Sports & Living
Imprint, Friday, February 26, 2010
19
Strokes and chokes jsmith@imprint.uwaterloo.ca
C
anadians have really been taken for a roller-coaster ride throughout these Olympic Games. There have been massive upsets left and right with Canadian athletes feeling the brunt of some exceedingly high expectations. The “Own The Podium” program has not produced the type of results that were being discussed before the Games began. It hasn’t been all disappointments, however, as biathlete JeanPhilippe Le Guellec placed sixth in the men’s 10km sprint - the best finish ever by a Canadian. The real headlines have been stolen by the Canadian cross-country team, which isn’t receiving nearly as much coverage as they deserve. Canada had three men finish in the top ten in the 30km pursuit - not an easy feat. Canadian teams also had best-ever results in the men’s and women’s team sprints; the men claimed purple (fourth) and the women were seventh. People put too much emphasis on medals because they’re countable. Yes it’s great to rack up the medals but purple isn’t a bad result when you consider that cross-country skiing is historically dominated by Eastern European countries. While Canada doesn’t have the medal total that people were expecting, it’s hard to call the efforts of the Canadian Olympic Committee an abject failure. The alpine ski team was a bit of a disaster but Canada is beginning to be competitive in events that were a complete write-off in past Olympics (Canadian ski-jumpers exist?). While it’s a little premature to start making predictions, expect the 2014 Games to produce Canada’s highet medal total ever.
First Down... It’s sad to think about the large number of people who are missing the Olympics because they’re too focused on the men’s hockey team. Not sure if those people realize that it’s only one event out of 86. The Games are an excellent opportunity to see sports that are not usually televised; don’t get tunnel vision and forget to enjoy the Games. While we’re on the subject: isn’t it much more satisfying to watch amateur athletes win gold than professionals? Obviously Canadian pride dictates our desire for Team Canada to win, but Sidney Crosby or Alexander Ovechkin winning gold is not the same as Jon Montgomery or Evgeny Ustyugov taking it home... Speaking of Jon Montgomery: his celebration was simply classic after he watched Martins Dukurs finish the race slightly behind his own time. Too often champions hold back their reactions, but what would you expect from someone who goes head first down a path of ice at speeds over 100 km per hour? The best part of his victory was seeing him chug a pitcher of beer on the streets of Vancouver and nobody seeming to care. How bizarre was the Michael Douglas disqualification just before the third and fourth runs of the skeleton? First off, it’s the Olympics and you’re competing in one event; what else are you thinking about 30 minutes before your run? It’s not like these guidelines are a secret. Second, and possibly the most ridiculous part of the story, Douglas not so subtly called out his coach and Montgomery in an interview afterwards for not reminding him! Pretty sure it’s your own responsibility to do something you’ve probably done a thousand times previous - figure it out, sports fan.
Seventh Inning Stretch... Huge hat tip to Sven Kramer of the Netherlands for putting an NBC reporter in her place. After winning the gold in the men’s 5000m long track speed skating event an NBC reporter asked him who he was and what he had just won. Kramer replied with, “Are you stupid?”. The answer: yes. Kramer is by far the biggest star athlete in the Netherlands and is clearly just figuring out that if you aren’t an American, they have no knowledge of you whatsoever. Is anyone else confused as to how the South Koreans are so good at speed skating? Apparently this is a popular after-school activity for them. It’s not that the Canadians are choking in short-track skating, the Koreans are clearly just superior in terms of speed and strategy. After the first few days of racing it was evident that the Canadians had severely overestimated how many medal chances they had in short-track and the results showed it... Kevin Martin is destroying the field in men’s curling and it’s not even fair. It’s not a big story because this is what everyone expects Canadian teams to do at international competitions, but there are a lot of quality teams outside of Canada. The main difference between Canada and the rest of the world is the depth of teams. Canada has at least a dozen teams that could play in this tournament and have a legitimate shot at winning, whereas other countries have one or two teams that repeatedly make it. It makes you wonder if it would make more sense to drop one or two countries and let in an extra Canadian team. How about France gets a curling club and then their team can play at the Olympics.
While Canada isn’t in the race for the overall medal title (were people really talking like we had a shot?), it’s possible we can contend for the most golds. In all honesty isn’t gold what it’s all about? They can hand out medals for as many positions as they want but it’s all academic really. Overtime... As enjoyable as Shaun White’s 1260 was to watch in the half pipe snowboarding competition, the Olympics really could have done without his “I’m the greatest” attitude. Not only is this the absolute opposite message the Olympics is supposed to be conveying to kids but the snowboard half-pipe is one of the least impressive events in the Winter Games. As long as we’re talking about Americans: it’s probably time for them to stop winning medals. There is nothing worse than watching an American athlete stand on any part of the podium. You can see the smug satisfaction on their face knowing that they’re running away with the overall medal count. Any other athlete is fine (sans Canada’s prodigal son turned Australian, Dale Begg-Smith). The only thing tolerable about the US at these Olympics is Stephen Colbert. Congratulations to the Finnish women’s hockey team for hitting double digit shots during their semi-final match-up with Canada. An achieve-
ment that without a doubt had the fans on the edge of their seats. In the same game, Canada’s Meghan Agosta had a real accomplishment as she became the first player in Olympic history with nine goals (three hat-tricks) in one year. Both of these feats just underscore the fact that women’s hockey has a long way to go before it should be considered as an Olympic event. What is with the awkward commentary from the curling arena? Why is this allowed to continue? Vic Rauter, Linda Moore, and Ray Turnbull are, at the best of times, simply filling air time with confusing dialogue. Other times it seems like Turnbull openly dislikes Rauter and prides himself on exposing Rauter’s ignorance of intricate curling strategy. Whether this is a clever ploy to explain the game to novice curlers or not remains to be seen but Turnbull needs to go...quickly. Shout out of the Week: A general shout out this week is extended to all of the biathletes in the Olympics, and even those who weren’t in it. The natural combination of skiing and shooting is quite entertaining to watch and no doubt comes in handy during life and death alpine pursuits. Nobody is fooled, however; all biathletes are training for the same thing: an epic chase down the Swiss Alps with James Bond. (The Living Daylights is the movie you’re remembering.)
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