You know you are getting old when you need three hands to count the number of summer Olympics you have watched.

My score is 14, although I’m not quite old enough to remember anything about Tokyo 1964, apart from the hit theme tune.

But I am probably getting a bit too old to be sitting up into the early hours, watching sports we never see in three years out of every four (or five).

There’s the mysterious spectacle of taekwondo, for example, where the lead changes hands every few seconds, and you win the gold medal if the clock happens to stop when you are ahead.

But don’t get me wrong.

I’m not one of those people who turn their noses up when something less mainstream comes on and snobbishly say it ‘isn’t a proper sport’.

Because no matter how bizarre a sport is - and I’m especially looking at you synchronised swimmers and dressagers (assuming that’s an actual word) - you can’t help but admire the hard work that goes into it, and the grace and skill that comes out of it.

I can neither swim nor ride a horse, so I can’t even imagine how you go about training yourself to do what they do, let alone persuade a horse to join in.

And I’m not going to make myself look like a really old duffer by suggesting that a lot of the events included in the Olympics nowadays are less sport and more the result of mis-spent youth, like surfing, skateboarding and BMX.

Besides, you can’t say a sport is too obscure when your own favourite is cycling.

And although cycle racing could not be simpler - a contest to find out who can ride a bike the quickest between A and B - they have somehow devised dozens of different ways of complicating it.

There are BMX, mountain bikes, road bikes and track bikes, for a start, and even I have to keep reminding myself of the difference between all those track disciplines, most of which sound like the names pop stars give to their children: Madison, Keirin and Omnium.

All these sports are, quite literally, fair game - but I am drawing the line at softball.

The funny thing is, I have enjoyed watching baseball before, and the only difference is the softness of the ball, the cranky underarm bowling and the fact that - nobody knows why - only girls do it.

Maybe it was the pointless incessant screechy vocal encouragement of their teammates, or because hardly anybody managed to lay bat on ball, but I don’t think there has ever been a duller or less elegant spectator sport.

So I would love somebody to explain to me why my wife and I found ourselves glued to it at 1.30am, unable to go to bed until we found out whether Japan or USA took gold.

That’s how the Olympics gets you.

Anyway… must rush.

Although my wife somehow isn’t quite as interested in it as I am, we have some beach volleyball to catch up with.