2026 Winter Olympics - follow along and discussion thread

The Game Room
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psychobunny - Yow. Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo is scary good. Imagine if he was actually trying! :grin: Side note: I finally finished the men’s downhill today, and the one American that got interviewed (he finished something like 20th) said something about it’s not about winning the gold, it’s about showing up and doing your best. This is the kind of attitude that would’ve gotten American Olympians defenestrated not very long ago (I recall the GOLD GOLD GOLD GOLD GOLD hysteria as late as London), and USA had no problem airing it. And now a nation very rightfully celebrates a 2nd place. We really have come a long way. :slightly_smiling_face:

As for network flag-waving, I’m used to it. I think Atlanta was when it first started getting really bad.

I’m more interested in how a result happened, so I don’t care about spoilers, but I’ll wait until the whole family is in for the evening before watching the rest of the men’s free skate (finally bit the bullet and set “Primetime in Milan” recordings). I will say regarding Malinin that I always get a bit nervous when an athlete gives himself a pretentious nickname (American Ninja Warrior was not a pleasant experience for me near the end), and for all the hype, nothing has ever been a lock for him. He’s a high-risk, go-for-the-green gunner who can self-destruct at any time (he nearly did in the team competition). I don’t expect to be particularly shocked by what I see.

Dinsdale - Given that NBC owns the Olympics, that didn’t surprise me at all. They are way too enamored with family members. I remember grumbling about this regarding women’s beach volleyball in Paris.

LurkMeister - I don’t recall a single instance at any level of competition where a skater just quit. I imagine that most everyone in the figure skating community would consider it not only disgraceful, but bizarre…this is your time in the limelight, and you’re just going to give it up for no good reason? As for injuries, I remember watching a couple accident compilations on YouTube a while back, and yes, there were some nasty injuries in them. Rare at elite levels, thankfully.

N9IWP - Wikipedia link on Skeleton.

Figure skating has a mandatory 1 point deduction for a fall (2 points after the second fall), but the much bigger hit is for messing up the jump, and that’s never cut and dried. On the plus side, individual judges’ scores don’t get shown anymore, so they don’t have to worry about scrutiny! :grin:

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Earlier this morning (and as I type this) NBC showed Biathlon live – you know they are hard up when they show something that is not (I assume) that popular AND the US isn’t expected to do well (the two are similar but not the same)
Interesting some shoot targets left to right and some right to left.

Brian

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We watched that as well, and wondered if it was just a slow period that needed some filler. I mean, an American came in 8th. 8th!! WTH? We don’t wanna see no 8th! Please only show us the gold!! /s

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I like watching a few minutes of biathlon. The original Olympics were tribes showing off their military prowess in a non-lethal way. The only Olympic sport we have that’s even slightly relevant to modern military is biathlon. I believe Finnish soldiers still practice that, and run around near the border on skis. (Although I’m sure it’s a lot less relevant than it used to be, like all individual riflery. ) I’d be sad to totally miss the biathlon.

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There are also skied soldiers in the Alpine regions/countries.

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I always said that a biathlete would be useful to have if you’re stranded in the snow. I want someone who can kill some food and go for help.

Meanwhile, watching the pairs short program and what they do is crazy. I’m sort of rooting for the 42 year old woman because this is a sport for young women but she is tough.

The one thing that’s been bothering me is that people are talking like letting Ilia skate in the exhibition is controversial. I think all medal winners should be allowed to skate and no he didn’t win a medal in men’s but everyone seems to forget he still has a gold medal in the team competition. I think everyone who skated on a medal winning team should be in the exhibition if they want. People keep saying how bad this was for Ilia and how this Olympics was a complete failure for him but dude still won an Olympic gold medal!

Looking forward to more slopestyle tonight. Can’t figure out the point system but appreciate the insanity.

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I’ll bump this. Is there any good, brief daily summary? Not necessarily YouTube but anywhere?

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Just think what his medal count could be if he learned to shoot! :money_mouth_face:

Bullet: You might try the little short recap usually around 11:35 (on the local channel). It’s called “Olympic Late Night” and they tend to rush thru some stuff. Closest thing to highlights I think.

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Turned into NBC real time this morning and caught the final skeleton event, team mixed. (Side note, I find it a remarkable and very welcome development that so many mixed events have been added to the Olympics in recent years, and as far as I know there’s been zero beef. You’d think at least the pronoun spazzoids would have something, but nope, silence!) It had a thrilling conclusion, with the fourth to last pair, from Germany, taking the lead, then the third to last pair, also from Germany, finished one hundredth of a second faster, and still had the lead after the second to last…only to be decisively outdone by the final pair, from Great Britain. I remember that old quote about if you want to understand the value of one hundredth of a second, ask someone who won a silver medal in the Olympics, and I was pleasantly surprised I actually got to see it live. :grin: (Speaking of which, anyone got a list of these? The only other example I know of is Josh Kerr in the 1500m in Paris.)

Also saw some monobob just now. I’m not sure why it never stood out for me before, but in the sliding events, nobody ever has a “perfect” run. These are the best of the best in the sport, and every run there are bumps, skids, and missed lines. Plural. And of course, being even a tiny bit too late, too early, or too slow in the starting push can ruin their hopes. I always knew that it took a tremendous amount of guts to go flying down a narrow ice chute, but I can’t imagine the unbelievable level of guts needed to contend in these sports. There is no margin for error.

N9IWP - In the past NBC rightfully caught a lot of flack for massively delaying its Olympic coverage (I recall one event that started airing as I was reading a newspaper article about it), and the Internet era effectively killed this practice for good. The problem with the Winter Olympics (I still think the opening ceremony has to be same-day tape, BTW) is that there aren’t that many events running at any one time, and there’s a bunch of stuff we’re never going to contend in. So in such instances, they go with Option #2: quirky stuff you don’t see anytime else. Hey I appreciate acts of corporate goodwill, even if done out of necessity. :slightly_smiling_face:

psychobunny - Geez. The man landed a jump one else in history has ever done and won back to back Worlds. If he wants to do the clown show, let him do the effin’ clown show. Who exactly is he holding back here?

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Have you not heard of the scandal within the French women’s biathlon team? Julia Simon was recently convicted of credit card fraud. Her victims were teammate Justine Braissaz-Bouchet (a gold medalist in 2022), and the team’s physiotherapist. Simon was banned from the sport for six months, five months of which was suspended. That allowed her to compete in the Olympics.

Simon won gold in the individual event a few days ago. Braissaz-Bouchet finished 80th.

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Okay, finally saw the rest of the men’s free skate. Awesome clutch effort by Mikhail Shaidorov, who left absolutely no doubt and got Kazakhstan’s first ever winter gold medal and the first medal of any kind since 1998. One of the coolest stories in sports is when someone who no one pegged as a favorite crushes it when it counts and shoots straight to the top, and it’s especially awesome when it happens on the biggest stage of all. :partying_face: As for the inevitable nonsense about “that’s not how you want to win it”, I accept no word but his on that particular subject. I’d certainly like to win like that!

Equal props to Shun Sato, who looked hopelessly out of contention but put together a very sharp, very clean program and will leave Milan with hardware (bronze).

Cha Jun-Hwan: Game, might’ve had a shot at the podium if he had more power. Daniel Grassl: Just not that great. Adam Siao Him Fa: Ugh. Notoriously streaky, and it showed. Yuma Kagiyama (silver): Something was definitely off, but he did enough things right to finish solidly between Sato and Shaidorov. He’ll be back.

Which leaves Ilia Malinin, and…hoo boy. Three pops, two falls, 'nuff said. I could see the wheels come off after the second pop; his spins looked listless and he had trouble just getting off the ground. From what I’ve seen, the problem is that he really has trouble shaking off adversity. Something goes the way it shouldn’t and it just gets in his head. Add the pressure of a huge event and he can crumble at any time. To his credit, he did admit to overconfidence afterward, so there’s a good chance of him avoiding the slow downward spiral that often accompanies these collapses (cf. Tyson, Mike; Rousey, Rhonda; Gracie, Royce), but this one is definitely going to take some healing. Well, he got one gold, so that’s something positive, at least, and I know there are a lot of fans who expect him to come firing back at Worlds.

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Men’s Slalom was about as much fun as you can have watching ski racing. I won’t spoil it, but try to catch both runs if you can!

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The women’s hockey final is as expected; Canada vs USA.

I watched Canada’s game today and seeing Marie-Philip Poulin score twice to beat and then exceed the record for most Olympic goals in a career was pretty awesome. The previous record holder was Haley Wickenheiser. Both are absolute legends.

The announcers kept talking about the record being in women’s Olympic hockey, but Google tells me that MPP’s 20 goals exceeds the highest scoring man as well; Teemu Selanne has 17.

So that was cool!

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And my local news site wins best tagline of the day (I’ve screenshotted because it won’t stay up for long and may be behind paywall):

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And it’s a photo finish. Hmm, something seems off.

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One guy won his race in Men’s Moguls backwards. The other guy left the course, but he fell on his last jump and kinda recovered the wrong way. Good times!

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For posterity, this is Pietro Sighel for Italy finishing second in a Mens 500m short track race. He had just been bumped by another player, but instead of crashing, recovered his balance but backwards. I think he actually managed to get a good push from the maneuver.

Finishes are based on any part of the blade crossing the line.

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Was at the car dealership getting tires on and watched the last few women’s monobob–got a little emotional watching the 41 YO winner with her children… To win on that stage at that stage of life must be unbelievable.

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Germany sweeps the podium in 2-man Bob for the second straight games. Impressive!

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Yeah, we had a lot of disappointments so far, but these three medals were somehow almost guaranteed, and the athletes didn’t disappoint. Let’s see how the 4 men bob event will turn out, if Friedrich can take revenge on his eternal rival Lochner. If he wins gold, he will be the most successful Olympic bob pilot ever.