Your big fat Greek Olympics: A couch guide

By ALAN PERROTT

Anyone who can sit through every minute of Olympic coverage can expect a visit from the drug squad and have eyes with more rings than the Games flag.

Here's a weekend checklist before you settle down for the biggest sporting event on Earth.

Your challenge: 17 late nights and early mornings crammed with 14,400 minutes' worth of 10,500 fit, young things from 202 countries going "citius, altius, fortius" (faster, higher, stronger - the Olympic motto) over 28 sports in 38 venues.

The first hurdle is to wake for the grand opening ceremony tomorrow from 5.15am to 9.30am on TV One. The feast of televised sport will then move into the starters' blocks at 7pm.

Locals: Early attention will focus on the rowing heats and the women basketballers Davina and Xena's matchup against the United States at 11.30pm. The odds: Not so good. The TAB has the basketball team at the no-chance odds of $2000 to win gold. But the Ever-Swindells are looking likely in the double skulls.

Early highlight: Round one of the gold rush between the big-feet, Ian Thorpe from Australia, and American Michael Phelps.

Phelps is chasing a full house of gold medals while Thorpe will be praying his starting technique has improved since his bellybuster at the Australian trials.

Together they feature in 10 events, but the pair face off only in the 200m freestyle. The final is late on Monday night.

Impressive statistics: Thorpe boasts size-17 feet and Phelps puts socks on his size-14s every morning.

Sunday's play: The NZ v Italy men's basketball match about 8.15pm, the three-day eventing equestrians from 7pm and delayed coverage of the NZ v Australia men's hockey.

Planned coverage times: Following tomorrow's opening ceremony, a highlights package from 4pm to 6pm will precede live coverage from 7pm to 9am. Nightly coverage will settle into a 7pm to 10am routine. Special events outside those times may still break into scheduled TV One programming. Nightly highlights will be screened after 6.30am each day.

Disclaimer one: Smarter viewers planning on setting the trusty video to record such events before heading to bed are setting themselves up for disappointment. TVNZ executive producer Stu Dennison is predicting plenty of "seat of the pants" coverage, making accurate scheduling difficult. Dennison's mission statement: screen as much live coverage as possible; follow all the New Zealanders; and broadcast all the sexy, headline acts such as the 100m finals.

TVNZ presenters will provide updates on upcoming events throughout each night and further information will be scrolled under the live pictures.

Disclaimer two: Team-sport fans should not expect complete coverage of matches. What arrives on our screens will be assembled from nine separate feeds of continuous sport and it is unlikely the juggling will allow 80 or 90 unbroken minutes of any single event.