Rain stopped play? Biggest worry now in British sport is extreme heat | Emma John

<p>Climate crisis is on show every day when sportspeople do their thing and the rest of us sweat on the sofa</p><p>Nothing sharpens the distinction between professional athletes and the rest of us like a week of truly hot weather. While we’re apologetically crying off long-in-the-diary engagements – <em>so sorry, just can’t face it in this weather</em> – elite sportspeople are blinking the rivulets of sweat out of their eyes while squinting under a hot and heavy helmet, then doing 22-yard sprints with a couple of kilos of padding strapped to their legs.</p><p>As one of nature’s non-athletes, I speak not only with admiration but with genuine wonder. My experience of the past week has been working out how not to do things, or, if forced, doing them half-heartedly because, you know, I haven’t slept. My friends and I message each other the latest innovations in fan strategy (“apparently putting a frozen bottle of water in front of it helps”) and talk about our journeys on public transport as if we’ve just survived the Somme.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/jun/26/biggest-worry-british-sport-extreme-heat-climate-crisis">Continue reading...</a>