DECISION 2016: Why roller sports must join the Olympic circus in 2016

ON Thursday the International Olympic Committee convene in Berlin to trim a shortlist of seven sports aspiring for a place at the 2016 Games down to two.

Last week, each of the sports - baseball, golf, karate, roller sports, rugby sevens, softball and squash - made their case. Now Sportsbeat reporters choose their personal preference and James Toney is backing roller sports.

EVERYTHING has its time and place. 

BLOODY HERO: Australia's Steven Bradbury never gave up and was rewarded with an improbable Olympic gold at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City

Golf is a blooming Augusta in spring and a wet and windy Scottish links in July.

Rugby is about foaming pints of bitter on cold Saturday afternoons in the New Year and avoiding Taffy at work after the Welsh have just won the Grand Slam.

Both are great sports with great credentials but when it comes to the five-ringed circus, the only act worth rolling up to is roller sports.

While the name might be disconcertingly vague, roller speed skating couldn’t be simpler.

First across the line wins gold. No complicated judging – open to corruption or incompetence – no scoring system to learn, digest and forget for four years.

It’s also cheap to stage, no bad thing in these parsimonious times, and great on television - people falling over has been popular since the days of Dennis Norden and check out You Tube for further evidence.

And its inclusion might finally make me take the roller blades I was given for Christmas six years ago out of their box.

But if you want a real tangible reason, I present the case for Mr. Steven Bradbury.

The Australian short track speed skater, competing in his fourth Olympics, was not expected to challenge at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

Indeed, most observers expected him to go out in his quarter-final race. He duly finished third with only the top two progressed.

However, when one of the higher placed skaters was disqualified, Bradbury scraped into the semi-finals.

In that race he was a distant last when three rivals ahead crashed, promoting him to second and securing a place in the five-man final.

You can almost guess the rest. Coming to the final corner, Bradbury was again a distant fifth – more than 15 metres off the pace - as the four before him jostled for gold.

Then, amazingly, they all fell, allowing Bradbury to cross the line in disbelief, the first athlete from any southern hemisphere country to win Winter Olympic gold.

If you’ve never seen it watch the clip below – it’s a classic.

While Australia celebrated – an even issued a stamp in his honour – Bradbury’s win was not universally popular.

USA Today wrote: "The first winter gold medal in the history of Australia fell out of the sky like a bagged goose. He (Bradbury) looked like the tortoise behind four hares.”

However, they missed the point.

Bradbury’s victory, however improbable it might have seemed, highlighted the beauty of short track skating and underlined just why sport is the greatest unscripted drama there is.

It’s unpredictable, gripping, dramatic and you didn’t need a rule book to appreciate it.

Put simply, Bradbury proved that it pays to never give up and that sometimes tortoises really do win.

And you can’t get a more Olympian sentiment than that.

What do you think? Read Sportsbeat's George Scott make the case for rugby sevens.

James Toney is the Managing Editor of national sports agency Sportsbeat and has covered seven Olympic Summer and Winter Games.

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