UP422 The 3 - The Stephen Hawking Episode

Unofficial Partner Podcast

The 3 stories are:
1. The race for the IOC big job - aka Bach’s overtures (this doesn’t make any sense but makes me sound like I know about classical music, which I don’t, apart from that theme from the Hovis ad). Six months ago the word on the street was that Seb Coe wasn’t running, and now he is. So, was the word wrong, or did he change his mind? Probably the former. Also, is the Samaranch name an asset or liability in the crusty world of IOC voting membership, the age profile of which makes the Tory party conference look like Coachella. Also, did you know Samaranch really likes crisps, so that’s a mark in the yes column from my pov.

1. Why Australia are paying 100million NOT to host The Commonwealth Games- echoes of the late, great Bob Hoskins, who used to tell a story about Brian DePalma paid him a couple of hundred grand not to play Al Capone in The Untouchables. Anyhow, it’s hard to get beyond the ‘What’s the point?’ trope when the CGs is in the headlines. The messaging this week has been around Glasgow getting the games for ‘free’, but - like lunch - I suspect that major quadrennial multisport events are rarely free. Which events will get the bullet, should the event have died with the Queen, will India ever engage properly and isn’t the British Empire a bit, how do we put it, passé?
2. Lego’s F1 deal - Cue outpouring of engaging Gen Alpha chat, with a smattering of hastily Googled facts about the environmental impact of the company’s failure to ‘transition to recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), which needs about 2kg of petroleum to make 1kg of plastic. ABS is used in about 80% of Lego blocks. “It’s like trying to make a bike out of wood rather than steel,” said Tim Brooks, Lego’s head of sustainability.

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