The Olympic Flag, which consists of five interlocking coloured rings, was created by Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympic games, and unveiled in 1914.

Coubertin said that the five rings represent the five parts of the world embracing "Olympism" and competing against each other: Africa, The Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania. The interlacing of the rings represents the unity and coming together of athletes from all parts of the world. Coubertin did not associate individual rings with individual continents.

The six colours of blue, dark yellow, black, green, red and white—the field on which the rings are set—"reproduce the colours of every country", and at least one is found on every national flag (I believe that’s still true).

I was thinking of including a sketch of each of the Olympic sports, but depending on how you count them, there are 32 sports and over 300 events.

You can learn more than you ever wanted to know about the history of the Olympic Flag in The Story of the Rings by Karl Lennartz (pdf). 

The Olympic flag and various other Olympic Properties (like the rings, torch and motto) are © IOC.

Great Britain, the British Isles, the United Kingdom - eh?

The Olympic Flag

Anchors and tugboats. One holds you back, and one pulls you forward.

Negativity can act like an anchor holding you back, narrowing your focus and restricting your potential.

By contrast, positivity acts like a tugboat pulling you forward. It's expansive. It opens us up to opportunity, gratitude or joy.

I heard this analogy from sports psychologist Justin Ross. It's a curious thing, he points out, that we don't actively learn how we should talk to ourselves; it just happens. If you're out running and things get tough, or if you're having a hard time at work or as a parent, our self-talk starts about how things are going and how we got here. But rarely do we consciously think about how we should talk to ourselves.

To get to positivity from a place of negativity, Justin says, the first step is awareness and noticing the negativity anchoring us down. Only then can we think about transforming the negative thoughts into positive ones and starting to feel the pull of the tugboat.

This example is sports psychology, but it applies throughout our lives.

Justin discusses this from 29:40 in the Löw Tide Boyz podcast episode 193.

Anchors and tugboats

A self-serving bias is one where we attribute our failures to external factors and our successes to our own admirable qualities and efforts.

So, a tennis player might internally credit their athleticism and skill for their victory, while the loser may blame the umpire's decisions, their racket or the court. You might have seen it in professional sports.

Self-serving bias may be rational and positive, maintaining our self-esteem and a positive view of ourselves. Conversely, it can hide reality (and give referees and umpires a more draining job) or cause us to reject negative but objective feedback.

Self-serving bias is a form of attribution bias where we misattribute behaviours or events to characteristics rather than circumstances or vice versa.

Self-serving bias is covered nicely (pdf) by Donelson R. Forsyth in the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, 2nd Edition.

Self-serving bias

It's something I like to keep in mind after a big workout, particularly on the legs — get the weight off them!

Stand sit lie

Physics envy refers to the wish that a field of study would turn out to be as precise, as predictable, as repeatable, and as amenable to modeling and theory that replicates practice as physics is.

As it turns out, most fields that involve people — such as economics and the social sciences — are rarely so tidy and orderly and neatly mathematically modeled. They are instead usually messy, uncertain, and filled with context, nuance, history and confounding factors such that making sense of them in broadly applicable ways is rather difficult. And while we do our best to quantify and identify effects, or cleanly isolate our cognitive biases or our quirks of behavioural psychology, rarely are they able to live up to the purest standards of physics. It's enough to turn one green with envy.

It reminded me of the best laid plans of our Saturday sports coaches turning for their substitutes to execute their plans, only to find the players climbing trees in the adjacent field.

Physics Envy

The Fun Scale categorizes different types of fun experiences into distinct levels. It consists of three main types of fun: Type 1, Type 2, and Type 3. The concept behind the Fun Scale is that not all fun is created equal, and some types may be more rewarding or memorable than others.

My brother, who learned it from a mountain guide, introduced me to the Fun Scale. Before then, I used to think that fun was just fun. But the Fun Scale opened my eyes to the fact that there are levels and types of fun, each with its own characteristics. 

So, what are the three types of fun in the Fun Scale?

Type 1 fun is the most straightforward type of fun. It’s the kind of activity that is fun while you’re doing it, and it stays fun when you think back on it. Picture something like eating ice cream on a hot day, riding a roller coaster, or skiing with lifts to whisk you right back to the top. Type 1 fun is carefree, pleasurable in the moment, and provides uncomplicated enjoyment.

I'm sure you can think of a million more.

Type 2 fun: hurts a bit to do, but fun in retrospect

On the other hand, Type 2 fun is a bit trickier. It's the kind of activity where you may not have a blast while you're doing it—it's probably hard work or even painful. However, once it's over, you look back on it with a sense of achievement, and it becomes fun in retrospect.

This is the sort of enjoyment you get from something like running a marathon or climbing a mountain. At the time, you might question why you're doing it. Brendan Leonard in Ultra-something relates the joke, "You know what I like most about climbing a mountain? It feels so good when I stop."

You'll often think of Type 2 fun as ultimately more fulfilling and often somewhat addictive than Type I fun.

Cycling a mountain stage of the Tour de France

Cold water swimming (or maybe an ice mile)

Type 3 fun: not fun to do, not fun in retrospect, but makes a great story

Type 3 fun is usually type 1 or 2 fun that went wrong. Though it was supposed to be fun, things actually got a little hairy. Perhaps a trip started out like good Type 2 fun, but then you got lost, or it got dark, and it got cold, or things got much more serious than intended. Maybe you had to be rescued.

This kind of fun is not fun while it's happening. It's probably not even fun when thinking back on it. But Type 3 fun sure makes a great story when you make it back, and, well, life is made up of great stories, so perhaps it wasn't so bad after all.

Not practicing your kitchen table survival skills

There are rumours of Type 4 fun and Type 5 fun, but having heard some good stories of Type 3 fun and created a few myself, I can't say I recommend them =)

The Fun Scale, adventure and fulfilment: why we crave Type 2 and Type 3 fun

In our podcast discussing the Fun Scale, Tom, identified Rob and I as Type 2 Fun junkies. There's something intriguingly addictive about setting yourself difficult challenges, pushing through hardship, and emerging out the other side. Rob and I have signed up for a challenging endurance event pretty much every year for the last decade or so. Every single time the event on the day is really hard. And yet, once the immediate memories subside we find ourselves signing up for something similar next year.

Even if it's not you, I'm sure you probably know someone who seems to keep pushing themselves to do things that they don't seem to enjoy. It reminds me of Calvin imitating his dad in Calvin and Hobbes: "Calvin, go do something you hate! Being miserable builds character!"

Type 2 fun and type 3 fun, to some extent, help build character, life experiences and the stories that shape us and are fun to tell others. The sense of accomplishment and unforgettable stories that emerge from these experiences outweigh the discomfort in the long run.

Type 1 fun is fun when you do it and fun to remember.

Type 2 fun is not so fun when you do it, but it is fun in retrospect and is the most fulfilling.

And Type 3 fun is not fun in the moment or when you remember it—but it makes the best stories!

I have seen people write about Type A fun, Type B fun and Type C fun, or Type I fun, Type II fun and Type III fun, but I learned it as 1, 2 and 3.

The Fun Scale is probably my favourite idea that didn't make it into my new book. If you like this one, you'll love the book Big Ideas Little Pictures.

Kaffikok - the distance you can go before needing a coffee

The fun scale: understanding the types of fun

Nine-enders are people in the last year of a decade, say, 29, 39, 49, 59. Adam Alter and Hal Hershfield, who introduced the term, propose that as we approach the end of a decade we are more likely to do a kind of "meaning audit" of our lives. And in the years just before the end of a decade, if we may have fallen short or feel there’s something else we want to accomplish, we’re much more likely to do it then than in any other year of a decade.

In practice, as Dan Pink shared in his book When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing, these are, therefore, the times when we’re more likely to do something extreme like running a marathon for the first time and, sadly, also committing suicide.

Read more in Dan Pink’s Atlantic article: You’re Most Likely to Do Something Extreme Right Before You Turn 30, Dan Pink, The Atlantic

When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing, Dan Pink

People search for meaning when they approach a new decade in chronological age, PNAS, vol. 111 no. 48, Alter and Hershfield, 2014.

This sketch, updated and polished, features with a number of others in my book Big Ideas Little Pictures.

9-Enders (nine-enders)

What's the difference between parachutes, paragliders, hang gliders, kitesurfs, parasails or parakites and wingsuits? They're all fun ways to get around and all very easy to mix up with each other.

Each form can be distinguished by a combination of how you launch, whether it has a rigid or flexible structure, and whether you travel over water, land or through the air.

A paragliding flight I once experienced was the closest I've ever felt to the joy of flying, even more so than when I jumped out of a plane.

You might also look out for para motors—a paraglider with a big fan on it—and winging, a cross between windsurfing and kitesurfing, where you hold directly onto a wing-shaped sail and let it woosh you over the water.

Know your flying fabrics

OK, this is not rocket science, but growing up, I tended to use kayak and canoe interchangeably out of ignorance. There are so many neat hybrid ways to get on the water now that nothing is as cut-and-dried as it once was. However, if you check the attributes in the sketch, you can be pretty confident you’ll get it right.

This sketch features in my book Big Ideas Little Pictures

Kayak vs Canoe: What's the difference?

One of the best virtuous circles. One of my more surprising recent reads has been Novak Djokovic’s Serve to Win about diet, discipline, going gluten-free and physical and mental excellence. The guy certainly knows about excellence and it was neat to learn his philosophy on eating — the book contains recipes — and taking care of yourself including some serious respect for sleep. This sketchplanation is just one of the reason’s why. Since reading it I’ve put an alarm on every night to remind me to respect sleep. Night!

The virtuous cycle of exercise and sleep

Swimrun is basically navigating from start to finish through water and over land carrying only the gear you need. What you start with you have to finish with. You will run in your wetsuit and swim in your running shoes. The world championship courses are run by Ötillö. Ötillö means island-to-island in Swedish after the original course created from a drunken bet.

A beautiful aspect of it is that it's a team sport, both run and swum in pairs. Many choose to tether together which dramatically on the swims and keeps you both close.

In 2016 I teamed up with Rob Bell and took part in Ötillö’s UK swimrun in the Isles of Scilly. The Scilly event was a swimrun paradise. Check out the course, and the amazing event photos. The place is gorgeous, go visit sometime. And get into swimrun it’s awesome!

Swimrun

Swim a mile in water 5C or less. The ice mile is hardcore. Respect for crazy, amazing people like Lewis Pugh. Or if you’re in London, check out The Swimmer.

The ice mile

In his post on Zanshin, a state of relaxed alertness, James Clear writes:

Great archery masters often teach that “everything is aiming.” Where you place your feet, how you hold the bow, the way you breathe during the release of the arrow—it all determines the end result.

I like the idea of zanshin, but I like more the insight that everything is aiming. How every piece of your attitude, preparation, body and state go towards influencing how you perform. No detail too small. Tennis coaches, for example, reinforce being in the ready position before a ball even comes your way. Experience teaches you it does matter.

The concept reminds me of one of my favourite quotes which I think pretty much sums up a great approach to life as a whole and also how I view luck:

I will study and get ready, and perhaps my chance will come.
—Abraham Lincoln

Everything is aiming

Somewhat improbable name for a simple training technique alternating fast and slower sections. Great if you’re short on time.

Fartlek

Means one in front of another, as opposed to side-by-side. It comes from a tandem harness with two horses pulling with one in front of the other. So technically no matter how many people you put on a bike, if they are in a straight line, they are still in tandem. As opposed to a bike where you sit side-by-side, also known as a sociable.

I had to check this one out as on Friday I’m doing a somewhat crazy cycle on a home-made 6-man bike (all sitting in tandem) from London to Amsterdam for a great cause - KEEN London who provide one-to-one sports for children with special needs. Any donation you can make will make a huge difference to a small organisation. With just one day left, please donate here if you can

In tandem

Surfing is all about catching the perfect wave, and the type of surf break plays a big role in shaping those waves. Surf breaks are influenced by the seabed, coastline, and water depth. While no two waves are the same, surf breaks can generally be grouped into three main types: beach breaks, reef breaks, and point breaks.

Beach breaks occur where waves form over sandy bottoms near the shore. These are often the go-to for beginner surfers because the sand offers a softer, more forgiving landing compared to reefs or rocks. Another advantage is that you usually don’t have to paddle far to catch waves at a beach break. However, the wave conditions can vary frequently as shifting sands reshape the underwater landscape.

Reef breaks are formed where waves break over a coral reef or rocky seabed. These can be located close to shore or further out at sea, depending on the reef’s position. Reef breaks are known for producing highly consistent and well-shaped waves, making them a favourite among experienced surfers. But be warned—wipeouts can be dangerous due to the shallow and sharp nature of the reef.

Point breaks form when waves wrap around a headland or rocky outcrop and peel along the coast. These breaks can create some of the longest, most rideable waves, often extending into a sheltered bay. The downside? Navigating rocks can be tricky, and the waves might require a bit more paddling effort. For surfers chasing long, clean rides, though, point breaks are hard to beat.

I updated this sketch from the original hand-drawn version for my book Big Ideas Little Pictures

The 3 Main Types of Surf Breaks Explained

This lot will have you set: house key, Boris bike key, Oyster card, Credit card, a fiver, and a phone for maps and photos. Now you can go anywhere.

London running kit

I'm not advocating it. It just seems to always be the case.

Rule 1 of indoor games: Play until something gets broken

Unfortunately, a site I really respect, Swim Smooth, recommends avoiding glide, though I do think that a good 80% of the swimmers I see could do with extending the reach of and calming down their front crawl stroke at least some. Bottom line: not too much glide and avoid dead spots.

Swimming is awesome. It seems so simple, but there’s always so much to learn.  (disclosure: I’m surely an overglider)

Improve your front crawl

In other news, I think the offside rule should be changed in football so that the goalkeeper doesn’t count when evaluating offside. Always seems stupid to me when the standard definition involves ‘the last defender’ but the technical definition is the 'second-to-last defender’ because the goalkeeper is usually one of those. Let’s just not count the goalkeeper and make the thing simpler.

The offside rule

Pulling along the bottom forces the flukes on the anchor to dig in. I think anchors are quite clever really.

Set an anchor

A mnemonic that has helped me many times: RICE—Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation—is a simple and effective way to treat joint injuries. Whether it’s a sprain or strain, this first aid method reduces pain and swelling to promote recovery. Keep this handy memory aid in mind for when you need it most.

Repair injured joints with RICE

If there are only two people in the changing room, your lockers will be next to each other.

The law of lockers

A worthy ball juggling challenge next time you’re messing around with a football.

The magnificent seven

These are the two things I always look out for when setting up for pool, the line and the C. The rest falls into place.

Set up for pool

The real spoil sports are those who remind you that you’re in a game at all.

How to be a spoil sport

By moving the rubbing from sock-to-foot, to sock-to-sock.

Two socks helps prevent blisters

If you stay close it’s just too tempting to cut it short. Give yourself no choice while you still feel good.

Run further by running far away

Couple of tips for front-crawl drills: twist your torso on each stroke, raise your elbow high and tight to the body, brush your ear with your hand as it passes.

Rotate your elbow, not your hand

Adopted from Brain Training for Runners. 

Be fanatical about refuelling after exercise

Cycle with hats not hoods

The best stuff I’ve learned from the chapter ‘Pursuing the perfect stride’ in Brain Training for Runners by Matt Fitzgerald and by reading Born to Run.

Sport sketches