Olympic Park and Appointments

Now that Kari has returned from traveling to Coventry as a fourth official for the match between Japan vs. Sweden, we ventured out to check out the Olympic Park. As officials for the Olympic Games we were issued Oyster Cards, which basically give us free access to public transportation. So today we rode the "tube" to get the Olympic Park, which was around a 35 minute ride from the train station near our hotel. On some days, we have been riding the tube to return to the hotel from the training fields as there is quite of bit of traffic and congestion and the train ride can be much quicker (33 minutes) than taking the bus (45 min - 1.5 hours). In the picture below, we are on the tube joined by Marie-Josee (Canada) and Kirsi (Finland).

Marlene and I had already seen the park the day of the Opening Ceremonies, but we enjoyed seeing it again, looking at the different structures, and of course we got some shopping in for official olympic merchandise. We left the Olympic Park at 12:30 pm in order to return back to the hotel. Our timing could not have been better as the park was very crowded by the time we left, and swarms of people kept arriving.

We returned in time to receive the announcements for the next round of appointments. Kari will be working as a fourth official for a referee from Greece and two assistant referees from Spain for the match between Japan vs. South Africa. She will be returning to Wales for this match. After lunch, we left for a late afternoon training session. Training today consisted of two parts: coordination & agility and technical. In the technical session, the assistant referees had three sequential throw in decisions, followed by a sprint up the field to make an offside decision, and then another sprint to the goal line to make another decision. We are putting in to practice the decision making skills that simulate situations that have been happening in the games. During these exercises, the referees primarily focused on team work, particularly in the goal/no goal scenario. As always, the goal is to give 100% effort in the training sessions, so that we are sharp and ready for our matches.