The Beijing Olympics are over. A thought or two popped up over the weekend while I was attending a party. Olympic Sex. Holy crap you know they’re having it. I posted an article on it last Olympics and meant to do the required searches this time around to see what news agency would have the nerve to give it up again. I managed not to look during the weeks in question but the exact article I was looking for just fell into my lap.

Over at Times Online UK, former Olympian Matthew Syed spills all on the happenings between the Olympic Villages sheets.

Before we get to that, however, it is worth noting an intriguing dichotomy between the sexes in respect of all this coupling. The chaps who win gold medals – even those as geeky as Michael Phelps – are the principal objects of desire for many female athletes. There is something about sporting success that makes a certain type of woman go crazy – smiling, flirting and sometimes even grabbing at the chaps who have done the business in the pool or on the track. An Olympic gold medal is not merely a route to fame and fortune; it is also a surefire ticket to writhe.

But – and this is the thing – success does not work both ways. Gold-medal winning female athletes are not looked upon by male athletes with any more desire than those who flunked out in the first round. It is sometimes even considered a defect, as if there is something downright unfeminine about all that striving, fist pumping and incontinent sweating. Sport, in this respect, is a reflection of wider society, where male success is a universal desirable whereas female success is sexually ambiguous. I do not condone this phenomenon, merely note it.

Well that’s unfortunate. All you lady medal holders be sure to shoot me an email. To talk, you know? We’ll discuss the unfairness of the male dominated society and drink much wine while doing it. Maybe afterwards, some coffee?

Misty May, you’re married and all so…. keep it discreet.

But let us get back to all the sex going down in the village. One possible explanation centres on the fact that Olympic athletes have to display an unnatural (and, it has to be said, wholly unhealthy) level of self-discipline in the build-up to big competitions. How else is this going to manifest itself than with a volcanic release of pent-up hedonism?

At least someone else noted that there’s a cost for all that determination.

(via timesonline uk)