OPINION: Paris, you were beautiful, and the competition was thrilling

Oh, wasn’t it fabulous!

The 2024 Olympic Games have come and gone and we are left with a huge void to fill.

It was a stunning two weeks of sporting action in Paris and say what you want about the opening ceremony and the beds, and the food and the dirty Seine, the sport delivered at the highest level.

There was excitement, there was joy, there were thrills and spills. There were shouts of joy and tears shed … and there were head shakes and everything in between. The Paris Olympics were just beautiful.

A global platform

The South Africans did their country proud, winning six medals, and of course some grabbed more attention than others – swimming sensation Tatjana, mountain-biker Alan (how thrilling was that race!), javelin thrower Jo-Ane, Akani, Shaun, Bradley, Bayanda (seriously, how cool is this story?) and the Sevens Boks. But all the athletes, medal winners or not, are all heroes and you have done your country proud.

There were fantastic moments in Paris and cringe-worthy ones too. As South Africans, we don’t know too much about many of the Olympic sports, but every four years we watch what we can, learn what we can and cheer on who we know.

That is what makes the Olympics great – little-known men and women having a platform to achieve their goals and be part of the global sporting audience. Everyone is treated the same.

Performance of the Games

Of course, some get more attention than others; the bigger sports always do, and the majority of the big-name stars shone and for the most part, won their medals — the likes of Marchand, Ledecky, Biles, Lyles, McLaughlin-Levrone, Thomas, Kipyegon, Duplantis and Djokovic and Scheffler and many others.

We were all thrilled by the many high quality performances, but for me the performance of the Games goes to Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands.

Not only did she run qualifiers, semi-finals and finals in the 5,000m and 10,000 metre events, winning bronze medals in both, but she also ran the marathon on Sunday and won. Just ridiculous! What a performance.

Finally, how fantastic were the crowds. Well done Paris, you delivered. LA and the 34th Olympic Games can’t come soon enough.