Oh hell. If you are right, I owe him an apology. If I really did misread your post, Spezza, my bad. :smack:
Doesn’t seem that was extending the lead.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5859225/
In case anyone thinks that’s an NBC conspiracy
1st link shows it in the 2nd paragraph, 2nd link has is further down.
Also, it took a full mile after that for him to lose the lead.
Whatever the reason is, Lima is truly a class act.
Thanks for the clarification duffer.
When watching sporting events, I prefer the old-school religious fanatics. Why couldn’t this guy hold up a “John 3:16” sign while wearing a rainbow wig?
Rainbow Man was too peaceful, and he didn’t disrupt anything.
Actve religioius fanatics are in now.
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a971107.html
Problem was Stewart would have just stood on the curb holding a sign. Wheras Horan was friggin’ pro-active!!!
Mike Myers: Now, that bloke who stabbed Monica Seles, that was prime hooliganism!
Mark McKinney: Too right, oi? That was doon straight up.
Myers: 'ere, give us a kiss. [head butts McKinney]
McKinney: Ach, you right bastard! You broke me nose again!
As much as I would like to pit the event, it produced one of the most heartwarming events of the Olympics. After all, athletes overcoming adversity is one of the compelling things in the Olympics, so much so that the coverage digs deeper and deeper every year to come up with more tales of adversity (AIEEEE! A hangnail!). This one is genuine and is actually related to athletics. Lima got back on the course and received the biggest ovation of any of the runners as he came into the stadium and again on the medal stand. The fans appreciated his effort, and he demonstrated a perfect response. He didn’t blame anyone, he didn’t get mad, he just accepted it and did his best, and seemed genuinely happy to have the bronze (as was apparent by his final few meters as he flew from side to side with his arms as wings). If every athlete was like Lima, athletics would be a lot better in many ways.
Amen, theR!
True, it is the judges which created this unfortunate situation. True, this has nothing to do with Hamm apologizing. In all fairness, the sports organizations and judges should apologize to all the competitors and Hamm for creating this dilemma. This mistake by the judges stole the gold from another competitor and shoved Hamm into this predicament. However, the reality Hamm must confront is that he did not earn his gold metal. As a display of good sportsmanship, of honor, and of respect to his competitors, he should recognize he is the only one able to right this wrong and step up to this unwanted responsibility. Nevertheless, if he does not return his ill-gotten metal, it will rest on his conscious that he never really did earn that gold; and only a mistake awarded it too him.
I did read your first post correctly. I thought I did. Apology retracted.
I’d be more impressed with this guy if he had tackled one of the race cars.
See, now, this is the problem with Formula 1. If it was a NASCAR race, the drivers could have run him over with only minor front end damange.
Acc. to Yahoo News, no jail time for the offender. I guess he’s off to the U.S. Open!
Well everyone talking of islamic fundamentalists ruining the games… and there goes a catholic/armageddon fundamentalist to ruin the marathon instead.
Hope to see him in F1 soon… and not getting jail time.
OK, first things first. It’s “medal.” Medal has a D in it. Medals are made of metals.
Secondly, it is in no way incumbent upon Hamm to return his medal. He won it. He acted in good faith and the spirit of competition, putting forward his best performance and in the process coming back from a massive mistake.
During the preliminaries, there was some controversy because two (or perhaps three) American athletes were informed that the routines they were planning were going to have a lower start value than the one that had previously been set. The athletes were advised of this two days before the start of the Games. This leads me to believe that the athletes were aware of the start values of their routines in advance of going out onto the mat to compete. If this is so, then there is no excuse for the Korean delegation not catching the error and protesting it then. If this isn’t so, then at the very least the athletes were aware of the start values at the time of the actual competition and the delegation could have protested before the athlete started his routine. Hell, someone could have gone and sat on the pommel horse; it wouldn’t be the first time a Korean staged a sit-in at the Olympics.
As has been shown and noted in other threads, there was a huge blunder on the part of the scoring judges in not taking a mandatory .2 deduction on the Korean for an extra hold in his routine. Add on the .1 for the value judges’ mistake and take off the .2 for the scoring judges’ mistake and the Korean ends up out of the medals entirely.
Finally, if the Korean had stuck one more landing then we wouldn’t be having this conversation in the first place.
And really finally, fucko off.
This year’s Williams could have gored him to death, though.
Otto, I don’t believe the gymnast’s routine had its difficulty consciously reduced, rather it was simply a cockup during the judging; given that the athlete and team are more likely to be concentrating on his performance during the actual competition, they can hardly be blamed for not spotting the judges’ error soon enough. I agree that Hamm is in no way to blame, though, and think it’s remarkably big of him and the US team to offer to share the medal, as I believe is the case. At least the Olympics tends to bring out the best in the performers, if no-one else. 
Just an update – the Grand Prix Priest (as he prefers to be called, evidently) got off with a slap on the wrist: “Cornelius Horan was given a one-year suspended sentence. Horan also was fined $3,600 and warned to stay out of trouble in Greece for the next three years.”
Not a bad price for the amount of world wide advertising he got – I bet IBM is jealous!
I’m not sure what you mean. There are two sets of judges, one set that decides the start value of the routine and one that does the deductions. Blaine Wilson and (I think) Jason Gadsen were both informed before the Olympics that their high bar routines, which had previously been rated with a certain start value, would be started at a lower value for the Olympic competition. Wilson changed his routine to get a higher start value and fell off the bar. Gadsen didn’t change his routine and started with the lower value. If the American team was informed before the Games of the start value of the routines then it stands to reason the Koreans were informed of their start values too. The judges who score the deductions don’t have anything to do with setting the start values. Both sets of judges screwed up on the Korean’s PB routine but the Koreans seem to want only one error taken into consideration. Meanwhile, some people (not you) are calling Hamm a bad sport because he isn’t volunteering to give away the thing he’d been working toward for over a decade.
Apology extended for misleading you. Obviously I totally misread it.