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6 - Ofpnd ii ■■nv s Times, Wednesday, Mây 8. 2002 BASIC BLACK The real Olympic spirit by Arthur Black That was some Winter Olympics, eh? The McKeever brothers standing tall and proud on the winners' podium. Lauren Woolstencroft bringing home the gold in skiing... skiing... Pierre Pichette making great saves in net for the mens' hockey team... Not the way you remember the Olympic Games in Salt Lake City? That's because I'm talking about the other Games - the 2002 Paralympic Games. They, too, took place at Salt Lake City, but several weeks after the glory boys and girls of the Olympiad had packed up their gear and their trainers and their managers and gone home. The Paralympics are much younger than their bigger brother - this is only the 7th incarnation - but they're important. Important enough to generate support from the governments of 35 nations. They kicked in dough towards the training and travel expenses expenses of more than 500 disabled performers from around the world. The Paralympics provide a place to shine for athletes from six different disability groups - but they don't focus on the disabilities of the athletes. athletes. And they certainly don't obsess about the gold-silver- bronze medal count. Still, I'm not surprised if you haven't heard about them. They don't get much respect, the Paralympics. Oh, some of the bigger newspapers send their B teams of columnists and the games get a few inches inches on the inside pages, behind the latest NHL and NBA results. Occasionally you'll see a fleeting clip buried in the nightly TV newscast, but the truth is, the professional sports world doesn't spend a lot of ink or air time covering these Other Olympics. A pity, considering what the original Olympics have become. When the modern Olympic Games were launched back in 1896, amateurism was a compliment, compliment, not a sneer. The venues venues were austere, the conditions conditions for the athletes Spartan and the rules forbiddingly strict: only amateur athletes would be eligible to participate. participate. The only prize: a crown of olive branches. A little over a century later, the games are unrecognizable. unrecognizable. They areawash with corporate sponsorships and multi-millionaire pro athletes. The Olympics have become a mega-billion-dollar industry. Municipalities spend king's ransoms for the privilege of hosting the Games, hurling themselves into whirlpools of debt building arenas and stadiums stadiums they can't afford in exchange for a 15 minute civic cakewalk on the world stage. Networks shell out hundreds of millions of dollars dollars for the broadcast rights. Journalists descend by the thousands, often outnumbering outnumbering the contestants five to one. And presiding over it all, the International Olympic Committee. The most bloated and corrupt gang of bagmen, grafters and freeloaders this side of Caligula's entourage. These guys hold the keys to the Olympic kingdom and they know it. They get to select the host cities, and they spend the years between Olympiads swanning around the globe, gliding in limos from five-star hotel to five- star hotel, being wined and the German contingent to a "real" Olympics. They do things differently. They dispense dispense with the breast-beating pomp and ceremony - no national anthems are played. Why, they barely keep a tally of which country won the most golds. And the athletes - that's where you see the real difference. difference. Perhaps it's something to do with the extra physical challenges they live with, but paralympians just don't seem to have the same competitive, win-at-any-cost fire in their bellies. At the Special Winter Olympics held in Toronto and Collingwood , Ontario back in 1997, there was a moment when a Canadian stood at the podium about to receive his second gold medal for downhill downhill skiing. Just before the awarding of the medals, he turned to a U.S. skier who had placed second and said: "I've got one gold medal already, but no silver. You don't have a gold medal yet. Can we trade?" Now I ask you - what kind of an attitude is that? Big Brothers & Sisters of Clarington B îs members of the community to attend their IUAL GENERAL MEETING inesday May 15, 2002 m 7:00 - 9:00 p.m. at igton Information. Centre lolt R<±, in Bowmanville mlllmlîîtitilitiîtili»»' 7 i! IT PAYS TO ADVERTISE TIMES 983-5301 all you can eat BUFFET SPECIAL - $14.50 Full Menu • Licenced by LLBO Give your Mother a treat at... New Dutch Oven Open 7 Days a week from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Hwy 35/115 Northbound - Orono ❖ ❖ ❖ Call for reservations 983-5001 supplicants. As for the athletes, they are - aside from a tiny handful of events -- hardly amateurs. When Team Canada and Team USA lined up on the ice before that famous hockey game last winter, the money that was standing around ton skates would dwarf the gross national products of some Third World countries. The U.S. Olympic Committee makes no pretense of honouring amateurism. It offers a flat cash gift to any American athlete who brings home a medal -- $7,500 for bronze, $10,000 for a silver, $15 G's for a gold. USA Swimming, the federation that oversees U.S. aquatics, pays $50,000 to every swimmer swimmer who wins a gold medal. That's not to mention the endorsements. Advertisers line up to sign Olympic champions champions to lucrative advertising contracts - especially if they're blond, with good teeth and a winsome smile. Nothing succeeds like excess. Then there's the Paralympics. 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