#it's a knockout

[pepimeinrad]

Jeux Sans Frontières/It’s a Knockout/Spiel ohne Grenzen

part of the 1978 final in Montecatini Terme

[oldgamemags]

Advert for the home computer version of ‘It’s A Knockout’. 

[vgjunk]

At the big VGJunk site today: a look at the terrible ZX Spectrum “sports” action in It’s A Knockout, which somehow manages to include the Holy Roman Empire and Charles de Gaulle. Read all about it here!

[coffeecurvesandconversation-blog]

Read Alice's story

Alice is raising money to help Zoe's Place Trust - Middlesbrough

Might as well put this here, just in case anyone wants to contribute! 

In abut 10 days I’m taking on the ‘It’s a Knockout’ challenge for Zoe’s Place Baby Hospice. They’re a fantastic but small charity. They provide palliative, respite and end-of-life care to babies and infants - and their families during the hardest and most awful times. 

If anyone has any spare change, every little helps (I know in this day an age, spare change would be a fine thing!)

No pressure and I will not be offended if people do not - I just thought I should try! <3 If you want just to share it that would be fab - and hopefully there will be someone who will want to help me out! I just want to get to £50 at least! 

Love to you all <3

[theelaggers]

Paedophile Stuart Hall  with royals

[contac]

[aussieintheeighties]

Seeing It's A Knockout

Everyone watched It's A Knockout. They just did. 

I'm not quite sure what was considered so entertaining about a weird state-based spoof of the Olympic Games, but there you have it - the biggest show on TV at the time, or so it seemed to us. And one evening in early 1987, our parents took us along to actually be in the audience!

It turned out that you didn't actually get to barrack for New South Wales by default. Yes, unbelievable as it may seem, they didn't actually fly in supporters in from every state each week. Instead, they assigned you to a state. We were given Queensland. Queensland. It hurt to boost Queensland over New South Wales. But we had to deal with it, and turned up in yellow clothing as instructed. I wore the same yellow dress that I'd worn to Australia's Wonderland.

The opening credits will show you that, as with all exciting things during the 1980s, it took place in a paddock in the middle of nowhere, somewhere in far Western Sydney (Wikipedia tells me it was Dural). You arrived after a fairly long drive. There was a carnival atmosphere in the car park. We were all given little yellow plastic triangular flags to wave. We were seated right at the edge of the grandstand, so we could look down into the alley from which "Billy, Jay, Smith and Feeeyona Macdonald! (aka 'sister of Jacki Macdonald from Hey Hey It's Saturday') emerged on their golf buggies. We were given a couple of test cheers to get things moving.

The arena was much smaller and shabbier than it seemed on television. Things that happened automatically on television - the changing of the scoreboard, for example - were the work of mere humans in reality. There were no wacky sound effects. Billy, Jay, Smith and Feeeeyona Macdonald! just looked like ordinary people. There were fairly long gaps between the games. What little else I remember was peculiarly unsatisfying.

Wikipedia also tells me that the good burghers of Dural got sick of us city slickers coming in every Friday and yelling up the joint, and It's A Knockout was knocked out of the place after only two years. It's probably covered in McMansions now.

UPDATE: It's totally covered in McMansions now.

[mindlessmunkey]

REMEMBER THAT TIME THE ROYAL FAMILY COMPETED IN AN EPISODE OF IT'S A KNOCKOUT WITH CELEBRITY TEAMS INCLUDING JOHN TRAVOLTA, KEVIN KLINE, MEATLOAF, JOHN CLEESE, JANE SEYMOUR,  CHRISTOPHER REEVE, ETC. ETC.?

No, seriously, guys. This is a thing that actually happened in 1987. I just discovered this recently and I still can't quite believe it's real.

Skip ahead to the part where Meatloaf chases (and fails to catch) an onion. Life will never be the same.