One thing about being down with the stomach flu, there's plenty of time to watch television. Since I am, unabashedly, an Olympics nut here are my thoughts on what transpired over the first weekend. (Some of this will be competition related)
Opening Ceremonies: Let's get this out of the way: Shut-up Matt Lauer. Just STFU. We're not in Beijing and, while the opening ceremony there was great, that doesn't mean you can start off the broadcast by immediately dooming the Canucks to the trash-bin of history. You sanctimonious prick. I suppose Canada could take people from their homes and have them practice 24/7 on one routine for a year, I supposed they could have decided to irresponsibly spend hundreds of Millions on some Democratic-socialist show of force. Fortunately, for us, they decided to stop all of that and celebrate their heritage. Yes, they had a technical error, but that didn't take away from the beauty of the ceremony, nor did it add any thing to the one from Beijing.
Luge: It was the big story over the weekend, and it's generated much debate over the safety of 'pushing the envelope' in the Olympic Games. What's often missed by the proponents of mediocrity (i.e. doughy sports writers with non-jock complex) is that it wasn't the pushing of the envelope that caused the problem, it was shoddy safety work around turn 16. Yes, the course was hard and fast, but Olympic courses are SUPPOSED to be hard & fast. Sadly, had the wall that was built 24 hours too-late been in place during the training runs none of this would have ever happened. Push the envelope organizers, but don't, for one second, take safety for granted. If I want to see a bunch of middling athletes perform at less than optimal levels I'll head over to the Downtown Y to watch the Houston Media basketball league.
Women's Moguls: Nice story of redemption for Hannah Kearney. This is why we watch the Olympics, to see elite athletes perform at their peak during times of intense stress. Citius, Altius, Fortius after all. Hannah Kearney was all three. Someone in this event that should have some x-over appeal is Sandra Barkey, (soon to be Happy) She's a free-spirit with a solid work ethic and her joy at winning the Bronze medal was infectious. If some events, and the money derived from them, make you cynical, it's events like moguls that remind us why we watch.
Nordic Combined: America is shut out no longer, thanks to a great ride by Johnny Spillane. Watching the race I was worried about the eventual champion Lamy-Chappius, who obviously had the better equipment and was the strongest skier, but when Spillane made his move I thought he might just be able to hold on for Gold. He didn't, but his silver-medal winning performance (and the fact that the delay of the Alpine events put it on television) should be a boost to a sport that's traditionally flown under the radar in the US.
Short-track speed skating: Apollo Anton Ohno is fast, and the S. Koreans are a bunch of whiny cheaters. That is all.
Speed skating: At every International sporting event, no matter where it's held or how it's attended, no single group of fans are going to have more fun than the orange-clad Dutch. It was the same thing when Sven Kramer won the 5000m on Saturday. Great stuff. (Note to the American team: If you're going to compete, then COMPETE dammit.
Figure Skating: Forgive me if I'm less than impressed with the so-called glamour event in the Winter Olympics. It's not that I don't appreciate skating, having a wife with a BFA in Dance and a little sister who danced for the Houston Ballet Academy and the Houston Met I certainly get it, as a matter of fact I grew up around dance, and skating is nothing more than dancing on ice. The problem that I have is with the judging and NBC's terrible commenting team of Tom Hammond, Sandra Bezic and Scott Hamilton. Bezic is in love with all things Chinese and Russian, Hamilton (who, to be fair, is an island of sanity in an insane competition) has been so thoroughly cowed by the skating powers that be he's incapable of finding his true voice and Hammond is quite possibly the worst play-by-play man in the business not named Joe Buck. When the 2nd Russian team BOTH fall on their side-by-side jumps, have sequence issues on their spins, and generally skate a terrible performance, only to be placed 5 points higher than an American team that skated their hearts out, something is terribly wrong.
Figure skating is a competition that's not even a true sport. It's a popularity contest judged by a political organization who pre-determines the winners based on media buzz and personal relationships. It's ALWAYS been that way. In 2002 when the Candian team Jaime Sale and David Pelletier carped about the scores given to Russian team of Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze, causing the Olympics to name them "co-champions" the result wasn't more open, transparent judging, it was the implementation of a judging system that's even weaker than the one in place previously, where personal accountability is less than zero, and where, last night, the judges placed the Chinese duo Shen and Zhao first, and then slotted everyone in after them into the pre-determined positions.
THAT's why the Russian team can survive a fall and end up in third place, and why the Canadian team finds themselves outside of medal contention despite a superior performance. They system is broken and ice-skating competitions (sorry, it's too subjective to be a true 'sport') is suffering for it.
All in all, the first weekend of the Olympics gave us just about what we expected. Some memorable moments, some heroes, some zeros and terrible judging in figure skating. Unfortunately, it also gave us something we didn't expect, and didn't want to see....The tragic death of a young athlete.
For now, the envelope will continue to be pushed. Here's hoping that the safety envelope is pushed as well....to new heights.
