The Olympic flame is a symbol used in the Olympic movement. It is also a symbol of continuity between ancient and modern games. Several months before the Olympic Games, the Olympic flame is lit at Olympia, Greece. This ceremony starts the Olympic torch relay, which formally ends with the lighting of the Olympic cauldron during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. The flame then continues to burn in the cauldron for the duration of the Games, until it is extinguished during the Olympic closing ceremony.
The Queen's Baton Relay is a relay around the world held prior to the beginning of the Commonwealth Games. The Baton carries a message from the Head of the Commonwealth, currently Queen Elizabeth II. The Relay traditionally begins at Buckingham Palace in London as a part of the city's Commonwealth Day festivities. The Queen entrusts the baton to the first relay runner. At the Opening Ceremony of the Games, the final relay runner hands the baton back to the Queen or her representative, who reads the message aloud to officially open the Games. The Queen's Baton Relay is similar to the Olympic Torch Relay.
The 2008 Summer Olympics torch relay was run from March 24 until August 8, 2008, prior to the 2008 Summer Olympics, with the theme of "one world, one dream". Plans for the relay were announced on April 26, 2007, in Beijing, China. The relay, also called by the organizers as the "Journey of Harmony", lasted 129 days and carried the torch 137,000 km (85,000 mi) – the longest distance of any Olympic torch relay since the tradition was started ahead of the 1936 Summer Olympics.
Rebecca Adlington is a British former competitive swimmer who specialised in freestyle events in international competition. She won two gold medals at the 2008 Summer Olympics in the 400-metre freestyle and 800-metre freestyle, breaking the 19-year-old world record of Janet Evans in the 800-metre final. Adlington was Britain's first Olympic swimming champion since 1988, and the first British swimmer to win two Olympic gold medals since 1908. After winning her first World Championship gold over 800 metres in 2011, along with silver in the 400 metres at the same meet, she won bronze medals in both the women's 400-metre and 800-metre freestyle events in the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.
The 2010 Winter Olympics Torch Relay was a 106-day run, from October 30, 2009 until February 12, 2010, prior to the 2010 Winter Olympics. Plans for the relay were originally announced November 21, 2008 by the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (VANOC). Communities were initially informed in June 2008, but the locations were not announced for "security reasons". Exact routes were later announced several weeks before the start of the torch relay.
Tyler Rix is a British singer songwriter, saxophonist & international model. Rix signed to Universal Music Group and his debut album, Ascent, was released in February 2009 reaching number one in the Classics & Jazz Charts.
The 2010 Winter Paralympics Torch Relay was a 10-day event leading up to the 2010 Winter Paralympic Games in Vancouver. It began on March 3, 2010, in Ottawa and concluded at the Games' opening ceremony on March 12. Held entirely within Canada, the host country, it has been described by the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games as "an important event to connect Canadians to the Games", by "demonstrating the fire inside each individual and how it inspires others".
The 2012 Summer Olympics torch relay was run from 19 May until 27 July, prior to the London 2012 Summer Olympics. The torch bearer selection process was announced on 18 May 2011.
George G. Weedon was a British gymnast who competed at two Summer Olympic Games. In 1948 in London he participated in the Men's Individual All-Around, Team All-Around, Floor Exercise, Horse Vault, Parallel Bars, Horizontal Bar, Rings, and Pommelled Horse, placing 12th out of 16 nations in the team competition, and no higher than 38th individually. In 1952 in Helsinki he competed in the same events, finishing 21st out of 23 countries in the team tournament and no higher than 116th in the individual ones. A lifelong friend was fellow competitor Frank Turner.
The 2010 Summer Youth Olympics torch relay was run from 23 July until 14 August 2010, prior to the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics held in Singapore. The torch relay was termed The Journey of the Youth Olympic Flame, or JYOF, by the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee (SYOGOC). It began with the traditional flame lighting ceremony in Olympia, Greece on 23 July 2010, and was followed by a 13-day round the world tour across five cities, namely Berlin, Germany; Dakar, Senegal; Mexico City, Mexico; Auckland, New Zealand; and Seoul, South Korea. Following the international leg, the torch arrived in host city Singapore on 6 August 2010 for the domestic leg.
The 2012 Summer Paralympics torch relay ran from 22 to 29 August 2012, prior to the 2012 Summer Paralympics. The relay began with four flames kindled on the highest peaks of the four nations of the United Kingdom, which were then brought to their respective capital cities for special events honouring the upcoming Games. For the relay proper, the four national flames were united at a ceremony in Stoke Mandeville in preparation for a final 92-mile (148-kilometre) journey to London.
Emily Diamond is a British track and field athlete, who competes in the 200 metres and 400 metres. Diamond came to prominence in her breakout season of 2016 when, following her first win at the British Championships over the 400 metres distance, she collected a gold medal in the 4 x 400 metres relay at the 2016 European Athletics Championships as part of the Great Britain team, followed by a bronze in the same discipline at the 2016 Summer Olympics.
Jade Helen Bailey is an English-born Jamaican professional footballer who plays for Liverpool. She previously played for Arsenal, Chelsea and Reading. She is a former England youth international. She was involved in the final stages of the 2012 Summer Olympics torch relay.
Episode 4466 of the BBC soap opera EastEnders was broadcast on BBC One on 23 July 2012, between 9pm and 9.30pm. It was written by Matt Evans, directed by Clive Arnold, and executively produced by Lorraine Newman. It included seven minutes of live footage, during which the character of Billy Mitchell, played by Perry Fenwick, carried the Olympic Torch as an official torch bearer as part of the official torch relay for the London 2012 Olympic Games, and Lola Pearce, played by Danielle Harold, gave birth to her daughter. The storyline for the episode was announced in November 2011, with the fact that Lola would give birth being reported in July 2012. The episode received positive reviews, with Karen Edwards from Heat calling it "special" and praising Harold's performance, and Jane Rackham from the Radio Times calling it "highly topical", though Boyd Hilton from Heat felt that Billy's torch bearing was a "gimmick" and the whole episode should have been live. It was watched by an average of 7.32 million people on its initial broadcast. It was accompanied by a special, one-off BBC Red Button episode called "Billy's Olympic Nightmare". The episode received an All About Soap award nomination for Best Episode, under the name "Billy and the Olympic Torch", and a British Soap Award nomination for "Spectacular Scene of the Year", both in 2013.
Georgina Sophie Twigg is an English international field hockey player and an Olympic gold medalist at the 2016 Summer Olympics.
Adriana Dos Santos Araújo is a Brazilian professional boxer. As an amateur she won a bronze medal in the lightweight division at the 2012 Olympics and qualified for the 2016 Olympics at the same weight.
The 2000 Summer Olympics torch relay was the transferral of the Olympic Flame to Sydney, Australia, that built up to the 2000 Summer Olympics. The torch travelled to various island nations as part of a tour of Oceania before beginning an extensive journey around Australia. For the first time the Flame was taken underwater, with a special flare-like torch taken on a dive down to the Great Barrier Reef. At the opening ceremony the cauldron was lit by Aboriginal athlete Cathy Freeman.
The London 2012 Olympic Torch was carried around the UK for 70 days in the London 2012 Torch Relay, from 19 May to 27 July 2012.
The 1984 Summer Olympics torch relay was run from May 8 until July 28, prior to the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. The route covered around 15,000 kilometres (9,300 mi) across the United States and involved over 3,600 torchbearers. Rafer Johnson lit the cauldron at the opening ceremony. The Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee (LAOOC) tasked Burson-Marsteller, the public relations agency of AT&T, with the organization of the relay. The Youth Legacy Kilometer pioneered the idea of runners being nominated by the public.
Raymond Leslie Puckett is a former New Zealand distance runner, who represented his country at the Olympic Games in 1960 and 1964, and at the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games. Coached by Arthur Lydiard, Puckett was the first New Zealander to complete a marathon in under two hours and 30 minutes.
