I’m not keen on stories about how athletes overcame such personal tragedies as ingrown toenails to get where they are today, but the story of Alex Bilodeau and his brother was somehow touching. It put the camera shots of Frederic Bilodeau at the finish line, cheering on his brother, in context. Well done guys! You both deserve congratulations.
I had heard someone say that the first Canadian to win a Gold was going to get a bonus. The number I heard was $1 million. Is there any truth to this?
BTW, I really feel sorry for the Slovak women hockey team. They really didn’t belong on the same ice as the Canadians.
Anybody else getting crappy quality transmission? NBC or my cable company? Major, major annoying.
On my TV, the pictures are generally good (with very intermittent breakup of the HD), but the sound is out of sync routinely.
My understanding is that women’s hockey should really just be a 7-game series between the U.S. and Canada, as they’re so far ahead if the rest of the field.
By the way, the the spread on Canada-Slovakia was 11.5 goals. The Over/Under was 12, which means that Slovakia was a huge underdog to score even a single goal (which, of course, the didn’t).
Keep in mind that Slovakia had to qualify for their spot in the Olympics. In one of their games, they beat Bulgaria 82-0. Women’s hockey is a 2.5 team tournament. The Swedes deserve a mention since they beat the US in Turin.
Goals for and against also come into play for tiebreakers in international hockey, so it was in Canada’s best interests (and Slovakia, versus Bulgaria) to score as many freaking goals as humanly possible.
It is just a matter of time before Sweden, Finland and Russia catch up, but it taking longer than we thought…
sigh
…congratulations Charlotte Kalla. That was a hell of a race.
but Marit shoulda won, man, Marit shoulda won!
It’s not just taking longer than we thought, it isn’t really happening. The 2006 Sweden fluke aside, there’s no evidence that the rest of the world is ready to take the ice against Canada (especially) and the USA. Sweden has about a 1% chance of beating the USA and zero of beating Canada.
I think Canada’s hockey program should find other countries’ women’s hockey programs and provide them with coaching and guidance. Maybe finagle a way to lend them some players who can’t quite make the Canadian squad but who can make a vague claim to the other country’s citizenship. What’s the point in having a great team if you’re just massacring everyone, the USA aside?
Men’s Downhill:
[spoiler]Gold: Didier Defago (SUI)
Silver: Aksel Lund Svindal (NOR)
Bronze: Bode Miller (USA)
Canada’s hope, Erik Guay, came in 5th behind Austria’sMario Scheiber.[/spoiler]
The top three competitors were separated by 9 hundredths of a second! Are downhill races typically that close?
yeah, Unfortunately women’s hockey is totally non-competitive.
Too bad they can’t subdivide it and still be Olympic. Maybe like like a Quebec team, as Ontario team, a Prairie team, Michigan, Minnesota, Massachusetts, etc. That would be much more watchable and competitive.
Is that the Steven Bradbury race you’re talking about? If so, Bradbury finishes on his feet for the gold (he went last-to-first). It’s actually quite an awesome story. In the quarters, he’s up against Ohno and Marc Gangnon (Canada) in his heat. They are clearly the favorites and, in fact, do finish in the top two, with Bradbury third. However, Gagnon gets DQ’ed for interfering with another skater, and Bradbury moves on.
So, in the semis, he and his coach realize that he doesn’t really have much of a chance keeping up with the skaters, so they decide on a hang-back-and-hope-for-the-best strategy. Sure enough, he’s in last place in the semis, when a crash takes out most of the field for him, and Bradbury finishes second, and continues his unlikely journey to the finals.
And then, you have the link above to the finals. Really incredible story for Steven Bradbury and Australia.
The Australian coach is bitching about how Begg-Smith should have won the gold, because Bilodeau “is just not capable” of 4.8, 4.9 [score] turns, and are accusing the judges of being swayed by the pro-Canadian crowd. Nevermind that the Aussi was actually slower, and that alone could have made up the difference in the winning score. I know it’s his coach, and not him, but the more I hear about this Begg-Smith guy, the less I like him!
Also Bilodeau’s aerial was a more difficult one than Begg-Smith’s; and Begg-Smith did not grab his ski on his trick, which is a requirement of it.
The CTV coverage of the event was some of the worst I’ve ever seen of a live sporting event, because nothing was explained. The difference between the top competitors wasn’t given a single word of analysis, not so much as a smidgen of explanation, except that the very last guy’s second jump was botched (and you didn’t need to be told.) If Begg made a technical mistake, that was NEVER mentioned once on the CTV broadcast. No aspects of the athletes’s performance was critiqued. All they did for the last ten races was scream “This guy is amazing! Just an amazing run! Look at him go!” and variations thereof.
I found it immensely frustrating, because I didn’t know WHY some guys were beating other guys in “Air score” and “turn score.” I know Bilodeau was much faster than Begg-Smith, and that that’s why he won (their “air scores” and “turn scores” cancelled out; the entire difference in score was the time factor.) But why did Bilodeau beat out his teammate, Vincent Marquis, who was even faster? I trust that the judges and anyone who’s into moguls skiing could see a difference, but most people aren’t into moguls skiing, and it would have been awfully helpful for the announcers to at least point out some critical features that affected their scores.
As to the accusation that the judges were swayed by the Canadian crowd, the problem with that theory is twofold:
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Again, they gave Begg-Smith the same subjective score they gave Bilodeau. The race was decided by the speed difference, and
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If the judges wanted to give a Canadian a gold medal, why didn’t they do it the day before, when in the women’s moguls, they could quite easily have handed the gold to the Canadian that finished second? Surely THAT was their chance to give the crowd a Canadian gold, right?
by gum, you are correct. that is the race, and the attention is on the crash and mr. bradbury slips through. you barely notice him because of the heap. he is just this flash through the heap of strewn racers.
he did keep his head and feet squarely on the race. fantastic day for mr bradbury and australia, and great video for the grand and great-grands. smart and steady does win the race!
I didn’t see it live, but I’ve been watching the coverage on RDS more often than not, and for the moguls one of the two announcers is Jean-Luc Brassard (of Lillihammer Gold medal and pot fame). His analyses have been amazing, with lots of technical info and detail. He notices little slip ups that seem like nothing at all but can make a major difference in the score. Too bad CTV couldn’t get someone as good in English.
It was Ross Rebagliati, a gold medalist in snowboarding in 1998, who was famous for enjoying the kind weed.