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British gun laws and the Olympics

According to this report, the British are considering relaxing their handgun ban a bit, in order to permit London hosting the 2012 Olympic games.

Reminds me of a trip I took to the Olympic training center in Colorado (I think) perhaps ten years ago. The shooting sports were, well, rather specialized. A pistol event where you had to hit a number (5-6) targets in the least time possible ... so it shot a .22 shot, from a gun with holes drilled thru the upper surface of the barrel to keep down even that tiny recoil and rise. A "running boar" event (now actually a "running oval" out of fear of offending moslems, although I can't see where they would have objection to shooting a pig, just to eating or contacting it, and boars aren't really pigs anyway) where, since the target went left to right and right to left, there were two rear sights for each arrangement.

But the most starting sight was on the running track. A lady was running, and next to her a golf cart or something very like that was keeping pace. A hose like a vacuum cleaner hose connected to a face mask she wore. I asked what was going on, and was told that the cart housed equipment that would plot her CO2 output as she ran, so that they could optimize her speed. I thought this was going just a trifle far, on something that's supposed to be an amateur sport, after all. (A remark a friend made: they ought to go back to the original system, where there was one prize, for the best, and there was no reckoning by nation or city-state. The object is simply to find the best individual, in a very limited number of events -- I think six or eight -- and not to tally up 22 golds, 35 silver and whatnot bronze for some country. But then I suppose there wouldn't be that much advertising to sell...)

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