Three of the best

3-0 the score line read last night, Bayern Munich one of the top teams in the world had been made to look very ordinary by an extrordinary Barcelona team, and with a two point advantage atop La Liga as well as a Copa Del Ray final in waiting no one would bet against Barca claiming a domestic and European treble of trophies.

They are at this moment in time once again the benchmark of world football, aggressive classy clinical and a joy to watch, Bayern were hounded from the word go and their fatigue having spent the match chasing shadows showed at the end when Barca’s front trio burst into life.

Luis Suarez had narrowly been denied a goal by the leg of Neuer in the first half, but there was nothing he could do about the three that hit the back of his net, first a smashing strike from Messi on the edge of the box after Dani Alves had set him up. Then a piece of brilliance from Messi, a moment of sheer magic that displayed,as he’s done thousands of times before, why he is simply the best in the world or as Franc Ribery once said “there’s him and then there’s the rest”, cutting in from the right he made to go around Jerome Boateng on the defenders right side before cutting the ball back the opposite direction and calmly slotting the ball over the hapless Neuer into the net leaving Boateng in a tangle on the floor and Neuer grasping at thin air.

To top it all off it was Messi who slipped Neymar through on goal, and the Brazillian made no mistake cooley slotting the ball home under Neuer with the Bayern defenders giving it everything to try and close down the Brazillian wonderkid turned world class performer. This has been the theme of Barcelonas season this year, they have been a class above everyone else, Neymar Messi and Suarez have scored over 100 goals between them this season and are miles ahead of every other strike with Real Madrids Ronaldo Bale and Benzema not having even reached the 90 goal mark, their closest opposition this season.

Messi of course has been Barca’s star performer creating chance after chance scoring goal after goal and ripping teams to shreds with his close control, incredible skill and huge hunger to win. With the support of Neymar and Suarez they have become a huge force, Neymar adds the flair which he has done since his early days at Santos, the ease with which he ghosts past other players and the skills he is capable of unleashing on the opposition, while Suarez is starting to pick up where he left off as one of the worlds top strikers, he has started hitting the back of the net at an immense rate over the past few months and has fully settled into life at Barcelona and is producing the goods for his team.

They are clicking and teams fear them once again like they used to in the Guardiola days, and there’s no doubting that this terrible trio will torment every single player and team they play against for years and years to come.

A criminal and a conservative with a bad shoulder

The biggest fight of the century, one of the biggest money makers in sporting history, Floyd money Mayweathrt vs Manny pacman Paquio.

Their is no doubting the prowess of these two fighters both are up among the greatest athletes to ever have graced the sport, both strong characters outside the ring and both lethal within, all other contenders have fallen to the fists of these two.

Fighters like Ricky Hatton the darling of England who in his prime was easily and ruthlessly dispatched by both Mayweather and Paquio or Oscar De la hoya, who, once beaten by Mayweather trained fighter after fighter claiming he had a blueprint to dethrone Mayweather a way in which to end his record, to this day that blueprint has not been discovered and with Floyds final fight coming up in september it looks as though he will step away from the ring with a perfect 49-0 record and go down in history as one of the greatest boxers ever.

Paquio on the other hand has lost that killer edge which saw him obliterate opponnents with his pitbull style approach in the ring, flurry upon flurry of precise aggressive punches knocked 59% of his opponents for six laying them flat on the canvas and giving him a better knockout ratio than mayweather.

And this displays why, a knockout that won the title of knockout of the year shows just how lethal Paquio can be.

The build up was intense every news outlet was flooded every single sports programme was focusing on the event the revenue it would generate, ridiculous sums of money, huge crowds wall to wall footage of training sessions, interviews and behind the scenes shows, the public was captivated.

Then may the 2nd came and these two behemoths of boxing stepped into the MGM Grand arena ring, people chanting beer flowing bets placed. rockstars, celebritys and the world watched on as the bell rang.

It went the distance and Mayweather won, although these two may be the fighters of the centuary this was not the fight of the centuary, and it ended with Mayweather convinvcingly winning and looking at the statistics afterwards its easy to see why, more of every type of punch landed the statistics where well and truly in Mayweathers favour.

But outside of the ring their is an aspect to these two fighter that has been neglected by the public the bad side which people dont seem to want to acknowledge.

Manny Paquio is a representative of the phillipines and is a shining beacon in his country, but has come out with some hugely homophobic statments such as when he claimed that gay people should be put to death. while this may just be due to the environment in which he was raised, this statment lost him much of his following in the LGBT community and shocked his fans in general.

Floyd Mayweather is a bad man and although a role model in the ring is far from a role model outside of the ring.

Mayweather is a serial beater of woman an animal to the one’s he is supposed to protect and care for, such as Josie Harris wife to three of his children, when Mayweather heard she was seeing other men, he at the time was seeing another woman, he went to her house at 4 in the morning confronted her and cracked her across the head with one of his prized fists a true champion he then twisted her arm and tore her to the floor, his children upon hearing Josies cries ran downstairs to this chaos, Mayweather Growled at Zion that if he called the cops he would beat him as well.

Hardly the actions of a man so revered by others, another incident where he met two of Harris’ girlfriends in the streets and proceeded to beat them with his fists is also well documented.

An egomaniac who owns the world and who feels it owes him something, he wents everything and knows how to go about getting it, he is proving to be a great buisness man and promoter a man of many talents.

A king in his own right, the king of boxing, he has enough money to buy what he wants to do what he wants, but money dosent buy you morals and a true sense of being proffesional.

American psycho may or may not be based on Mayweather (it’s not) but it is a testament to his life shrewed calculated aggressive and inspiring, but underneath  lies a monster with an ego the size of the country he owe’s it all to, the most awe inspiring beater of women to ever have lived or as his son Koraun once said “a coward”.

 

Endurance

Athlete’s push themselves consistently each and every day in order to improve themselves and produce their best performance’s.

But among the toughest and most demanding sports in the world is endurance or long distance running, huge levels of athleticism coupled with a confident and strong mind-set are vital, a huge degree of discipline is required in order to become a competitive long distance runner, hours spent running and training most time’s alone as well as a good diet.

They are distinctively marked apart from other athletes by their build, gazelle like legs compact, lean, knotted with lean muscles and a slim upper body, body fat is virtually none existent.

Watching them is special, each and every year the finest athletes line out at the Olympics, the world championships and at many other event’s around the world and put on a show.

Running is simple, to be faster than the competitiors around you over a certain distance, but the training involved is internsive and dedication is key to success.

Looking at these athletes is special the hours and hours they have put in to reach their peak for a certain race makes anyone watching appreciate their discipline.

Ive always enjoyed watching athletes such as Haile Gebreselassie, Bekele and Mo Farah racing to win the biggest prizes in their sport.

The Bupa great north run 2013 was a fantastic race and one which involved all 3 of these men, Mo fresh from London having won gold in the 5000m and 10000m races and setting himself up as one of the finest british athletes to ever have lived, was up against Gebreselassie, although old, possibly one of the greatest long distance runners to ever have lived, as well as Bekele one of the finest current athletes alongside Farah and the finish was something special

Its moments like these that make the sport so special, Farah came back in 2014 and won that same race beating Kegan in very similar fashion to the way in which Bekele beat him.

overall it is a beautiful sport to watch and the dedication and hard work the athletes put in is clear to see.

 

 

 

Mountaineering, a glimpse

“There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.” attributed, some say wrongly, to the great Ernest Hemingway does hold some sway.

Mountains have captured the imaginations of people for centuries, old civilization’s believed them to be the home’s of the god’s, Such as the Greek’s and Mount Olympus, over the past 150 years mountaineering has become a way of life for thousand’s, from Edmund Hilary and Tenzing Norgay reaching the summit of Everest in 1953 to the first successful summit on the Eiger North Face mountaineering continues to develop.

The sport is becoming more and more extreme and it is a pursuit that put’s one at risk of severe injury and as has occurred time and time again death.

Today’s benchmark setters are the like’s of Ueli Steck, Killian Jornet, Ed Viesturs and many more are continuing to push the boundaries of what people believed possible and adding to the reputation of a pursuit that test’s an individual both mentally and physically.

In previous generations reaching the summit of mount Everest was the biggest aspiration among mountaineers, but today the summit is much more reachable, improved technology and resources are what make this possible.

But like in any sport once a boundary has been breached and a benchmark set it is inevitably shot at. Nowadays the emphasis is on speed, and through a style known as alpine climbing huge speeds are being achieved.

Alpine style is a very self sufficient style of climbing, carrying your own food and equipment all the way up a mountain makes for a very quick and light ascent, the dangers associated with it is that in an emergency you become much more exposed to death than with the older methods.

Mountaineering is becoming more and more exciting and extreme each and every year, from climbing all 14 of the worlds highest peaks without supplemental oxygen to speed records on the matterhorn and the eiger north face, the pursuit of height will keep on developing.