Monday 30 July 2012

Olympic Moment.

The greatest moment in Olympic history was when Bobby Pearce the sculler, stopped for ducks because with an effort that would have been considered impossible from any of his competitors, and even today is hard to believe Pearce chased Savrin after stopping for the duck and its ducklings, caught up with the Frenchmen and then by the time the race was over Pearce had finished almost 30 seconds in front of his challenger. In fact Bobby Pearce's time even with the stop included was the fastest of the remaining eight scullers in that round.  Pearce himself gave only one recorded version of the incident that occurred in his scull against Savrin."I had beaten a German and a Dane in earlier heats and I was racing a Frenchman when I heard wild roars from the crowd along the bank of the canal. I could see some spectators vigorously pointing to something behind me, in my path. I peeked over one shoulder and saw something I didn't like, for a family of ducks in single file was swimming slowly from shore to shore. It's funny now, but it wasn't at the time for I had to lean on my oars and wait for a clear course, and all the while my opponenet was pulling away to a five length lead." 
Not even swimming ducks could halt Bobby Pearce.

1 comment:

  1. This is cool - I didn't know about it.

    Where did you get your information from? Put in references.

    ReplyDelete