let John Williams Olympic fan fair play us out. Until next time.