(But not this time.  A rare success. A piece I wrote a few years ago)

Not that it’s a recognised event, of course, but I’m contemplating entering our Tuesday Pub Quiz Team for the 2020 Olympics.

Bear with me while I digress a little but at the 2012 London Olympics the Men’s 4 x 100m Relay Team was disqualified for dropping the baton, handing it over outside the transition area, running out of their lanes, mooning at the judges or some other infringement. Likewise, they were disqualified (DQ) or did not finish (DNF) at the 2008, 2000 and 1996 Olympics.  But wait, they were also DQ’d or DNF’d at the World Championships of 2015, 2013, 2011, 2003 and 2001.  See a picture emerging?

Now I’m not suggesting that the Jamaicans and Americans are pooping their lycra at the prospect of facing our boys but it will certainly give them a “chuck on” to know in advance that we won’t finish.

It is an arresting fact that our boys have failed to finish in 4 of the 6 Olympics since 1996 and in 5 of the 8 World Championships since 2001.  At the Football World Cup the joke is that Uruguay are known as “Ten Man Uruguay” because of their propensity for getting sent off for dirty play.  I would suggest that the Men’s 4 x 100m Relay Team should enter under the revised name of GB (DQ) to save the scoreboard man the bother of looking for the letters.

So (and you may now be ahead of me) it has occurred to me that the selectors would be better off entering our quiz team in the event. We could walk around the track, hand the baton over to each other at a standstill and, provided we were not too drunk, keep in our lane.

We would unquestionably finish last unless, of course, the GB(DQ) 4 x 100m Relay Team had entered as well.