Agent Palmer

While the Olympics have been a bit hit or miss for me, less of it has to do with the network and more of it has to do with time zones, I have caught some of it, and of course, the USA’s win in the Gold Cup has continued the summer of soccer, but sports is not the only thing I have been consuming this summer.

I have been watching and listening to other things as well, plus my regular podcast habit (with a few new ones I’ll be mentioning), and my reading, means that there is literally always something to consume.

Pete Conrad’s biography is not a cookie-cutter story. Then again, there was nothing cookie-cutter about him. He was, as his headstone implies, “An Original.” Co-written by his second wife Nancy Conrad and Howard A. Klausner, the writer of Space Cowboys, this biography is presented cinematically, but it would have been a thrilling ride anyway.

Honestly, if ever you needed proof that you can have fun and enjoy a serious job with a smile on your face, then Pete Conrad is exhibit A for astronauts.

184 riders took off from Brest on June 26th to start the 2021 edition of the Tour de France. Three weeks later, 141 riders took the start to complete the Tour in Paris on the Champs-Elysees.

What took place during the stages in-between, may not have been unprecedented, but it certainly was compelling. Here is my recap of the 5 most important takeaways from this year’s race.

Is the summer of 2021 the greatest Summer of Soccer the world has ever known? I believe it might be, despite not being a World Cup year, it is jam-packed with international tournaments that are unlikely to ever coincide again.

The EUROs (postponed from 2020), the COPA, the Gold Cup, and the Olympics (also postponed to this year), have created a buzz around international soccer, the likes of which we only usually experience during a world cup year, and that is only a fraction of the number of participant nations.