As week two dawned, we bid a sad farewell to swimming and events involving guns, but shouted a joyful hello to the women's triathlon. That's the Games, though. When one door slams, another immediately opens, leading, if you are lucky, to a reservoir and, shortly thereafter, a bike rack. “We do like Mondays,” chirped Hazel Irvine, whose mission to become the first British woman to name-check every top-ten hit of the 1980s in the course of a single Olympics remains slightly tiresomely on course.

We certainly like the triathlon, which is essentially “Mad Max” in Lycra. On the starting pistol, everyone piles into a reservoir and swims a distance that most of us would grumble about driving. Then they cross half a continent on bikes before ditching their machines and continuing their journey on foot. As you do.

All of which would merit any viewer's open-mouthed attention, even without the masterful dramatic twist which is the “transition” phase - the point at which the swimmer becomes a cyclist and at which, later, the cyclist becomes a runner. Cue variously panicked attempts to change shoes, put on hats, stow away bikes, etc.

Sadly, the levels of confusion typically witnessed at primary school obstacle races are not duplicated. For instance, I didn't see one competitor forget to take the bean bag off their head for the running section. It's still fun, though, and makes one reflect that there aren't enough Olympic sports that involve a costume change.

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Background

• How the Brits became world beaters

• London double-decker arrives in Beijing

• Olympics proves capacity for greatness

• New dawn for British sport as Olympic sun sets

Multimedia

• Simon Barnes in Beijing

• Bring back the tug-of-war

• Top 100 Olympic athletes of all time

In a breakthrough for smoothness in the first “transition”, yesterday's competitors had their cycling shoes already fixed to their pedals, a cunning short cut affording a big saving on time and fiddling. Is there a broader application for this in today's busy world? Maybe we should all look into the possibility of pre-attaching our shoes to the clutch and brake of our car. It might simplify the morning rush.

Readers will appreciate that this column is, essentially, in an unofficial observer role for London 2012, and always ready to provide pointers when we spot aspects of the Olympic experience that could be improved upon. So: what if, at the triathlon, everyone's running shoes weren't waiting for them in a carefully numbered plastic crate, but were, instead, in a big pile just north of the bike park? Bundle! We'll leave it with you, Lord Coe.

Elsewhere, yesterday was unavoidably coloured by the exit, limping, of Liu Xiang, China's superstar hurdler, leaving “a country stunned into silence” (copyright all broadcasters). You would possibly think that there might be at least one resident of China, maybe a farmer in a remote province without television reception, who couldn't give a flying stuff about the 110 metres hurdles, but apparently you would be wrong.

Colin Jackson didn't see it coming. The former sprint hurdler kept insisting that Liu would be all right until he wasn't. But Olympic Breakfast felt the story was complex enough to merit wheeling on the BBC's Beijing correspondent, who intoned that a gold for Liu was intended to be “a statement about what this country can do”. But that was the opening ceremony, wasn't it? Much though it may pain us to admit it, the world will always be more impressed by fireworks than hurdling, and it's possible that China realised this.

Anyway, never mind the heaving shoulders of three billion weeping Chinese, here in the UK, an anguished nation is asking: “Where is Eddie Butler?” The BBC's big Welsh rugby man set the country alight in those early days of the Games when, as a result of the traditional Olympic “outsourcing” that happens on these occasions, he was required to become the voice of archery. Eddie's stint by the targets left many of us hungry for more and keenly wondering where he would pop up next.

Since when, though, silence. I tuned in hopefully to the men's volleyball yesterday, imagining I might find Eddie in action beside the sandpit, but no joy. Let's not worry at this stage, however. Something has got to come his way.

Who knows? He may, even now, be locked away in a Beijing hotel room, planning his next move, putting in the necessary research and poring very hard over a copy of “Know the Game: Women's Flat Water Canoeing”.