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Your support makes all the difference.Dwain was the golden boy of the Olympics, a world-beater. Even better, he was British. But then it all turned sour amid accusations of doping. After he had stormed down the course, beating his nearest rival by 10 seconds, at the recent Goldfish Olympics in Nottinghamshire, Dwain swam proudly on top of the podium. But then the water in his tank turned green. His owner, Richard Allen, said the murk was caused by the boiled peas he fed Dwain to cure his constipation, but Joe Weston-Webb, president of the World Goldfish Racing Association, spluttered: "There is no way a competitor could produce times like that unaided." As a dope test for goldfish has yet to be devised, there the matter rests. For now.
3
Number of officially designated "protest zones" in Beijing during the Games. Number of applications to demonstrate: 77. Number granted: 0. In other news: bears prefer to defecate in forested areas.
Astrological anorak of the week
Something fishy going on in the Olympics proper too, according to a British statistician. Kenneth Mitchell has compared the birth dates of all Olympic medal-winners since 1896, and claims an irrefutable correlation between star signs and success in different disciplines. For instance, Pisceans have won 30 per cent more swimming medals than those born under any other sign according to his results, which, he explains excitedly, "are almost exactly mapped by the function of a 3rd-degree poly-nomial!" If you haven't already nodded off, there's much more of the same at olympicstarsign.com
Good week for
The Queen, the head of state whose subjects have won the most medals in Beijing, thanks to the Commonwealth... Rohullah Nikpai, won Afghanistan's first-ever Olympic medal with a taekwondo bronze... and Frank Evans, the 65-year-old matador from Salford, made a successful return to the ring after three years.
Bad week for
Simon Jones, injury-plagued England fast bowler undergoes knee surgery... York racecourse, had to abandon entire Ebor Festival after waterlogging... Billy Joe Saunders, British Olympic welterweight, suspended by the Amateur Boxing Association for alleged lewd behaviour... and Denis Lynch, Irish showjumper was banned from Olympic final after his horse failed a drugs test.
Royal options of the week
We can't rely on Zara Phillips to provide Britain with a royal competitor at the 2012 Olympics, as the poor girl has pulled out of the eventing two Games in a row already. But all is not lost: among the International Olympic Committee's list of recognised sports is Air Sports, which includes helicopter racing. Sounds ideal for Wills – when he uses his RAF Chinook to visit Kate Middleton, he could claim to be practising. Sumo is also on the list, though suggestions that Prince Andrew is in early training on the off-chance are just too juvenile to repeat.
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