Winter Olympics

So who watched the opening ceremonies? I'm happy the games are ready to start. I just wasn't thrilled with the opening ceremonies, after the parade of nations it became pretty boring. The announcers for the parade of nations were just awful. Especially with comments like this "It seems to be a Canadian crowd here tonight". Really Mr. obvious the games are in Canada!!!

Here's hoping the events are good and Canada has a great Olympics.

I liked parts of the opening ceremonies, though I missed the parade of nations. The special effects can be pretty amazing. But some of it was drawn out too long - like the tap dancing fiddlers. At first I thought it was neat, then that part just went on and on.

I watched the parade of nations then switched channels.

I suppose it wasn't a surprising thing to see all the news channels show the video of the Georgian luger death.

I was caught in between the Opening Ceremonies and talking to Mr. Sandman, if you know what I mean. I do have it DVR'd. Of course, the DVR cut off right when they were having problems with the cauldron. But I was able to catch the "rerun" NBC ran overnight and get the ending the DVR missed the first time.

I was kind of dissappointed they showed as much of the luge accident as they did, especially the part where they were working on him and showed him all bloodied. Not exactly something I wanted the kids to see.

That being said, I'm looking forward to a couple weeks of the Olympics. I kind of prefer the Winter games to the Summer games...

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/vancouver/luge/news?slug=ap-lug-lugerdies&prov=ap&type=lgns

Olympic officials decided late Friday night against any major changes in the track or any delays in competition and even doubled up on the schedule in the wake of the horrifying accident that claimed the life of a 21-year-old luger from the republic of Georgia.

They said they would raise the wall where the slider flew off the track and make an unspecified “change in the ice profile”—but only as a preventative measure “to avoid that such an extremely exceptional accident could occur again.

Maybe it's just me, but I have always though the walls on the curves weren't high enough.

I didn't watch the opening ceremony. I have really been into the skiing events though. I watched the womens and mens moguls (sp?) and I couldn't change the channel. I'm looking forward to the Super G or Alpine or whatever they call it. Anyone catch Ohno's silver medal performance on Saturday night? Sometimes its all about being in the right place at the right time.

IrishGuy wrote:I didn't watch the opening ceremony. I have really been into the skiing events though. I watched the womens and mens moguls (sp?) and I couldn't change the channel. I'm looking forward to the Super G or Alpine or whatever they call it. Anyone catch Ohno's silver medal performance on Saturday night? Sometimes its all about being in the right place at the right time.

Yeah, I saw that...what a finish! That's a sport where the last 2-3 laps are just plain exciting stuff.

Cincy Fan 44 wrote:
Yeah, I saw that...what a finish! That's a sport where the last 2-3 laps are just plain exciting stuff.

That was awesome... I literally looked away for a second and two guys were gone... I cant imagine how terrible they feel. Korea was 1-2-3 and Ohno's medal chances were simply over. Certainly on Olympic moment. Every time I watch moguls my knees hurt. I'm also amazed at how much faster the men go than the women. There's gender differences in a lot of sports, but with moguls the difference seemed more marked.

I missed the Alpine skiing yesterday. My wife and I always watch the Olympics and always get hooked on whatever is on. Watching the elite of any sport is always great to me (except maybe baseball, that I like to play but never warmed up to watching).

Shaun White is amazing. He is so much better than any other snowboarder in the world. He tore it up last night.

I watched curling yesterday too. Don't know if anyone else caught it on one of the news channels around 5:00, I think it was on CNBC. The Americans went down 0-4 after the second set, then came back and took a 6-4 lead with 2 sets remaining and managed to absolutely blow it in overtime and lost. I can't believe I enjoy watching curling once or twice every 4 years.

I usually watch some of the curling as well, but missed it. White was amazing, that last move was the icing on his cake. Nice to see Vonn win the gold in the downhill, couldn't believe the numbers of gals that fell, oh well. Even though it was just a heat race, it was cool to watch short track again, I aim to watch all speed skating events. USA leads the medal count.

Is it too much to ask that women's beach volleyball be added to the winter games as well as the summer?

Watched the womens downhill last night. A lot of wipe outs. Good job Vohn, and Mancuso. Shawn White was absolutely great last night.

Saw this last night, this would suck!

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2859593/French-skier-in-five-second-crash.html

Excellent hockey game last night with USA beating Canada 5-3.

I have been enjoying watching the hockey myself... have watched quite a bit of it, really enjoyed the first couple periods of the Russia/Czech republic game. Of course I missed the USA game...

Does anyone know if they got the top seed? I think that depended on the sweden match, but I'm not sure which way it needed to go.

I was turning a bowl last night and watching Curling... I'm really kinda surprised how much curling they cover. I guess it's somewhat telegenic, easy to cover, indoors... Dont get me wrong, I enjoy it, I'm just surprised that it's covered so much, and only covered during the olympics.

Pez wrote:

I was turning a bowl last night and watching Curling...

What?
You mean like Demi Moore in the movie 'Ghost'? Or do you mean like Jeff Spicoli on 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High'?

IrishGuy wrote:

Pez wrote:

I was turning a bowl last night and watching Curling...

What?
You mean like Demi Moore in the movie 'Ghost'? Or do you mean like Jeff Spicoli on 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High'?

Yea, I was watching curling while dreaming of making out with Patrick Swayze.

I'm teaching myself to make bowls on a wood lathe... a practice sometimes referred to as turning.

I think the Demi Moore version is called "throwing." Add Patrick Swayze and it's 'throwing up'

Pez wrote:

IrishGuy wrote:

Pez wrote:

I was turning a bowl last night and watching Curling...

What?
You mean like Demi Moore in the movie 'Ghost'? Or do you mean like Jeff Spicoli on 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High'?

Yea, I was watching curling while dreaming of making out with Patrick Swayze.

I'm teaching myself to make bowls on a wood lathe... a practice sometimes referred to as turning.

I think the Demi Moore version is called "throwing." Add Patrick Swayze and it's 'throwing up'

Ahh, I see. The respect is maintained. Cause if you were playing with clay, the would be totally gay, but playing with wood is completely legit.

You know you had the soundtrack playing in the background.

Back on topic...

I saw a crazy wreck in mens ski cross yesterday. A guy went over a ramp and got off balance. He ended up landing on his back from what looked like 15 feet or so up. Also saw Bode Miller get his first gold.

Has anyone seen the speedskating relay race on the short track? I watched qualifying the other night and it was bizarre. There are 4 skaters for each team and one skater goes for 1.5 laps, then instead of passing a baton like the running races, the skater pushes his teamate in front of him to kind of give him a speed boost. Hard to explain without seeing it.

I saw those events too IrishGuy. I think the guy in ski-cross was Canuckian (where the heck is he anyway?) and when he was interviewed later, he said he knew he had the Bronze, but he wanted Gold, so he went for it (and lost out on the Bronze). I guess it's a new event this year, and it's alright, but I like Snowboarding better than it.

I also saw the retrospective they did on the 1980 men's hockey team. Wonderful story! Makes me want to go out and rent "Miracle." Amazing that all of those guys on that team are still alive today. The only one dead is their coach Herb Brooks.

The "Miracle" movie is pretty good... Kurt Russel does well as brooks. My parents lived in KC for a while and one of the guys on that team lived 2-3 doors down from them. My dad actually built a deck for them. I guess his wife was a real bit**...

Man... I really try to like figure skating... I.... just.... dont...

Pez wrote:Man... I really try to like figure skating... I.... just.... dont...

I'm with you on that one. Actually, I can watch the traditional figure skating, with difficult jumps and all, and be semi-interested, but this ice dancing is just intolerable to watch.

Markwes wrote:

Pez wrote:Man... I really try to like figure skating... I.... just.... dont...

I'm with you on that one. Actually, I can watch the traditional figure skating, with difficult jumps and all, and be semi-interested, but this ice dancing is just intolerable to watch.

I think there would Be a huge benefit if they ditched just a bit of the pageantry of the whole thing. the short progeram is 3+ minutes long, then 3+ minutes to wait for the score, then 1-2 minutes for the next one, if they dont go to a commercial first... 3 mins of skating every 10... put a time limit on it or something... 3 jumping passes, 2 twizzles and a footwork pass, and you have 45 seconds, 2 time outs and 40 yards to drive for the touchdown.... wait...