First Games shift

Behind the scenes at the games are 80,000 volunteers – the GamesMakers. Some of us are fortunate to be working on the ‘Field of Play’ – we get to work in amongst the athletes and Technical Officials. The real heroes  are the GMs who are either at the front of house – meeting and greeting, pointing out the way to go, seeing everyone safely home; and the ‘back office’ people – logistics, cleaning and tidying ........

Our FoP squad is pretty big, and those of us on duty had a team photo today:

This first shift took me into the stadium on Sunday evening – a session which included the women’s 400m hurdles. We put the hurdles out, they ran, we collected them in again.

We get to see the action from the end of the access tunnels – and managed catch a photo of the hurdling.

I only have my small camera, with not too many settings to choose from, so it can be a bit of a blur, as these steeplechasers were:

We also had the Womens 400m last night with Christine Ohurugu winning Silver:

And finally Bolt proved he can still do it when it matters.

After all the excitement there is the tidying to do.
The hurdles were collected in, but finished at the wrong end of the stadium, we had to wait until the end to take them back to the storage area. They have to be checked over and any damaged ones sent for repairs.
The hammer cage has to be frogged – there are winding handles on each of the uprights, but the handle is rather high and I had struggled to turn the handle over the top of its turn – faster they said – but I couldn’t – must remember not to be volunteered for that again.
The drinks bottles have to be sorted and the used bottles sent for recycling, with the unused ones saved for tomorrow.
The high jump beds are collected and put to sleep.
The steeplechase hurdles are wheeled away.

Eventually I join the crowds thronging out of the park and catch the bus home. Sleeping was not easy though I was tired, my head was full of logistics.