Ditch the tech like Anna did to strike gold

Purity and simplicity are not among the nouns most commonly associated with Rugby Union in its current state of confusion: prop forwards were routinely described as “simple” back in the day, but that was a different thing altogether.

- CHRIS HEWETT

So we must find our sporting Edens where we can. The best place right now? Tokyo.

A few hours after the Lions’ victory over the Springboks in the Test series opener in Cape Town, a low-profile Austrian cyclist by the name of Anna Kiesenhofer – a rider without a professional contract, it should be emphasised – won the Olympic Women’s Road Race by riding away from the full-time professionals in the opening moments and remaining in a different postcode for the next four hours.

None of the favourites noticed until it was too late. Indeed, the silver medallist and pre-race favourite, Annemiek van Vleuten of the Netherlands, didn’t notice at all. When she crossed the line second, Van Vleuten assumed she was first and celebrated accordingly. Oops.

This kind of thing happens when robo-minded sportspeople are stripped of the technological support on which they have come to depend – there was no in-race radio communication system, in this case – and are suddenly left to work things out on their Jack Joneses.

If Van Vleuten fell short on that score, Kiesenhofer was just about the last person on earth to mess up the calculations. She does, after all, hold a PhD and a post-doctoral fellowship in mathematical physics.

“In the most important race, you’re not allowed to ride with communication,” said the silver medallist, through gritted teeth. “It should have made the race more interesting, but instead it made it more confusing.”