Paul Mc Namara's WorldView

I recently completed a 3-weekend skiing course based on the principles of Parallel Skiing out of Munich. It was a super-enjoyable course with great instructors who were incredibly patient and good-humoured. It was well-organised with every detail was taken care of like a different set of skis for each days tuition (the idea is to start on very short skis and learn how to stop using parallel movement and then progress to longer skis). The next course begins next January but if you send an email to , you will be contacted in November next about the upcoming course.

The Guardian’s Jon Henley tries Michael Phelps’ diet on video.

Take a look at the Michael Phelps diet. You really can eat what you want provided that you have 6 hours a day to work out. Pizza, pasta, french toast, pancakes…..

I’m a big Villa fan but this story really makes me proud of the club. I’m going to get one of those shirts for next season.

Normally, I would jump at the chance of a ticket for a Bayern game. Not tonight. The race for the Bundesliga title is already over and while the game is interesting for the relegation battle that Armenia Bielefeld are involved in, I’m just not interested enough to spend €20 to see it.

Trappatoni has been chosen as the new Ireland manager. At least he seems much better than all of the other rumoured candidates and should provide some interesting times for Irish football in the next couple of years.

See the result here.

Nice result for Ireland last night although there was so many chances for both sides during the game, I wonder how useful an exercise it was. When the game was at 4-0, I thought it would be funny if there was a repeat of the incident in the Sweden – Denmark game where a supporter came on and tried to hit the referee. The match was abandoned and the score set at 3-0. If a supporter did something similar, they would have improved on the final result. At the end of the game, I saw that they played in a different stadium to the Sweden game with a big running track around the pitch. Anyone trying to get onto the pitch would have a difficult task in getting onto the pitch.

From Spiegel

The football World Cup from June 9 to July 9 last year appears to have sparked a baby boom in the host country Germany, where hospitals are reporting a marked rise in imminent births nine months after the tournament, remembered here as a month-long fairy-tale of sunshine, parties and soccer success.

Mourinho has made an apology. What is the world coming to?