What does \"greatness\" mean? The answer is not as simple as you might think.
In this episode of Gaeilge Thar Lear, I follow one thread from the All-Ireland Championship... through the World Cup... to the Tour de France... from Joe Canning to Tadej Pogacar... and eventually to a question with no simple answer.
An episode about memory, about time, and about the person you were when you witnessed greatness. About why it is objective and subjective and everything in between — and about the uncomfortable questions that sometimes come with it.
Post-Production Notes
This episode falls in a weird space where the story came to me and was then developed (pulled at) at the start of July and then written down over a couple of days... the episode itself took a while to record - again over maybe three or four days - so yes, this easily could have explored \"Mayo 4 Sam\", Limerick hurlers in more detail, more on the World Cup, and more with Tadej and the Tour. Those are the difficulties when writing and responding to \"current\" events, while also \"bulk recording\"...
The idea with Tadej is that he has been truly exceptional - a bolt from the blue - since the very start of his career, whereas typically in the history of cheats they take some time to fall into that pattern - riders have said it takes \"1000 days of losing\" before you resort to the \"dark arts\" - so three years - in comparison, Pogacar won his first Tour in 2020 in his second professional season as a 21 year old... Furthermore, he races and wins everything throughout the year - from February to October - typically dopers would have downtime to get their blood bags, etc., organised - he does not follow that pattern. I do not think I outlined it all that well when I listened back to the pod, so hopefully this explainer makes it a bit clearer.
Aspects of this could have been improved and explained better - the thread is not perfect - but I thought it was better to get it out there rather than endless rewrites.... so it is not perfect, but sure what is?
Anyway, I hope ye enjoy this one.
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Cad is brí le \"greatness\"? Ní hé an freagra atá chomh simplí agus a cheapfá.
San eagrán seo de Gaeilge Thar Lear, lean mé snáth amháin ó Chraobh na hÉireann... tríd an gCorn na Domhanda... go dtí an Tour de France... ó Joe Canning go dtí Tadej Pogacar... agus ar deireadh go dtí ceist nach bhfuil freagra simplí uirthi.
Is eagrán é faoi chuimhne, faoin am, agus faoin duine a bhí tú nuair a chonaic tú greatness. Faoin difríocht idir í a fheiceáil agus í a mhothú — agus nach ionann an dá rud i gcónaí. Agus faoi na ceisteanna crua a thagann léi uaireanta.
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