“The secret behind Ireland’s surge is a revolutionary and suffocating defensive scheme, known as the “choke,” that relies on ferocious tackling and a loophole in the rules of the game to sap energy and momentum of its opponents. As Ireland prepares for a quarterfinal matchup with Wales on Saturday, this new system has confounded opponents and transformed a struggling team into contenders for the sport’s biggest prize.”

“Executing the choke requires two defenders to tackle a ball carrier from either side. One goes high, trapping the runner’s arms against his body, the other goes low, preventing him from reaching the ground.”

“The physical toll required to perform the choke is so exhausting that it would have been impossible to implement without the fitter, faster, physically stronger players in today’s game or the time to practice it obsessively which is now available in the professional era. But when it works, it traps opposing runners in a sort of suspended animation.”

Dammit! They’re onto us.

Ireland Will Hug You To Death (Wall Street Journal)

From The Mayo News:

The Chairman of a Mayo County Council strategic committee has slammed as ‘daft’ National Road Authority policy to make all  welcome signs at the various Mayo borders smaller, as seen in the Charlestown sign (above).
Cllr Jarlath Munnelly made the comments at last week’s Roads and Transportation Strategic Policy Committee meeting in Castlebar after another councillor described the sign on the new Charlestown by-pass as ‘miserable’.
“There’s a sign coming into Mayo on the Charlestown by-pass saying ‘Welcome to Mayo’ and it is the most miserable sign in Mayo,” said Cllr Blackie Gavin. “It is like something with just one leg. We have major signs all over our county welcoming people and surely to God we can produce something better. It wouldn’t lift your heart to be returning to Mayo and to see that. It is disgraceful. I know it is probably the NRA that are behind it.”
Castlebar-based Cllr Gavin added that other larger signs in the country were the way forward.


Small ‘Welcome To Mayo’ Signs ‘Daft’ (Edwin McGreal, Mayo News)

“The fruits of these women’s labours were often a lucrative source of income for the religious orders running the institutions, both figuratively and literally.

In many cases, prior to adoption, babies were used as test subjects by pharmaceutical companies who were trialling new vaccines.

It can go without saying that these trials were carried out without the consent of the mother, whose incarceration in these homes robbed them of so many basic human rights.”

 

Prime Time: Mother And Baby Homes, RTE 1 9.35pm

The Sleepsuit by Forrest Jessee is made of a structural pleat composed of EVA foam and based on US engineer Buckminster Fuller’s notion of Dymaxion or Polyphasic Sleeping (a regime of 30 minute naps every six hours to achieve more time awake during the day.)

Practical AND stylish.

via
Broadsheet.ie