Author archive for ‘Stephanie Branston’
Steve Parry; ex-Team GB Olympian, bronze medallist, BBC TV pundit, Michael Phelps look-a-likey.
One of the funniest clips from the Beijing 2008 Olympics. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.
By Stephanie Branston on August 20th, 2008
Tags: BBC, Beijing 2008, China, Olympics
You don’t find many articles that compare Stephen Hendry and Zara Phillips but this is one of the funniest I have read. Scratch the comedy surface and you’ll also find a considered and more serious take on the (much debated) topic of funding for our GB Olympic athletes:
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/08/09/zaras_horse_sense_beats_allcon.html
All hail the great and very funny David Mitchell.
By Stephanie Branston on August 11th, 2008
Tags: Beijing 2008, London 2012, Olympics
There’s not much you can do in 0.028 seconds.
Am sure it takes me significantly longer than that to blink for a start. But for one athlete, that was the difference between reaching her eighth Olympics Games and staying at home next month. Which is sadly where she will be having just missed out on Olympic selection, in what must be her last opportunity at the impressive age of 48. No spring chicken in the world of sprinting. Seven Olympics down, training for her eighth. Sir Steve Redgrave stand aside, this woman means business.
Anyone who like me, used to devour athletics on TV as a young kid in the 1980s, will recall the name Merlene Ottey. The Jamaican-born sprinter is ranked 4th on the list of all time female athletes in the 100m, and 3rd in the 200m rankings. She was always up there on the podium, the Jamaican anthem playing loudly. Well that is until she switched allegiance away from her Caribbean roots (don’t get me started on that subject…choose your country and stick to it in my opinion, however…) Changing her nationality followed a number of controversial years for Ottey in which she fell out with the Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) against team selection disputes and fought to clear her name of suspected anabolic steroid use, charges that she was cleared of in 2000.
2002 was the year Ottey adopted a new country and began to represent her new home of Slovenia, training under Slovenian coach Srdjan Djordjevic. Then it was the Slovenian anthem that would belt out in athletics stadiums around the world. If you ever want to learn more about national anthems, note that Slovenian’s is taken from the 7th stanza of the poem ‘A Toast’ written by France Prešeren in 1844. No idea how the actual tune goes, less reggae undertones than Jamaica’s I imagine.
I digress.
Along with Swedish fencer Kirstin Palm, Ottey is the only woman to have competed at seven Olympic Games; her Olympic career commencing in Moscow in 1980. In five World Championships, she has won 13 medals (three gold, four silver and six bronze medals). In the Olympics, she has won two silver and five bronze medals; more Olympic medals than any other athlete from the Western Hemisphere. Not forgetting being the first female Caribbean athlete to win an Olympic medal. That was pre-Slovenia days mind. In her impressive medal collection, only an Olympic gold medal eludes her.
Call me sentimental but it would have been inspiring to witness Merlene run in Beijing - even had she not qualified for the semi final stages in the sprint events, a feat she succeeded in doing at the age of 44 in Athens. Perhaps I’m feeling particularly sentimental this month having personally witnessed the drama that unfolded at Royal Birkdale when Greg Norman, at the age of 53, threatened to claim one of the least expected sporting victories ever and take home the Claret Jug as Open Champion for a third time. A tournament he last won in 1993. Sadly for Norman, like Ottey, there was to be no fairytale ending in 2008 but regardless I applaud them both for their sheer grit and determination, physical excellence and the ability to (very nearly) defiantly roll back their glory years.
(Ottey failed by 0.028 seconds to reach her eighth Olympic Games, aged 48 in 2008).
By Stephanie Branston on July 29th, 2008
In the ever evolving world that is sponsorship PR, there are two factors that increasingly hit our radar again and again:
1. A client’s request to come up with an idea that is unique, something never been done before, one that will grip news editors, secure acres of coverage, go down in history. Ideally the idea should also be engaging, clever and memorable. And must reward customers too.
No mean feat - a new, engaging, rewarding killer idea.
Leave it with us.
2. The power of celebville. The obsession with celebrities and fame, Heat headlines and Hello! ‘exclusives’ which shows no signs of truly waning. People yearn to be famous particularly those with no discerning talent. Shame on them. I don’t get it but then I don’t actively choose to be the centre of attention, preferring to promote clients; make them more famous for what they do, rather then me.
However, an idea that recently caught my eye is one that manages to combine the two - a never been done before corker that will guarantee headlines and media coverage across the land. And at the same time, a stunt that will make normal beings famous. Give an everyday Joe his 15 seconds of fame. Although in this case, it will be a whole hour; an impressive 3,600 seconds.
And I love it enough to (temporarily) abandon my ‘I really don’t want to be in the limelight, honestly I blush very easily’ genes and sign up for my very own moment in the media spotlight.
Those that live in London will almost certainly be familiar with the Fourth Plinth. Those who don’t juggle their evening commute reading between London Lite, the London Paper and the Evening Standard may be happily oblivious so here goes; the Fourth Plinth is in the north-west of Trafalgar Square. Built in 1841, it was originally intended for an equestrian statue but remained empty for years. It is now the location for specially commissioned art works. The most talked about commission unveiled on the Fourth Plinth was Marc Quinn’s sculpture Alison Lapper Pregnant which was taken down in October 2007.
Lapper was born with no arms and shortened legs. Quinn’s inspiration came from the fact that there was ‘no positive representation of disability in the history of public art’.
Controversial? Absolutely. Powerful enough to change peoples’ perceptions of disability and motherhood. Definitely. It was widely viewed as a success, capturing the attention of the public and global media alike.
Alison Lapper has long gone. Thomas Schütte’s Model for a Hotel 2007, unveiled in November 2007, is currently on the Fourth Plinth.
But it’s a future resident of the Plinth that I am most interested by; Antony Gormley’s ‘One and Other’. Antony Gormley and Yinka Shonibare (to follow later in the year) were chosen from a shortlist of six artists. Gormley? I know the name. English sculptor, Londoner by birth, him of Angel of the North fame, erected in Gateshead back in 1998. And a range of other public sculpture commissions.
For ‘One and Other’, Antony is looking for 2,400 members of the public who have volunteered to stand on the plinth for an hour at a time.
I love it. It’s a cracker. And so simple. I’m inspired and I find myself wanting to be part of it.
The official line from Gormley is “Through elevation onto the plinth and removal from common ground, the subjective living body becomes both representation and representative, encouraging consideration of diversity, vulnerability and the individual in contemporary society’.
Hmmmm, I’m not so sure that did it for me Ant. My motivation is driven by an opportunity to be part of history in a vibrant city in which I have lived for the past 9 years. Perhaps also because Trafalgar Square, location of the Fouth Plinth, holds happy memories for me. Having worked on the historic npower Ashes Series of 2005, I was privileged to watch the England cricket team’s victorious tour parade perched on some tall column owned by a chap called Nelson. Top view, what a summer. And the final brucie bonus is that it’s nice and close to the office; easy to squeeze in my hour of plinth service between meetings. Convenience is everything.
I applaud Antony Gormley for his creative concept and I high five the Mayor of London’s Fourth Plinth Commissioning Group for choosing it. When you see Gormley’s Fourth Plinth unveiled, whenever that is, think of me. Website ballot permitting, I will be there soaking up the spotlight. Me, myself and I.
For one hour only.
By Stephanie Branston on July 24th, 2008
Tags: Ashes, Public relations, Sponsorship, The Arts
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