Life

Sleb Safari: Katie Price has her sights set on an Olympic medal

Maeve Connoly

Maeve Connolly

Maeve is the deputy digital editor at The Irish News. She has worked for the company since 2000.

Katie Price and quite possibly the horse she intends taking to the Olympics
Katie Price and quite possibly the horse she intends taking to the Olympics Katie Price and quite possibly the horse she intends taking to the Olympics

THE Pricey has a dream; a dream of competing at the Olympics, and if anyone can turn a pipe dream into a business venture/reality TV show/eighth autobiography, it's Katie Price.

Katie wants to join Team GB's equestrian team and does at least have decades of riding experience. With The Pricey there was always the chance that she'd choose something like the pole vault despite having a fear of heights or volleyball when she's allergic to sand.

Katie first announced she wanted to take part in the Olympics in 2008, but London 2012 has been and gone, so too has Rio 2016 and now Tokyo 2020 has joined them. Paris 2024 it is, then.

Getting to the Olympics is all about commitment, sacrifice, training and injuries and if anyone can handle the pain it's The Pricey. This is a woman who's made cosmetic surgery her personal semi-Olympic event. Just because it's cosmetic doesn't make it fun.

Cynics might think that at 43 Katie has left it a little late to start her Olympics 'journey', but why the beep shouldn't she have a go? Sleb Safari managed to catch precisely two-and-a-half minutes of the Tokyo Olympics. By coincidence it was an equestrian event and the man, called Andrew, who led the Australian team to silver was 62 and competing in his eighth Olympics.

Sleb Safari asked Google about Tokyo Olympians nearing retirement age and was informed that Australia also boasted the oldest competitor of this games – 66-year-old Mary Hanna. Brava Mary.

Is equestrian the only discipline where you don't need to have Tigger's bounce to qualify? Apparently not. Google also offered up 59-year-old Argentinian sailor Santiago Raul Lange who was competing in his sixth games. In 2015 Santiago had surgery for lung cancer which saw him lose 80 per cent of one lung and the following year he won gold at Rio, so what's your excuse for skipping ParkRun?

There was also a 52-year-old shooter in Tokyo, Nino Salukvadze, who first competed for the Soviet Union and now represents Georgia, plus 46-year-old gymnast Oksana Chusovitina who is, let's be honest, astonishing. Skateboarding also turned up two 46-year-old men.

Katie can rule out boxing as her sport because you must have turned 18 but be no older than 40. Sleb Safari is devastated to find itself ineligible too, particularly when it is so handy with a skipping rope which is all the training boxers do, right?

The babies of this Olympics were 12-year-old Hend Zaza from Syria, who is a table tennis whizz,12-year-old skateboarder Kokona Hiraki from Japan and 13-year-old Sky Brown from Team GB.

They are little superstars who deserve endless admiration but Sleb Safari much prefers the Pricey Method – don't waste your youth training for the Olympics; wait, take early retirement and join the national equestrian team then.

Here's to seeing Katie on a horse and on a podium one of these days.

Social Media Smut

Lizzo is done with people who can't social distance. Picture from Instagram
Lizzo is done with people who can't social distance. Picture from Instagram Lizzo is done with people who can't social distance. Picture from Instagram

LIZZO is a straight-talking lady and she's getting sick, sore and tired of people wanting to hug and kiss her in the middle of a pandemic. So she had this to say on Instagram:

"I don't care who you are. You could be the nicest person. You could be vaccinated. You could be quadruple vaccinated. If you see me, please! Give me 6 feet. This s**t is coming back. Covid. Aaand people being real sloppy with personal space.

"I'm not trying to catch nothing. I don't even wanna catch feelings... You think I wanna catch Covid? So at this point I'm going to be slightly rude about it.

"Don't think, "Ah, she a celebrity, she thinks she's all that!" It's not that, boo-boo. You know what I think I am? Healthy. You know what I think I am? Covid-free. You know what I think I am? Full of Vitamin D and Vitamin C. You know what I think I am? Safe for my friends and family to be around and my co-workers and my teammates. That's who I think I am.

"So if y'all see me in the street, come up on me, want to hug, want to shake my hand, want to kiss me on the cheek, ZON'T ZO IT. ZOOON'T ZOOOO IT. Cause I ain't trying to catch this virus that's coming back."

Jack Whitehall's non-showbiz injury

Jack Whitehall
Jack Whitehall Jack Whitehall

AND so to Jack Whitehall who has suffered the most non-showbiz injury imaginable. Remember when Tom Cruise broke his ankle when he jumped and crashed into the side of a building while filming a stunt for one of the Mission Impossible films? You do? Well, it was nothing like that.

Jack dislocated a rib watching 50 First Dates on an exercise bike in between filming scenes for Jungle Cruise.

"I was in my own gym and I dislocated a rib. I was on the exercise bike and I felt something go in my back. I ended up in ER," he told Metro.

"They asked me if I was in an unnatural position on the bike and I was actually, because they had a Drew Barrymore film on the screen and I was trying to read the subtitles. I was there for 40 minutes watching this film."

If this is what Jack is prepared to suffer to watch 50 First Dates imagine the pain he'd endure for ET.