As the resident Boom Roasted Sports Olympics fan it has been left to me to dispense some opinion of the games.
So while Dave's interest extended only to trying to do the Lindsey two-step and become the cream filling in a Vonn/Jacobellis sandwich, I was actually watching some of the action.
Here are my thoughts on some of the weekend's events...
- The opening ceremonies....wow. They had two themes to me, which are both things I kept saying during the proceedings - "Oh Canada," (Imagine that said in resigned, you feel sorry for the country sort of way.), and "Wow, I forgot/didn't know that he/she is Canadian!" At the end of the ceremonies, after all of the boring Canada, This is Your Life stuff, the two themes came to a head when Steve Nash (Wow, I forgot he's Canadian!) and Wayne Gretzky and two others went to light the four-pronged torch...but only three pieces raised out of the ground, (Oh Canada.)
- The first medals of the games were awarded in men's short hill ski-jumping and the gold was won by Simon Ammann of Switzerland. For Ammann this continues a rollercoaster career arc that began with him bursting on the ski-jumping scene at age 16. At the 1998 Nagano games he finished 35th. He pulled out a surprise gold medal sweep (long hill and short hill) at the 2002 games in Salt Lake. In Torino in 2006 he didn't medal and then came back strong this year to win the short hill gold convincingly. Oh, and he looks like Harry Potter and Napoleon Dynamite had a baby.
- Canada's first chance to hear "O Canada" (their national anthem, not my way) after winning gold on their own soil was ruined by American Hannah Kearney in the moguls. She dropped in last, right after Canadian Jenn Heil grabbed first place, and snatched the gold medal from Canada's hands and in so doing, won the first, and so far only, gold medal for the U.S. in these games. Canada was vindicated in the men's moguls though, as Alexandre Bilodeau won gold and therefore uncursed (I think that's a word) the Canucks.
- Apolo Ohno won a silver medal in the 1500m speed skating event. He was sitting in fourth behind three South Koreans when the guys in 2nd and 3rd decided to play footsie and knock themselves out of the race. Ohno is now tied for first place for most Winter Olympic medals won by an American.
- And finally, I hate to end this on a sad note, but I have to say something about Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili. First, let me say that I love the luge. The luge and skeleton are two of my favorite Olympic events, winter or summer. I love that they are extremely fast events that are decided by inches. But those are the same reasons why these events are so dangerous.
In my opinion the blame for this lies with the designers of the track. Leading up to these games even the most experienced sledders were concerned about the turn where Kumaritashvili lost control. They were calling it a '50-50' curve, meaning they thought only 50% of the athletes would make it through without crashing especially young inexperienced riders like the 21 year-old Georgian. With tracks for the sledding events and slopes for the downhill skiing the officials need to make the tracks difficult enough to separate the elite competitors but not so difficult that they become life threatening. They really messed up this time.
Sir gabe, i think you hit it on the head about the luge. It is close to my favorite (Down Hill, SuperG and Freestyle skiing) There is a certain amount of danger that goes with most of the events, i.e. speed skating J.R. Celski nearly cutting his femoral. However as the IOC Rep stated, a mistake should not result in death. It was well documented that this was a fast fast track and there were many concerns dealing with it. It is sad that this had to happen, cant wait to see the outcome of the skeleton. U-S-A!!!!!
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