1. It would be wrong and a cliche to say we lost our innocence on Monday afternoon as a plume of white smoke drifted high above Boylston Street, as blood pooled on the sidewalk across from the Boston Public Library, as severed limbs lay amid the bruised and the bloodied and the stunned, their ears ringing, their ears bleeding. We lost our innocence on another perfect day, in September, 12 years ago. But we lost something Monday, too, and that is the idea that we will ever feel totally safe in this city again.
2. Yesterday, when attacks on the Boston Marathon injured scores of people, mostly spectators, every runner I know spent the day wandering around in a daze, then either going on an angry run or curling up in the fetal position at 9 pm. The spectators — people who show up and cheer with noisemakers and high fives and encouraging cheers and magic-markered tagboard signs that read “YOU ALL ARE CRAZY! KEEP RUNNING!”— are the people who matter most to runners. Without those people, a marathon would just be an exercise in self-abuse from a large group of crazies. But there is meaning in marathoning: the people who watch.
3. Augusta National’s manners are impeccable, but like most courtesies there is a polite undercurrent of please fuck off before we release the hounds flowing beneath it. Augusta National, to the outsider, is an inscrutable block of greenery cordoned off from the rest of the world and surrounded by worker bees scrubbing the perimeter clean of unsanitary intrusions of the jorted hoi-polloi.
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A Masters badge is one of the hardest tickets to come by in sport, so what do you do if you find yourself ticketless and outside Augusta National? SB Nation’s Spencer Hall investigates.
4. I’d always wanted to try boxing. One of my all time top 5 sporting heroes is Steve Collins, and him beating Chris Eubank left an indelible mark on my young brain. Even before that, I remember as a 9 year old jumping around my living room screaming with joy when Michael Carruth won gold in Barcelona ’92. I’d always wanted to do it. But I didn’t. And here’s why. I was scared to.
Big Red Bench presenter Ruairi O’Hagan always wanted to be a boxer. This is his brilliant account of how he finally found the courage to step into the ring — and what happened next.
5. When Fred Smoot, a former Washington Redskins defensive back, fractured his sternum and had to spend four months sleeping in a recliner because he couldn’t lie flat, he said his team doctors gave him a choice: Miss the rest of the season or “figure out a way to play.” Worried about his livelihood, he made it on the football field each Sunday thanks to a syringe full of a drug called Toradol.
6. The next morning, the day of the match, he calls into the newsagent where Anne was working to get crisps and drinks for the journey. He tells her not to save him any moussaka for tea, that he’ll have beans on toast instead. She pats him on the head, pleased he’s so happy, and says: “I hope they win for you, son.” He turns round at the doorway, face beaming, and says: “No problem, Mum. Three nil.” And then he was gone forever.
On Thursday one of the most prominent campaigners for Hillsborough justice, Anne Williams, died following a short battle against cancer. The Mirror’s Brian Reade pays tribute to a fearless, inspirational woman who was the most incredible advert for a mother’s love.
7. Following her debut in 1951, she joined Mexico’s Matadors’ Union — at the time she was the only woman member — and received top billing for 10 years, fighting in 300 corridas. One critic thought her “the most courageous woman I have ever seen”. But her bravery came at a cost: she was gored six times in the course of her career, once so badly that a priest was called to administer the last rites.
8. When the siren sounded, and an undermanned St Kilda recorded its first win at the ground in almost two decades, Winmar found himself near the Collingwood cheer squad, and instinctively, spontaneously, raised his arms over his head before lifting his St Kilda guernsey, pointed to his bare brown skin and declared: ”I’m black – and I’m proud to be black!”
One of the most iconic photos in Aussie Rules history shows Nicky Winmar staring down racist abuse by lifting his shirt and declaring “I’m black and I’m proud to be black.” Twenty years on, Winmar tells the story to Michael Gordon of the Age.
Boxing dreams and Boston nightmares: some of the week’s best sportswriting
1. It would be wrong and a cliche to say we lost our innocence on Monday afternoon as a plume of white smoke drifted high above Boylston Street, as blood pooled on the sidewalk across from the Boston Public Library, as severed limbs lay amid the bruised and the bloodied and the stunned, their ears ringing, their ears bleeding. We lost our innocence on another perfect day, in September, 12 years ago. But we lost something Monday, too, and that is the idea that we will ever feel totally safe in this city again.
In the aftermath of the Boston Marathon attacks, Kevin Cullen of the Boston Globe captured the hurt and confusion of a city rocked to its core.
2. Yesterday, when attacks on the Boston Marathon injured scores of people, mostly spectators, every runner I know spent the day wandering around in a daze, then either going on an angry run or curling up in the fetal position at 9 pm. The spectators — people who show up and cheer with noisemakers and high fives and encouraging cheers and magic-markered tagboard signs that read “YOU ALL ARE CRAZY! KEEP RUNNING!”— are the people who matter most to runners. Without those people, a marathon would just be an exercise in self-abuse from a large group of crazies. But there is meaning in marathoning: the people who watch.
Among the other great pieces on Boston was this by Erin Gloria Ryan for Jezebel on why attacking marathon spectactors was unconscionable, and on why it will never work.
3. Augusta National’s manners are impeccable, but like most courtesies there is a polite undercurrent of please fuck off before we release the hounds flowing beneath it. Augusta National, to the outsider, is an inscrutable block of greenery cordoned off from the rest of the world and surrounded by worker bees scrubbing the perimeter clean of unsanitary intrusions of the jorted hoi-polloi.
A Masters badge is one of the hardest tickets to come by in sport, so what do you do if you find yourself ticketless and outside Augusta National? SB Nation’s Spencer Hall investigates.
4. I’d always wanted to try boxing. One of my all time top 5 sporting heroes is Steve Collins, and him beating Chris Eubank left an indelible mark on my young brain. Even before that, I remember as a 9 year old jumping around my living room screaming with joy when Michael Carruth won gold in Barcelona ’92. I’d always wanted to do it. But I didn’t. And here’s why. I was scared to.
Big Red Bench presenter Ruairi O’Hagan always wanted to be a boxer. This is his brilliant account of how he finally found the courage to step into the ring — and what happened next.
5. When Fred Smoot, a former Washington Redskins defensive back, fractured his sternum and had to spend four months sleeping in a recliner because he couldn’t lie flat, he said his team doctors gave him a choice: Miss the rest of the season or “figure out a way to play.” Worried about his livelihood, he made it on the football field each Sunday thanks to a syringe full of a drug called Toradol.
When the pads come off, the big hits of the NFL leave big pain. Sally Jenkins and Rick Maise of the Washington Post investigate sport’s culture of prescription drug use and abuse.
6. The next morning, the day of the match, he calls into the newsagent where Anne was working to get crisps and drinks for the journey. He tells her not to save him any moussaka for tea, that he’ll have beans on toast instead. She pats him on the head, pleased he’s so happy, and says: “I hope they win for you, son.” He turns round at the doorway, face beaming, and says: “No problem, Mum. Three nil.” And then he was gone forever.
On Thursday one of the most prominent campaigners for Hillsborough justice, Anne Williams, died following a short battle against cancer. The Mirror’s Brian Reade pays tribute to a fearless, inspirational woman who was the most incredible advert for a mother’s love.
7. Following her debut in 1951, she joined Mexico’s Matadors’ Union — at the time she was the only woman member — and received top billing for 10 years, fighting in 300 corridas. One critic thought her “the most courageous woman I have ever seen”. But her bravery came at a cost: she was gored six times in the course of her career, once so badly that a priest was called to administer the last rites.
Patricia McCormack, who was America’s first female matador, died last month aged 83. The Telegraph’s obituary looked at how she won the sport’s admiration — and survived countless close scares.
8. When the siren sounded, and an undermanned St Kilda recorded its first win at the ground in almost two decades, Winmar found himself near the Collingwood cheer squad, and instinctively, spontaneously, raised his arms over his head before lifting his St Kilda guernsey, pointed to his bare brown skin and declared: ”I’m black – and I’m proud to be black!”
One of the most iconic photos in Aussie Rules history shows Nicky Winmar staring down racist abuse by lifting his shirt and declaring “I’m black and I’m proud to be black.” Twenty years on, Winmar tells the story to Michael Gordon of the Age.
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