Sainsbury’s 2012 School Games

This journey all began ten years ago when I was working at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester.  I was doing the Breakfast show at BBC 2002 Commonwealth Games Radio.  One of our producers was Damian  Payton.

Some months later and I am now Assistant Editor at BBC Radio Manchester and I get a call from Damian asking if he could bring some youngsters for a look round our studios.  I was also asked if I could give them a short talk and then answer some of their questions.  They were the S2R (Supporters to Reporters) team.

This was a fantastic day and the kids left our studios really enthused.

I have bumped into members of the team at various sporting events over the years as they send their reports back to the fantastic S2R website.

Right out of the blue in November of 2011, I get an e-mail from Damian asking if I would be interested in coming on board with S2R as a broadcasting expert working with the youngsters on a very special project.

This would involve travelling to three schools and presenting a broadcasting master class.

Once that had happened the best young broadcasters plus photographers under the tutelage of the wonderful Gwen, would spend four days in London first at the Excel Centre and then at the Olympic Park reporting from the 2012 Sainsbury’s School Games. I agreed immediately and after numerous phonecalls and meetings, plans were put in place.

Our first visit was to South Dartmoor College, Ashburton which is a very long way away.  I think I spent over five hours travelling there but, thankfully, I arrived safe and well.  This was the first time I met Gwen and I am delighted to say that we have become firm friends since that day.  The master class went very well and I spotted a couple of youngsters who definitely have the X-factor…whatever that is.

Our next visit was to Biddick High School, Chester-le-Street, Durham and again this was a fabulous experience as we spent the day showing the youngsters some of the tricks of the trade and generally inspiring them to hopefully become better broadcasters.

Our final stop was Crystal Palace, London. Now I think I should let you know at this point that I hate driving in London and almost always make that trip by train.  However this event was on a Thursday and I was working on the Friday in Birmingham.  On the Friday I was also working at the Sharks game in Sheffield.  No matter how I looked at it there was simply no way I could do this journey by train so regretfully I had to go by car.  What a unremarkable journey I had thanks to my satnav, which to me right to the door of my hotel.

And so it is that I am on the train heading to London for the 2012 Sainsbury’s School Games.  Now as I intimated earlier I love train journeys but I’m afraid that this truly was the train journey from hell.

A trip that usually takes 2 hours and 7 minutes actually took over 4 hours.  A trip that usually requires no changes actually involved two changes only one of which we had been told about. Well, eventually we arrived in London, me short of my favourite cap which I had lost on the journey.  I will be dropping a line to Richard Branson to let him know about my exploits and my lost cap.

I then take the tube and DLR to the Excel Centre for Day 1.  Now I had seen the Excel Centre from the outside but I had never been inside.  OMG! What a building? It is massive.  I eventually meet my contact Lucy and it is right down to business.  I am introduced to my team and we go about reporting the Opening Day.

To put it mildly, we immediately had an astonishing piece of luck.  Making her way through the massive crowd is one of my favourite individuals Dame Tanni Grey- Thompson.

I had met Tanni back in 1994 at the Commonwealth Games in Victoria, Canada and she, like me, had never forgotten it.

I caught her attention and asked if we could have an interview with her.  She said she would love to do it but had something else she had to do.  She promised to return for the interview in about 5 minutes.

Right on cue Tanni turned up and we switched on our camera with Glenn doing the interview and Tom doing the filming.  It was fantastic and we immediately drew a massive crowd who wanted to see what was going on.  To be honest, after that start we could not fail.  We interviewed some athletes with Bee doing the interviewing and it was all fantastic.

We also got an excellent interview with a Brazilian Journalist who was visiting the School Games.  Brazil will host the 2016 Olympics and there were here to see how London was doing it and to get ideas for themselves.  We recorded an opening link with Glenn, some cutaways and with that it is back on the DLR, still missing my cap and off to bed.

Day 2 and we begin to edit the previous days stuff and we are amazed at how good the footage is.  We make our first film and attempt to put it on the website.  No matter how hard we try it will not load.  In the end we have to leave that and get out for the days filming.  Although this is day 2 of the event it is on Day 1 of the sport.  We are joined by a new member of the team Polly, whom I had met at South Dartmoor.

We have another major bit of luck.  Another very good friend of mine is strolling through the venue and agrees to an interview.  It is legendary British sprinter and Gold medal winner Darren Campbell MBE.  Another fantastic interview is carried out by the team and we now strut around about 6 inches above the ground.  In my first chat with the team I had told them that we were going to be the best of all the teams there and that we were going to get the best interviews.  We were well on the way.

We get back to the office to begin to edit the Darren Campbell interview and start our second film.

THERE IS NOTHING ON THE DISK.

We try everything to retrieve our footage but it is nowhere to be found. We use a different camera, collect more footage do some more interviews and the day comes to an end.  I go back to the hotel and we, as a team still have no films on line.  I have to tell you I am as mad as hell.

Day 3 and it is Tuesday morning.  We meet at the Excel and I let the team know that I am not happy.  We have got tons of stuff in the can, one film edited but nothing on-line.  We also still don’t know if we can retrieve our Darren interview.  We go to work…and I mean go to work.

Within minutes our first film is on line.  It is the Tanni Grey-Thompson one and we are the talk of the office.  The press office want a quote from the Tanni film and a copy of her interview.  We make all that happen.  We get back in touch with Darren Campbell who agrees to do another interview but he doesn’t know when he will have the time.   Luckily, we get another major interview with Jason Gardener which is again fantastic.  I also get him to record a special message, on the dangers of taking performance enhancing drugs, to young athletes.  We get that on-line immediately and start to edit the film of Day 2.  It works out brilliantly and the main part of the film is the interview with Jason.   We have another film on line.

Day 3 and our final day at the Excel Centre.  We are given a brief which is to cover the Disability sports taking place.  This film had to be a maximum of 2 minutes long.  In the end we agree to cover just Wheelchair Basketball and even then we could not bring it in at 2 minutes.  We go out and get some fantastic interviews including announcer Ron McIntosh and BBC London’s Olympic Correspondent – Adrian Warner.    We get lots of Wheelchair action but the clock beats us and we do not have time to edit our film.

Day 4 and our final day at the games.  It is an early start (the alarm goes off at 5:00 am) as we now have to relocate to the Olympic park.  What a setting?  We are based at the Main Arena, the 80,000 seat venue which will house the 100m Men’s and Women’s finals plus all the other big Athletics events.

Now I have to admit that I have been to the Olympic Park before but I had never been inside the main arena.  I am impressed.

What a day we have?  Truly awesome!  Tons of people to interview including Darren Campbell plus the Chair of UK Sport, and Chair of the Youth Sports Trust Baroness Sue Campbell.

We record an introduction and manage to make another film.  The only thing missing is a closing to our film and it is pelting down with rain.  There is no way that we could do this outdoors.  We eventually find an indoor spot, record the closing, add it to the film and we are done.  We’d only missed the deadline by about 10 minutes.

We have a quick get together with all the other teams, head for the hotel to collect our bags and then it is back on the tube then train and eventually back home.

This had been another truly memorable experience for me personally and for all of our young reporters and photographers. I’d like to thank all the people at the Youth Sports Trust and at Supporter to Reporter for making it happen. I hope we all get to meet up again soon.

Later
Mike S