Vancouver Olympics

OK, can't let this go I guess. The track should be fast. It should carry with it some danger. The purpose is to test the very best athletes in these sports to their limits. It is the Olympics after all. Obviously there can't be any possibility of anyone or anything flying out of the track.

The history of the sport carries with it people and sleds flying out of the track. With that both competitors and spectators have been hurt and even died as a result of things escaping a track.

In this day of CAD design, computer power, and nth degree math - how is it even possible for this to happen? It simply isn't conceivable. In colder terms, maybe a sled runner causes the impossible cut as has happened in hockey often and to this point thankfully without death. Maybe that happens with a slider. Not much to be done about that really from an engineering POV. But people shouldn't fly out a track ever. Are you kidding me?

In simplisitc terms any designer should have tested for making the complete wrong directional turn - possibly a polar opposite of the otherwise natural flow of a "dead weight" - appologies for the term - at every possible point on the track. Add in maxumum possible G-forces and rebound characteristics of the human body. If anything escapes then you change the track to eliminate the possibility.

An article mentioned the pole hit wasn't padded. Well, of course it isn't padded. If athere was any possibility of anything flying out of track, the track should have been advusted. You can't have anything flying out of track at the 60+ mph things still move at crashes near the bottom. A nerf ball hits you at 60 mph, that's a problem.

In years past walls were shorter, speeds were less, what was possible was less, so forces acting on the body, sled, and track were less. People pushed boundaries and people sometimes died. Tracks were made safer.

I'm not saying this designing bit is anything near easy, but it's a simplistic idea with today's tools. One idea being, nothing escapes the track. Something went horribly wrong both in the process of what is possible in the conception and buiding of this track and, of course, in the reality of what did happen with the Georgian.

This isn't the first Engineering failure to have caused a death. KC's most familiar happening is the Hyatt collapse some 30 years ago. Even then the correct information was available, but was ignored. I'd hate to think that with as many runs as have happened on this track to date and the rather blunt feedback from athletes previous to the unfortunate death, that the information was simply ignored in favor of ignoring the need of a screen or safety net that might otherwise impede a television camera.

I honestly can't conceive of how it can be anything else.

For informational purposes the NHL had a young girl die in the stands on an end as she was hit with a puck that defelcted high. The NHL now has nets at the ends to stop errant pucks. Mostly that's how we humans work. We build things, accidents happen, people die, and changes are made in reaction.

With today's math and computer power, it should never happen anymore. Very sad.

In the NHL, a player could turn and shoot the puck over the glass out the sides and kill someone where there is no netting.

In NASCAR even with all the fence technology they have developed to keep the cars on the track, you can still get a tire or various car chunks over the fence into the crowd.

In baseball they have nets behind the plate, but foul balls go buzzing out the sides all game long.


I don't think there is anyway to make a track that can't be left by the sled without making it a complete tube. You could use some fencing to try and keep the sled out of the crowd, but the fencing could kill the athlete at 60 MPH just as easily as the random chance to hit something else sans fence. They have fences in the ski events. Skiers get injured by the fence all the time.

Ayrton Senna died in an F1 race hitting a wall at 135 MPH because one of his own wheels hit him in the head with a suspension part puncturing his helmet.

There is no way to make anything involving an object moving at great speed 100% safe. Nor should we try to create the illusion of safety. If a sledder thinks they can't leave the track, or that they will be okay when the fence catches them... they will take more risks and cause their own wreck.

I agree with you, but I don't think 100% safe should be the standard. This isn't for tourists. Let's start with nobody dies as the standard and work up from there. Let's start with no projectiles.

As is, the gurus shortened the Men's course to the Women's doubles starting line. That lowered speeds from above 90 mph, to the mid 80s around 50/50.

I get the point, but I don't agree. At one time downhill didn't have catch fences either. I have not been that fast on anything while low to the ground. 60 mph on a snowmobile is probably my fastest. Anyway, I'd just imagine that once you're at those speeds and on a decidedly competitve edge mentally, your thoughts have zero room for anything other than FAST FAST FAST. I'd doubt the existance of fences enters into anything at any time. Nobody goes down a run thinking they are going to crash. Take risk and handle it well, you win. Don't take risk and you're 12th.

Also, I saw the video of his run. Coming into the huge corner late, he couldn't recover at speed, lost control, and pretty much steered his sled's right runner down off the tall corner directly into the inside corner of the straightaway. That's a huge miss at that level not unlike driving a car straight into a wall. His action probably wasn't anything more that him trying to maintain contact with his sled after knowing he was crashing. That bump kicked him immediately and irreversably into the air and that was it. The F1 motorcycles have it happen all the time. A turn is mistimed, the gyro effect happens and the rider is flipped off to oblivion as bike and rider skid to a stop. Nothing to ramp off of on a motorcyle track however. Maybe there shouldn't have been on the luge run either.

Coming back to the Whistler sliding track, the gurus did erect a wall and change the corner the Georgian hit so that nobody else will be a projectile off that ramp corner anyway.

Better stuff:

SKI FLYING – Men’s Normal Hill: Dunno, I couldn’t really get into it. The American team not only isn’t very good, be The USOC gives them absolutely ZERO money. All our guys are in Vancouver on their own dime. Ridiculous! No wonder our guys suck. What, we can’t shift over some of the millions of Nike or Speedo money to get some tech run for our ski jumpers? Are you kidding me? Truly, that’s embarrassing for an Olympics in North America.

SPEEDSKATING Men’s 5000m – First off, I don’t like black, that’s no secret. Japan did an impressive job with their unis which are gold and black. Dutch also stylish with orange legs and trim on a black trunk. USA’s are pretty standard and boring.

5000m: Shanni Davis went out too fast chasing the Gold Medallist and flat died late. Chad Hendrick was a non-factor. A huge Dutchman with grasshopper legs and excellent technique carried the day over 12 laps. He destroyed the full field by over 2 seconds for Gold. Apparently he’s the Wayne Gretzky at distance but failed in Torino and the pressure of his rabidly fanatic about speedskating nation was on him and his family. After his win he sprinted up into the stands to hug everyone, clearly looking something well beyond relieved. Good Olympic moment.

If you would like to try to have some deeper understanding about how punishing the 5000m actually is, try this: Put 105% of your body weight on a leg press machine. Sit down. Every 3 seconds lift it with one leg, alternating legs. Do that with perfectly controlled, repetitive, and unerring form until you hit about 7 minutes. When your legs and lungs feel like they might explode after about 2 minutes, go ahead and stop. Collect yourself and then realize you made it about 1500m if you’re lucky. Congratulations.

Also in a TV article was a guy in Netherlands who opened an artificial ice speedskating facility. It’s 3 miles long - no joke - and winds around like the most complicated F1 track you have ever seen only with 3x as many curves with all of them wide and none of them alike. The entire thing is refrigerated from underneath like the best indoor facilities. It had to be done as climate change has prevented the vast canal systems from totally freezing for many years, killing annual competitions. Pretty amazing. I saw the pictures on TV and I sort of felt like a kid looking at a toy that’s impossibly expensive.

I’m telling you, if I ever make it to Holland, good chance I’m doing 3 things: I will eat a brownie or 2, I will see Ajax at the A-Arena, and I’m going to skate that track wearing orange.

BIATHALON – I always think this sport is interesting. The fans who show up truly know what they are watching. Every miss by the hopefuls is greeted with cheers by the other fans. Accurate 5 of 5s are cheered universally. A penalty lap for every miss is 150m of extra skiing. Just the pained looks on the faces of the people who just missed tells you what you need to know. The women’s gold medal today was determined by a single miss on the last set leading to 1.5 second loss. Ouch.

I do really like the design of the guns they have. Trigger to shoot and a quick touch of the same trigger finger on the side slide to load the next shell. Quick. Very nice. It used to be a bolt action that had to be cocked back. Ahhh, technology.

OPENING CEREMONIES – Mary Carillo was interviewed as well as she had a stint with the Olympic torch. No other torch had ever been conveyed in so many different ways. For Canada it was taken forward by every conceivable conveyance know to man from helicopter to canoe, from dogsled to dirigible, by ski, Skidoo, and snocat, by foot, wheelchair, truck, and many other methods.

As for the ceremony…obviously it wasn’t Bejing, but I’m not sure anything ever will be. That might be an unmatchable standard. It was still a good show and seemingly very representative of every corner of the nation and of every aspect of the heritage. Good stuff.

SHORT TRACK: Ohno pulled off a 5th to 1st move inside 3/4ths of a lap. It was Usain Bolt-esque. Ohno had a quarter lap lead 5 second later and cruised home in second gear for a large easy win. On the list of impressive things I've ever seen, that's in the discussion. BTW, The World Championships had 4 skaters with 2 advanceing. This comp has 6 per round with 3 advancing.

Figure skating: Not much to see here, all the pairs but the Chinese fell on their butts. Moving on.

Speedskating: More massive problems with the ice in the middle of the 500m. The process is 10 pairs skate, and then they resurface the ice. The facility has 3 state of the art ice resurfacers – think Zambonis on ‘roids – and exactly none of them could do the job. The chief icemaker for the Olympics then got behind the wheel and still couldn’t produce flat ice. That’s apparently an issue at 35mph. So, the coaches went apoplectic and they were delays. Commentator and Gold medallist Dan Jansen looked shocked and amazed that an Olympic event would have this problem. He went on at length about routines and schedules and throwing those off for the guys not in the first 10 pairs, etc. Primadonna elite athlete mentality aside, he’s right. Those issues simply can’t happen in an Olympics.

Vancouver, Canada: So, to review…Only 3 of 4 arms of the Olympic Cauldron same up on opening night. Oops. There’s been a death on the most hyper sliding track in history. All starts have been moved down at least two gates, but the track was not in any way at fault. Hmmm, keep telling yourselves that, guys. After a massive change to the ramp/corner that propelled the young Georgian to his death and the erection of an entire wall, the men’s start dropped to the Women’s Doubles’ start, the Women’s start dropped to the Juniors’ starting gate. Obviously it wasn’t the track…

Other Olympics have certainly experienced delays for weather in alpine sports, but Vancouver’s issue hasn’t been the typical white out mountain blizzard, but rather constant intermittent rain…as in what happens above 32 degrees. Biathlon and Cross-country medals have been affected as rain causes cross-country skis to slow to a pace that effectively eliminated those athletes on the wrong end of staggered starts. The speedskating venue couldn’t quite make flat ice. Forgive me, but that seems like step 2 after “measure the distance”. Pairs figure skating was remarkable only because nobody could stay on their skates when they were not grabbing them by hand. USA and Canada’s Women’s Hockey teams are beating foes 40-2. In ski jumping women still are not allowed to compete. This is 2010, right, not 1950? The septuagenarian Grand Idiot/Grand Pubah of the sport decreed from on high that female bodies are not fit to take the pounding of the sport. Never mind that one woman, an American, out jumps men…but don’t tell anyone. The IOC is all too happy to take the massive amounts of corporate dollars from our country, but sports Americans dominate need to be excused, like Softball and apparently Women’s Ski Jumping…can’t have Americans winning everything. If it were my daughter, I’d want to excuse him from the planet. Hope the old fart dies soon.

So, first few days? The Olympics will always have nice moments, but these games have been a little shaky to say the least. The message seems to be that the next Winter Games handed out should have a February average temp of about 0 or less, all the better for avoiding rain and making proper ice.

Better stuff: I’ll certainly admit goose bumping up a little at seeing and hearing the thousands of Canadians going nuts and then proudly singing “Oh, Canada” at full collective throat for the first time in Olympic history for a home winner. This, at the medal ceremony of their Men’s Mogul’s Champion and countryman, Alex Bilodeaux. Outstanding! First ever Individual Canadian Gold in 3 games held in Canada. Pretty good stuff if you like the purely positive bent that can come from nationalistic pride. As it happens, I like it very much. Also, I’ve enjoyed many events. The dichotomy of risk vs reward in biathlon is interesting to take in. The Bordercross track is amazing. Nobody went through that track clean, it’s just too hard. Nothing to me is as stunningly remarkable as the Men’s 500m speedskating. Pure speed from piston-packed mountains of quick-twitch muscle that make Usain Bolt look pedestrian by comparison. I forget what it really looks like over the previous 4 years. Awesome. If Ferrari crafted human legs, they would all be 500m speedskating legs. Pretty amazing pictures of the Canadian countryside as well. All good stuff. Love it.

Good win for the USA men's hockey team this afternoon!

anyone think lindsey vonn looks like a lost sister of hope solo? they're both tasty, that's for sure.

I can see that, sure. Vonn is married to a GQ Cover-boy type.

CURLING: In the whole of our country is there not a Skip of either gender capable of throwing a hammer (last rock) with proper weight and curl greater than 50% of the time? Great Britain has a gal in her early 20s who throws 2 foot peeling draws for 3-point swing, on-the-button match winners. If you didn’t know, early 20s is diaper age in Olympic Curling terms.

There’s no defense here. No one is blocking your shot or hitting you in the mouth or returning fire at you. Both USA Men’s and Women’s teams are beating themselves. Both skips have thrown multiple hammers in every match that have either led to opposition “steals” (them scoring on our hammer) or have had errant shots to turn a multiple point opportunity into a single point end. USA continues to lose by a point. That in addition to decisions that are being questioned by the announcers as either higher risk or flatly questionable for the situation. Skips are the play callers. At some point, it’s the Skips that are failing.

Seems to me that Olympic teams from any country are good enough, no need to gift wrap the match.

Curling seems to have a quality unique to sports other than net games, in that, errors happen commonly even to the very best. As such it’s about controlling the errors, making lesser errors over huge ones, and finally allowing or sometimes forcing, in subtle ways, the other team to screw up in greater fashion. These aspects distill nicely into a strategy of covering the high percentage of everything and make the other guys win at the low percentage shots. Unless they are the best, they will screw up. If we’re the best, we’ll prove it the one time you leave the door open. Obviously everything gets more complicated at the higher levels. But USA isn’t forcing their opposition to a higher level. They are the ones screwing up volluntarilly. The skips are giving 3-4 points a match in a sport where a one point difference changes the entire risk profile of how an end must be played.

C’MON YOU SKIPS!!!!

SNOWBOARDCROSS: Lindsey Jacobellis misses a gate and DQs in the semi-finals. Her story began at the previous games in Torino, where she dominated the field only to fall on a basic trick she did as a showboat move over a jump. At the time she had essentially lapped the field and the only way she gets silver is to trip herself…which she did. This time Jacobellis had dominated the times in both practice and qualifying. On an early jump in the Semis, she caught the edge of another’s board on a landing, got a little squiggly, and missed a gate by a foot. She won the consolation final going away for an easy but disappointing 5th overall. Thankfully nobody died, so this isn’t a Dan Jansen story. LJ is young and dominant on the World Cup so she has a good shot at the next games.

HOCKEY: USA Men were sloppy and lucky to win 3-1 against a pedestrian Swiss team who continued to get odd man rushes on Mike Miller in the US goal. USA’s only redeeming quality was Miller, who may be the best GK in the world right now. That’s been very important in Olympic history. Canada had no issues in pounding Russia like a heavy bag. It looks so far like USA and Canada’s women are the two best Women’s teams ever assembled and Canada is a level better. I do like the USA power play, so that’s something. On the Men’s side, it looks like Canada is far and away the best after an early game.

FIGURE SKATING: Johnny Wier – he of the what must be high estrogen levels and pink wardrobe - is rooming with Tannith Belbin. All I have to say to that is, I’m glad the girls can get getting together…

BIATLON: The initial sprint event was followed yesterday by the “Pursuit”. The format is that however you finished in the sprint determined when you start in the pursuit. If you were a minute behind the Gold medallist then you are still a minute back in this event. Money is normally the root of all silliness and that’s no different here. In Europe the TV contract written specifically to cover this event was over 8 years! The “hook” is that the staggered start allows pressure and differential to come together for a great finish and therefore good TV. Euros, what can you do? It doesn’t seem particularly fair, especially in a sport where a little rain or snow can greatly affect results.

I watched the entire Men’s Pursuit late last night. My impression was that only about 3 guys were ever in the race and only 4 of about 35 were ever really in medal contention. The upside is that the clear and informative real-time instant graphics on screen when everyone is shooting are very good. It’s outstandingly dramatic TV.

Thought I postedthis yesterday, guess I got busy...

Dump:

Figure skating: Not much to see here, all the pairs but the Chinese fell on their butts. Moving on.

Speedskating: More massive problems with the ice in the middle of the 500m. The process is 10 pairs skate, and then they resurface the ice. The facility has 3 state of the art ice resurfacers – think Zambonis on ‘roids – and exactly none of them could do the job. The chief icemaker for the Olympics then got behind the wheel and still couldn’t produce flat ice. That’s apparently an issue at 35mph. So, the coaches went apoplectic and they were delays. Commentator and Gold medallist Dan Jansen looked shocked and amazed that an Olympic event would have this problem. He went on at length about routines and schedules and throwing those off for the guys not in the first 10 pairs, etc. Primadonna elite athlete mentality aside, he’s right. Those issues simply can’t happen in an Olympics.

Vancouver, Canada: So, to review…Only 3 of 4 arms of the Olympic Cauldron same up on opening night. Oops. There’s been a death on the most hyper sliding track in history. All starts have been moved down at least two gates, but the track was not in any way at fault. Hmmm, keep telling yourselves that, guys. After a massive change to the ramp/corner that propelled the young Georgian to his death and the erection of an entire wall, the men’s start dropped to the Women’s Doubles’ start, the Women’s start dropped to the Juniors’ starting gate. Obviously it wasn’t the track…

Other Olympics have certainly experienced delays for weather in alpine sports, but Vancouver’s issue hasn’t been the typical white out mountain blizzard, but rather constant intermittent rain…as in what happens above 32 degrees. Biathlon and Cross-country medals have been affected as rain causes cross-country skis to slow to a pace that effectively eliminated those athletes on the wrong end of staggered starts. The speedskating venue couldn’t quite make flat ice. Forgive me, but that seems like step 2 after “measure the distance”. Pairs figure skating was remarkable only because nobody could stay on their skates when they were not grabbing them by hand. USA and Canada’s Women’s Hockey teams are beating foes 40-2. In ski jumping women still are not allowed to compete. This is 2010, right, not 1950? The septuagenarian Grand Idiot/Grand Pubah of the sport decreed from on high that female bodies are not fit to take the pounding of the sport. Never mind that one woman, an American, out jumps men…but don’t tell anyone. The IOC is all too happy to take the massive amounts of corporate dollars from our country, but sports Americans dominate need to be excused, like Softball and apparently Women’s Ski Jumping…can’t have Americans winning everything. If it were my daughter, I’d want to excuse him from the planet. Hope the old fart dies soon.

So, first few days? The Olympics will always have nice moments, but these games have been a little shaky to say the least. The message seems to be that the next Winter Games handed out should have a February average temp of about 0 or less, all the better for avoiding rain and making proper ice.

Better stuff: I’ll certainly admit goose bumping up a little at seeing and hearing the thousands of Canadians going nuts and then proudly singing “Oh, Canada” at full collective throat for the first time in Olympic history for a home winner. This, at the medal ceremony of their Men’s Mogul’s Champion and countryman, Alex Bilodeaux. Outstanding! First ever Individual Canadian Gold in 3 games held in Canada. Pretty good stuff if you like the purely positive bent that can come from nationalistic pride. As it happens, I like it very much. Also, I’ve enjoyed many events. The dichotomy of risk vs reward in biathlon is interesting to take in. The Bordercross track is amazing. Nobody went through that track clean, it’s just too hard. Nothing to me is as stunningly remarkable as the Men’s 500m speedskating. Pure speed from piston-packed mountains of quick-twitch muscle that make Usain Bolt look pedestrian by comparison. I forget what it really looks like over the previous 4 years. Awesome. If Ferrari crafted human legs, they would all be 500m speedskating legs. Pretty amazing pictures of the Canadian countryside as well. All good stuff. Love it.

The Canadian Women's Hockey team is ridiculous. They were making moves that I have never seen before. Highly impressed by those women.

In regards to curling, I watched a little last night and I am a little surprised by how lax the game is. It seems like the surface of the ice is one of the most important, if not the most important, factor in the game. Yet, when a team takes a timeout, the entire team including the coach can walk all over it and then sit there and brush the ice as they talk strategy. It seems a little odd that they would be able to do that, isnt that like cheating?

just want to add julia mancuso to this. nothing better than hot chicks who kick ass in their sport.

Yeah. USA has had some of those moves to. The difference is most every played on Canada has these types of things in their bag of moves.

It seems obvious that other teams get mentally deflated after the second or third time they are abused by one of these dream crushing moves. Goalkeepers cry after facing them. Teams skate away after goals just hangdog staring at the ice. You can almost see the thought bubble, "Holy crap, I have no idea what I just saw, much less how to stop it. My brothers were not that fast. Good Lord."

How good is Canada? One team they pasted had 8 qualifying games to get there. That team won 5 of their 8 qualifyers by shutout. Their GK is considered one of the best in NCAA hockey. Canada made them look like high schoolers playing pros. Beat 'em 18-0. The GK played very well to only allow the 18. My point is, the teams they are absolutely destroying are quality teams. Canada beat the Torino Silver medalist, Sweden 8-0. Sweden, isn't Jamaica or Japan or the piddly host nation or some African island. It's Sweden for the sake of the three crowns!

Amazing.

I'm not a scientist, but I think sliding on the ice is unlike, say, spiking the putt-line grass on a putting green. Ice would freeze again very quicky after a footstep or brushing and this ice is refrigerated. Plus, they are all wearing teflon soles.

Maybe only one thing, hot chicks who kick ass in their sport and also very badly want to be with you. Goin' on long memory on that last bit unfortunately...

Julia is smokin'. She looked a little PO'ed to have the silver, even though her buddy won.

Nationalism: Norway and Sweden are trading barbs as are Slovakia and the Czechs. Long history in both obviously. One Noweigan X-country skiier apologized to his country after taking Silver saying, "It's embarassing being beaten by a Swede." The Swedish coach retorted by saying, they can say whatever we have Gold and they don't". Norway retorted by kicking the stuffing out of the Swedes in the sprints yesterday. I should add, I'm half Norweigan...yaah.

Nice! Luv this stuff.

A Slovakian said, "We don't...{pause}...hate exactly all of them just because they are Czechs, but we are ultra-competitive. Beating them has a nice flavor to it."

CURLING: USA still winless in both genders. Skips keep failing at the critical moment. USA Men overcame an 0-4 deficit to lead 6-4, only to blow the hammer in the both the 10th end and the OT 11th end. USA allowed steals in both ends to lose 7-6 to the Swiss. Huge gack.

Also, the British Laddies' Skip is only 19, not in her early 20s as I thought. She's a master at the double take out. If I was anything close to 25, she would be quite hot. I have no difficulty imagining she's in the Brit papers daily. The Swedish team is older, but also pretty hot. The skip is 40-something but I'd imagine her daughter would be quite pleasant for a young gent to meet one day. Sweden beat GBR yesterday in that matchup. The old Swede has every decoration adn title. She looked the entire time like a person who didn't want any part of being out-thought or out-shot by a 19 year-old. Good theatre and eye-candy.

Figure skating: So, I'm watching the Olympics while playing poker and one gal at the table comments about how the skater on the screen is, "hot". That engendered some comments I can't share from the men at the table, which then lend to slightly less masoginistic discussions. Anyway, the concensus became that all female skaters have to be hot and are selected to be that way because figure skating isn't a sport as much as it's a judged performance, like any other dramatic event like a play or acting or whatever. Only with skating, the points for costume and other asthetics are real.

In skating, it's a selection and grooming process. So, if the future world-class athlete is beautiful, you're a skater. If not, you're a biathlete. If you're a hot Norwiegan and you happen to be a great Cross country skier, then fine. If you're a less than attractive Chinese world-class skater; you had better learn how to shoot a puck and play some defense. Sorry dear, but you have a face for hockey...

Separately, PTI had a debate about the effeminate battling with words. Wilbonne pointed out that once a dude wearing a miliion sequins gets lippy with another dude wearing feathers, he's out. He apparently doesn't need the third dude sporting attitude, pink, and neck to belly button man-cleavage to chime in...

I laughed.

Fact of the mater is Pleshenko (sequins) still hits the quad after three years of retirement and everyone else sucks (feathers and pink). No convoluted scoring system in the world is going to cure that. Maybe if our pink and feathered men manned up a bit and learned how to hit a quad...

Canada's womens hockey team reminds me of Pavel Bure in the mid 90's. Except they have about 8 of them and Bure was unique.

Interesting also is that both sets of rivals were once a single nation and both divorced peacefully. Doesn't happen often, unfortunately.

Sweden-Norway is something like a sibling rivalry--there's no hatred or bile there, but maybe a little envy both ways, a little resentment from time to time, the odd eyerolling, and a lot of teasing and jokes. Sweden-Finland, however, is something else entirely. There's bad blood there, particularly from the Finnish perspective, which I can't really understand because they haven't been under the Swedish thumb for centuries, whereas they fought vicious shooting wars with Russia as recently as the 20th century.

Yeah.

That might be how things are viewed in most circles here. Abroad, I'm not sure that's the exact case.

My experience here is having Swedes live next door to me as a kid and being around both Swedes and Norweigans simultaneously on vacations in Mexico. The neighbors I had did have plenty of Norweigan jokes, most of which were good-natured and were probalby interchangable with whatever nation you wanted to take a stab at. My family is basically German and Norweigan generations back, so jokes were told over drinks and food. When it came to describing culture, there was certainly a note of dismisive distain from our Swedish neighbors. It was the mid 80s, so a long time ago.

As for the vacation. while in my Dad's second hometown, Playa del Carmen, Mexico, I've met people of many nations, including all of Scandinavia. On occasions, I've found myself in big groups with high creekboned people of both nations. Everyone is cordial, but Norweigans and Swedes don't seem to ever mix in anything but large groups. If anyone broke away it was one of those nations leaving with people of other nations, not each other. My experience proobably isn't the sum total. I've always really liked Swedes for whatever reason.

FIGURE SKATING: After hearing the American won, I was shocked so I forced myself to watch the late night replay. Pleshenko got screwed. This is no different than when Roy Jones Jr. pummeled Park Su-Hun for 3 rounds in the Seoul Olympic final but the Korean was given a 3-2 decision. At least Park had the good sense to be embarrassed when his arm was raised and try to drag it back down. OK, I’ll admit the margin wasn’t quite the same. There’s a better argument for the Evan Lysechek being deserving. The key here is that the scoring system is in error. Pleshenko skated just as clean AND hit the quad. The American did one of those things.

How can you land a jump with an entire additional revolution, land on an edge, skate away as if it’s nothing, and not have that be a massive differential?!?

Move this over to the Halfpipe and you have The Flying Tomato spinning and landing a “1440”; essentially a “quad”. The difference being that skaters can use the lower body to torque and drive the spin where snowboarders have anchors on their feet that prevent the feet from being drawn in for higher centripetal force and a faster spin. Snowboarders do have that nice wide board and forgivingly soft snow to make corrections on the landing, but whatever. Either way nobody else is doing it, so no question Sean White is the Gold Medallist.

To Pleshenko’s credit he did a post-medal ceremony interview with one of the American commentators. She gave him every opportunity to grouse and/or comment. The Russian just said he was happy, that silver-gold-silver over 3 Olympiads is pretty outstanding, he hit the quad, the scoring system is what it is, hitting the quad last time in Torino might have been enough, and then he looked up at the scoreboard again. He looked as though he wanted to rip it, but the humble and gracious Gold medallist in him came out instead. That’s probably what the Games should be about. Roy Jones Jr. certainly couldn’t find the graciousness in his character in his worst Olympic moment.

X-COUNTRY: Norwegians are the King Pimps, everyone else is just a Ho. I honestly have zero clue how anyone goes that fast on flat ground on such tiny little skis. Heard on the commentary that Norway has fully 22 waxing technicians just to wax skis. Just watching it, they are faster, apparently need less oxygen, and have less resistance on the ski. There must be something the Norwegians know that the rest of the world doesn’t about waxing a ski.

20K MEN’S BIATHLON: Two favorites didn’t shoot clean and so a Belarussian snuck in to tie the 10-time medallist Norwegian with the nickname “The King” for the Silver Medal. 20K and you tie down to the tenth of a second for Silver. Remarkable. What I lie about this is two things. First, the sport is supposed to reward shooting clean. The Belarussian did. The Norwegian missed 2 of 20 shots, was penalized 2 minutes and that was enough. The second thing is for a tiny country like Belarussia, this man in now a National hero to a nation that probably doesn’t have many. He’ll receive his Nation’s highest honors, he’s probably coach for life and, he may not ever have to spend money in his hometown again. I dunno, something about that thought brings a smile to my face and it’s among the many reason I love the Olympic games. Even Belarussians should have a reason to feel the nationalistic pride of their great land, right?

HOCKEY: For starters, it was ridiculously good Men’s hockey yesterday. Canada had difficulty dismissing the Swiss in Men’s, needing a shootout. The Russians dropped two points to Slovakia’s NHL stacked lineup, losing in a shootout. Russian’s are supposed to be favored in this thing. Canada was everyone else’s favorite. Oops. As it sets up now, USA finds a way to beat Canada (shouldn’t happen) and they win their group by 4 points. A group win is an “easy” quarterfinal, which gives the best path to rested lines and a certain medal.

In previous Olympiads pools of 5 and 6 teams were the norm. Now it’s pools of 3. I like that upsets have more effect, but I’d prefer that the cream rise in important tournaments like this. Ideally if in a 3 team pool, then have a 3-game series come playoffs. I’d rather see 6 team pools for a one-off bracket. Soccer and other sports start early before any Opening ceremony; no reason Hockey can’t do the same.

CURLING: 3 straight matches the USA skip has had the winning hammer in his hand. In one of those he had it three straight ends to end the match. He’s failed in all 5 attempts to throw a match winning rock. USA remains winless in both genders. No medals this time around. Disappointing. Separately, Germany’s Women’s skip might be the scariest woman I’ve ever seen.

US women's curling skip can't judge her weight. Started out the game against Britain throwing everything straight through the house. Then overcompensated and started throwing short... You'd think after a week of games she would have a better grasp on the speed of the ice.

US won the match anyway. Britain's 19 year old skip basically choked. Most of the US' points were steals.

Ohno just pulled a SICK move in the semi there. We'll see if it's enough for him in the final.

The 3rd Swiss goal in the Swiss vs Norway men's hockey game was sweet... if it was intentional. The C. Ronaldo style skate pass that started the move for the 4th or 5th (I forget) Swiss goal was also sweet. The Swiss seem to like their trickeration as the guys on Sportscenter would probably call it.

US vs Canada women's curling... ugly. up the the 5th end, the US isn't even making Canada work. Just giving them points.

They should have demoted the skip like the men's team did.

I'll admit being the furthest thing from a skating judge. I did see both performances as well. 4 revolutions over 3 revolutions. It's a whole other revolution without aid of a jump or physics. It should be a MASSIVE difference. If Evan was truly that differential better in every other aspect, then fine. I didn't see the difference of the two skates as being either relevant or that massive.

Personally, I'm all for Russia losing in anything, go USA. Plus, I tried to express that it was like Roy Jones. The magnitude is less. Nothing in the history of the competitions of the Olympic Games has been a larger mistake...even the USA/USSR basketball game...'72?

Poor girl. She doesn't like the loud crowd. The best part of this for Britain is that she will be the likely Skip for the next 16-20 years. Plus, I'm pretty sure she'll just get better looking over the next 10 or so to boot.

Looks aside, there are Doctor's that study how people peak. One had stated through study and evidence that it takses 10,000 hours to maximize competence in anything complicated. At 19, it's unlikely that a human has spent 10,000 hours doing much of anything but sleeping.

For perspective, a working year might be 40 hours times 50 weeks or about 2000 hours.

Fantasticly competitive game. Outstanding TV.

HOCKEY: Great games now. Russia/Chechs was great. Like an NHL All-Star game when the first lines were out there; the difference being that those guys wanted every inch on every shift.

Nice retrospective on the 1980 USA Hockey Team with 3 of the main players and Al Michaels. One of those guys interviewed was Mark Johnson, who is now the coach of the USA Women's Team, BTW. Liniage runs deep here as Mark's Dad, Bob Johnston, among many other things, authored the quote, "It's a great day for hockey". You might now know it around here, but, that quote is chissled onto and into cornerstones of many hockey arenas and other permanent structures around the world.

Watching the retorspective reminded me of where I was then. I was 10 and living my last winter in Lincoln before moving here. ESPN as a network was less than a year old or therabouts. Internet and cell phones were not part of the deal. TV's had 12 channels available and usually less than that had actual programming at any time. Black and white TV's were common. Watching Nebraska football road games was normally done on Sunday mornings in the form of a highlight package that I had to wait for the God-awful Notre Dame highlights package to finish before I found out what happened. I couldn't even get the sports page until my Dad had read it first.

Dark ages. Hate Notre Dame. Scars of youth.

All that is backdrop to point out that unless you attended the event, probably you didn't see it. If you saw more than one highlight of a game, that was rare thing as the sports part of a half-hour newscast was 2-5 minutes depending on the day. That covered high school, college, pro, and international if a story was big enough.

When USA played USSR, I knew about it. I had seen all the results in the paper and some of the little on weekend TV. The game was on radio and not TV, but I figured I'd just get the score later. No way they win, right? That Russian team had stomped the NHL's best, obliterated the NY Rangers, and beat USA 10-something just a week ago or so. It was the Red Army team plus some All-Stars at a time where USSR really was a world power in every conceivable way. Roster full of Hall of Fame guys that could dominate the NHL if given the chance, so said the paper. USA had some guys that played for the Gophers and Badgers. My uncle Wayne said one of them was pretty good... I didn't think much about it. I hated seeing those scorelines where the team I liked gets crushed. It felt like Oklahoma stomping my Huskers every year. Yuck! Better to ignore it, unless you have to go attend the game. Less painful, right? Then my Mom asks me if I want to go to the store with her. That was the only way I got the cereal I liked, so a boy's gotta eat...

On the way, AM radio was the sound option (singular) for the car so I tune it to the Lincoln channel that had sports on it often. My future HS, Lincoln East, played their home games on the chanel, as did NU. It's USA v USSR hockey. Right after I tune in, USA scores! I'm done. That's it. I'm hooked. I'm powerless to do anything else but listen to the game. Just the noise of the crowd over the radio was enough. I previously wasn't aware that crowds could sound like that anywhere other than Memorial Stadium after Nebraska scores. Then you get the U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A chant over the radio guy. Mike Eruzione says it's where the chant started. I believe him. It's so loud it's rumbling the both the car speakers and the equipment used to produce the audio there in Lake Placid. 1980 tech. I'd never heard anything that positive about our country before. Everything on the news and 60 minutes - manditory viewing for my Dad - was about how horrible we seem to be as a country and how awful everything is.

We arrive at the store and my Mom only half-heartedly asked me if I was coming in. I think she knew that had no chance of happening, so I get the Mom lecture of keeping the car doors locked, etc. I was still only 10.

No prob. I'll be right here...

Mom was in and out quick, so back home for the end and to my 9-volt battery transistor radio, the 1980 iPod of the time. It had one plastic "earbud" and everything. That way a kid could attend the Husker game, catch the radio call, and have an ear free to have a conversation with family and other fans.

Anyway, I went nuts three times, after the 3rd USA goal, after the 4th goal - 10 minutes left, how do they win this game, that's forever - and after the clock hit zero and all you could here on radio was the crowd drowning out some poor guy who's announomous because he wasn't Al Michaels. The second time my Dad came in to check on the noise. I told him USA was [/i]beating the Russians. My Dad said, "In what"? My Dad was a good Defenseman before I showed up as a rather large surprise. It didn't ever occur to him that hockey was a possible answer to that question. Why would it?

Later I watched the game on TV when it was aired. The announcers spoke like little kids at Christmas. At 10 you may have a sense of the importane of something, but good luck fully appreciating it. Our guys looked so small compared to the dark red guys with CCCP on their chest. What kind of alphabet has the same letter for U and S? Why doesn't Nebraska wear all red? That looks cool. Why doesn't NU have hockey? Why does the ice have blue patches? Why does our coach look so pissed off, doesn't he know he's going to be famous?

I still get somehow uplifted at the highlights. It still gets me. It surprises me how it gets to me. Can't explain it.

Years after, Dad and I traveled to northern Minnesota for a canoeing trip. On the way home on I-35 is the US Hockey Hall of Fame. Among the exhibits is the 1980 beating of the Russians and then the Fins on what was then a countinuous 8mm film loop. I'm sure they've upgraded. We found it about half way through the Russian game and both of us just stood there mesmerized until the building closed. We appologized, but the guy working said it happens most days, so don't worry about it.

Wether you are a hockey guy, an American, or none of those things, the 1980 Olympics is a touchstone moment for much of what makes up fandom for world sports now. It isn't the be all end all obviously, other cultures do have their seminal moments, sports, stories and legends. Much of that history predates 1980. That said, the '80 USA Hockey Team did unintentionally progress much of what can be seen all over the world for better or worse in fans today. Nationistic jingoism taken to levels where entire civilzations are molded into one over many days, just through a game. Before if there was universal flag waving, a World War either just started or just ended. Now it's our guys are ready to play your guys in a big one.

If you see older footage of interantional sports you often see some small flags waiving. What you didn't see outside soccer (even then only in some countries in small quantities) are large banners, slogans, large flags, people dressed in color, faces in color, and everything else that today commonly makes up how people celebrate their citisenship and the National team of whatever sport.

It's no coincidence that the Olympics are successful worldwide and no more successful anywhere than right here in these United States. Next time you buy anything of the proper color to wear to watch the team you love, give that a passing thought. It's history and there's something intrinsically good there.

Besides now you get everyone wrapped in flags, the Dutch in head to toe silly orange, Norweigans in braids and Viking horned helms, Argentines who can't leave a hotel without being clad in the light blue stripes, BRAZIL, Eng-Er-Land, and 200 other nations only too proud to show you what their colors are. What could be better than that?

Re: Vancouver Olympics [R]

That's one of the most exciting games I've ever seen.

Ryan Miller earned this award tonight:

Re: Vancouver Olympics [R]

Canuckistan...funny.

Just finished it. Yeah, that was pretty good stuff.

Mike Emrek is possibly the single best announcer in American sport. He does hockey better than anyone does anything with possible exception of Liggett doing a clinching Armstrong mountain stage. Emrek just had that perfect blend of giving you the action, the crowd, the arena feel, the level, gear changes, descriptions, inside details, off camera things, technical matchups, tone, and pitch. Just a master.

Nothing done just yet. USA in the #1 or #2 hole with 9 points from 3. Canada plays the #6/#11 game. If USA is #1, they couldn't meet Canada until the Gold Medal game. I'd still like Canada in that one. How do you beat Canada twice at home? US hadn't beaten Canada in Olympic play since 1960.

BTW, never in the history of hustle has hustle been so hustled as Ryan Kessler hustled on the 5th (en) goal. The only way that goal gets better is if it's a medal game instead of just to lock up the group and the extra day off. That after being stuck in their own end, mostly a man down for about 7 full minutes with 2 stoppages and few changes.

Kessler was a stride and a half back at his own blue, sprinted with energy from I don't know where, and just dove full sell-out stretch with his stick around a huge guy to pop it in the corner from nowhere. Outstanding. No way that happened. I'm still smiling.

5 generations from now a Dad will pop in an ether file (or whatever it is then) and tell his son about heart and how good his Great Grandfather was. He'll play that goal. I hope someoone rinkside got the definitive picture of him at full dive and stretch with the puck just off of his stick. I'd like that shot.

If you love what makes hockey what it is, that goal just makes you honor the level, even if you're Canadian.

What a penalty kill for the Americans! Four minutes of pure onslaught with everyone selling out at every pass, blocked shot, and crashing every rebound. Awesome. Beautiful. Love it.