BEFORE TIGER WOODS took to the fairways at last week’s Barclays PGA tournament, the ”cheetah” sat down for a perfunctory pre-tourney press conference. Reporters started things off with a few run of the mill golf-related queries: “Drive well today?”; “How many drivers will you hit out there?”; “Have you made the decision now to change your swing?” But this was no ordinary [...]
Entries Tagged as 'Sporting Life'
Bull-baiting boneheads
July 13th, 2010 · View Comments · Around the World, Currently, Pop Culture, Sporting Life, Weird and wacky
THREE BONEHEADS ended up injured yesterday during the running of the bulls at the San Fermin Festival in Pamplona, Spain. If you’ve never heard of it – and haven’t read Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises – the bull run is a super popular annual event that essentially involves a bunch of idiots hustling down narrow cobbled-stone streets [...]
Tags:animal cruelty·Darwin·Ernest Hemmingway·Pamplona·running of the bulls·Spain·The Sun Also Rises
Coney Island chaos
July 5th, 2010 · View Comments · Around the World, Currently, Pop Culture, Sporting Life, Weird and wacky
APPARENTLY THINGS got a wee bit crazy yesterday at the annual Nathan’s International July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest in Coney Island. So-called competitive eater Joey “Jaws” Chestnut won the championship after stuffing 54 hotdogs and buns down his throat in 10 minutes. Alas, the San Jose man fell short of his goal to eat 70 dogs [...]
Tags:competitive eating·Coney Island·Joey “Jaws” Chestnut·Major League Eating·Nathan's International July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest·Takeru Kobayashi
Good for Ghana
June 30th, 2010 · View Comments · Around the World, Currently, Pop Culture, Sporting Life
CAN’T SAY I know all that much about football/soccer. Like most, though, I’ve been taking in the World Cup action whenever I can. In a multicultural city such as Toronto, you simply can’t avoid the hoopla, and it’s been fun to watch the various ethnic communities around town reacting as their teams win or lose. (That said, I won’t [...]
Tags:Africa·Black Stars·Brazil·Cameroon·Daily Telegraph·FIFA·football·Germany·Ghana·Korea·Senegal·soccer·South Africa·Spain·Toronto·Uruguay·World Cup
Wimble-dumb
June 26th, 2010 · View Comments · Around the World, Currently, Pop Culture, Sporting Life
WIMBLEDON IS BIG on traditions. But this week’s marathon match has me thinking it’s time for some changes. Most tennis fans loved the 11-hour, three-day epic between John Isner and Thiemo de Bakker. It was decided 70-68 in the fifth set – the longest match in professional tennis history. I don’t really get it. Maybe it’s because [...]
Tags:All England Club·England·John Isner·tennis·Thiemo de Bakker·tradition·Wimbledon
OK Leafs, stop being losers
June 10th, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Media Matters, Pop Culture, Sporting Life, Toronto
GOOD ON the Chicago Blackhawks. The young squad finished off the tenacious Philadelphia Flyers in six games last night, ending the club’s 49-year Stanley Cup drought, the only Original Six team whose dry spell was longer than the Toronto Maple Leafs’. What a strange goal to end it all, though. Other than Chicago forward Patrick Kane — who scored – no one in Wachovia Center, nor [...]
Tags:broadcasting·CBC·Chicago Blackhawks·Hockey Night In Canada·National Hockey League·Original Six·Patrick Kane·Philadelphia Flyers·playoffs·sports·Stanley Cup·television·Toronto Maple Leafs
Slayers of giants
May 14th, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Pop Culture, Sporting Life, Toronto
I’M A TORONTO Maple Leafs fan (read: sad, masochistic, glutton for punishment.) But you gotta be impressed by the Montreal Canadiens. Going from 8th in the Eastern Conference to bumping off Sid the Kid and the Pittsburgh Penguins, the defending Stanley Cup champs? Pretty awesome stuff. Not to mention the fact that the Habs also knocked [...]
Tags:Alexander Ovechkin·hockey·Montreal Canadiens·NHL·Pittsburgh Penguins·playoffs·Sidney Crosby·Stanley Cup·talk radio·Toronto·Toronto Maple Leafs·Washington Capitals
Hard-earned teasing for Tiger
April 9th, 2010 · View Comments · Celebrity Scandal, Currently, Media Matters, Pop Culture, Sporting Life
THE ATMPOSHERE at The Masters has been remarkably civilized for Tiger Woods’s big comeback this week. Tiger didn’t suffer much at his highly anticipated press conference Monday and so far during competition hasn’t been subjected to heckling from the gallery. Considering how hard it is to get a ticket to The Masters, I doubt people would be dumb enough to jeopardize their good fortune by shouting something [...]
Tags:Augusta·Augusta National·Georgia·golf·PGA·sex·sex addiction·The Masters·Tiger Woods·Urban Dictionary
Canada’s big moment
March 1st, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Sporting Life
WORST OLYMPICS EVER, EH? Well how do you like us now, you tea-sucking hacks? Sure the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games had its share of mishaps / challenges / tragedies – capped off by a closing ceremony that was embarrassing at points; giant inflatable beavers… really? – but man, events-wise, what a spectacular finish. Sid the Kid [...]
Tags:amateur athletes·Canada·closing ceremony·hockey·nationalism·Nickelback·Own the Podium·Parliament·patriotism·Sidney Crosby·Stephen Harper·Vancouver 2010·Winter Olympics
The game plan for the weekend
February 26th, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Sporting Life
‘Don’t fence me in,’ Olympic flame says
February 20th, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Pop Culture, Sporting Life
ANGER ABOUNDED in Vancouver this week over the Olympic cauldron being cordoned off behind a ghetto-riffic chain-link fence and concrete barricades. As if the British press needed one more reason to dub these the worst Games ever. Organizers relented somewhat and eventually cut a slit in the fence to allow for photos, albeit shots that couldn’t [...]
Tags:anti-poverty·British Columbia·cauldron·fence·Gordon Campbell·protest·social justice·Vancouver·Wayne Gretzky·Winter Olympics
Gold in the Great White North
February 15th, 2010 · View Comments · Around the World, Currently, Media Matters, Oh Canada, Sporting Life
CANADA IS basking in the afterglow of Alexandre Bilodeau’s triumphant winning of the country’s first-ever Olympic gold medal on home turf. TV networks have been playing the victorious performance on repeat and have pumped up their patriotism; Twitter’s all abuzz (a Canadian is a trending topic!); and there’s even word the Royal Canadian Mint will [...]
Tags:2010 Winter Olympics·Alexandre Bilodeau·Charles McGrath·Dale Begg-Smith·Goergia·luge·moguls·New York Times·Nodar Kumaritashvilion·Olympics·Own the Podium·Royal Canadian Mint·Twitter·Vancouver·Whistler
Asleep at the switch
January 26th, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Media Matters, Oh Canada, Sporting Life, Toronto
THERE WAS plenty of snickering/sneering in Toronto last week following the publication of a photo showing a transit ticket collector snoozing on the job. In keeping with the spirit of the times, the picture, snapped by a passenger and posted online via Twitpic, went viral, and this poor schmuck fast became the focus of worldwide [...]
Tags:Haiti·sleeping ticket collector·snoozing on the job·Toronto·Toronto Transit Commision·transit·Twitpic
Happy new year – you're now impotent
January 2nd, 2010 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Pop Culture, Sporting Life
WITH THE new year upon us, it’s time for all those annual polar bear dips. I’ve always thought these people were just a tad nutty – especially the dudes, who surely must spend the next week waiting for their frozen genitalia to descend from their stomachs. Of course most of the groups that organize the [...]
The agony of Leafs Nation
December 19th, 2009 · View Comments · Currently, Oh Canada, Sporting Life
NOTHING ENCAPSULATES how badly things have been going for the Toronto Maple Leafs – and their legion of masochistically loyal fans – quite like this awful goal from last night’s game against the Buffalo Sabres. As the video shows, this is the same hapless (hopeless? useless?) goaltender, Vesa Toskala, who in a game against the [...]
Tags:Boston Red Sox·Buffalo Sabres·Canada·goaltending·hockey·New York Islanders·NHL·Stanley Cup·Toronto Maple Leafs·Vesa Toskala

