Olympic Shorts: Discus champion's celebrations thrown off course
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Your support makes all the difference.The German discus thrower Robert Harting got a true London welcome on Tuesday night after having his accreditation stolen and being forced to sleep in a train station. Despite having won the gold medal hours earlier, he was denied entry to the Athletes' Village. "Puuh, I just got robbed while I did some work to please athletic fans! I lost my accreditation for Olympic village! – no entrance," he tweeted. He later told the German newspaper Bild that his belongings were stolen as he celebrated on the cruise ship MS Deutschland on the Thames.
North Korea: don't call us naughty
North Korea's unintentionally hilarious Central News Agency has attacked an Australian newspaper over a joke about the isolated regime. The mX published a medal table in which South and North Korea were referred to as "Nice Korea" and "Naughty Korea". The agency was apoplectic. "This is a bullying act little short of insulting the Olympic spirit of solidarity, friendship and progress and politicising sports," it said From its position of moral authority, the Agency cried: "Media are obliged to lead the public in today's highly civilised world."
And how did the Agency educate its citizens yesterday? With a story describing Japan as a "corrupt country whose moral vulgarity has reached the extreme phase".
A genuine multi-eventer
The press and public have hailed our Olympic heroes, but one decathlete moonlights as a crime-fighting, cape-donning champion for justice. Team GB's Daniel Awde was a running body double for Chris Evans in last year's blockbuster Captain America: The First Avenger.
Country of the day: Australia
Sports minister Kate Lundy has admitted she will have to do an Olympics forfeit after losing a bet over who would finish higher up the medals table between Britain and Australia. Lundy will don a Team GB shirt and row a length of the Eton Dorney course.
In the losing lanes
Almost 2,500 drivers have been fined £130 for using the Olympic Games lanes.
The 30 miles of lanes, used to transport athletes, officials and the media, were brought in on 25 July and for the first six days only warnings were issued while drivers became used to the system, Transport for London (TfL) said.
There has been a 98 per cent compliance rate but 2,400 fines, totalling £312,000, have been issued since the start of the month.
Stat of the day: £15
The price of one drink in London clubs, and enough to put off Canadian rower Darcy Marquardt. "There was a lot more free booze in Beijing," she complained.
Kiwis' party is a real blast
Three hundred people were evacuated from New Zealand's Olympic hospitality house last night after gas canisters being used to cook a barbecue at the back of Kiwi House, near King's Cross, exploded. No one was injured.
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