All Hail the 2012 Medalists!

The 2012 Olympic Medals are now residing alongside some pretty other important pieces of hardware.

Competing at the Olympics is pretty dog-gone fantastic. Winning a medal at the Olympics is even more fantastic. To know that prior to the medal ceremony, your Olympic medal–your Olympic medal–was housed alongside England’s Crown Jewels inside the Tower of London….Well, that’s just supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!

The London 2012 Olympic Committee recently announced that all medals (gold, silver, and bronze) will be housed in a secret vault within the Tower of London. The precious metals (and medals) will be heavily guarded by the Queen’s Yeomen Warders, aka “Beefeaters” to us tourists. No chance of stealing an Olympic medal with this protection!

How appropriate that such extraordinary measures are being taken with the 2012 medals. After all, those who win gold are, in a sense, king or queen of their sport. The Olympic medal ceremony is, in its own way, a very regal occasion where athletes are anointed and crowned the best, the supreme.

I loved what London Mayor Boris Johnson had to say about the storing of the 2012 medals in such a historic repository:

For centuries the Tower of London has protected some of this country’s greatest treasures so there can be no better sanctuary for the 2012 medals – the most precious possession any athlete could hope to possess – than at this world-famous iconic landmark.

Although American, Olympic Games held in countries with such history add an extra sparkle to the Games. It just makes an already special sporting event all the more momentous. The 2012 Games will be no exception.

Faster, Higher, Stronger.