Maddenation

Olympic boredom

Last week, a cable news commentator was saying how boring the Olympics are. His point was that, years ago, before the fall of the Soviet Union, the games were a lot more interesting because they were “us against them.” We’d cheer the American “amateurs” versus the steroid-laden athletes from the communist block countries. Nowadays, that confrontation of ideologies is no longer there, and we tend to be less interested. I don’t agree with him fully, but I have to admit he has a point. Anyway, I find I’m pretty bored watching the bobsleds and the cross-country skiers. Likewise figure skating and many of the skiing events. (I do like the anticipation of a wipe out by one of the downhill racers, however.)

Maybe what we need is an infusion of new events to pique our interest. Here are a few ideas. You can add to the list.

Luge relay. (participants have to jump off/on the moving sled.)

Tag team ice dancing.

Downhill snow wrestling.

Old-fashioned snowball fights. (No judges or rules. One team must acknowledge that they lost.)

Swimsuit hockey.

Speed skating “chicken.” (Skaters speed toward each other and one who veers off at the last second loses.)

Ski high jump. (We have the “long jump,” why not the high jump?)

Polar bear swimming events.

Dad • Observations • 02/22/06 • 6 comments

Comments

David • 02/23/06 • 5:09 PM:

How about skiing around, cross country style, with a rifle on your back. Then every now and again you stop, lay down, and shot at targets.

Don’t forget about the Japanese Snowball Fighting Championships

Swimsuit hockey? Huh? The women?

Patrick • 02/24/06 • 7:56 PM:

Just yesterday I was watching the gold medal women’s curling match, which went into overtime because Switzerland came from behind (on a Sweden careless error) to tie in the tenth and final end. Then something happened that I don’t quite remember, but I do remember the commentator trembling with excitement and saying, “Oh, this is so exciting! It’s down to the wire!” or somesuch. While he said it, absolutely nothing was going on. Anyway, I enjoy curling as much as the next know-nothing American who gets his quadrennial dose by happenstance while flipping channels, and I guess the match was interesting, but I don’t think you could really call it exciting. Here is the report from NBC on the match. I love it because it’s so jargon-laden (which, coincidentally, is the name of the “skip” on the gold-medalist Swedish team: Jargenladen):

In the 11th, Switzerland put one stone in the middle and piled guards in front of it before Swedish second Cathrine Lindahl took out two stones with one shot to get the edge back. Mirjam Ott curled her first stone — Switzerland’s second-to-last of the game — around a guard, but it didn’t get inside the Swedish one that was sitting on the lip of the red 4-foot circle.

For their last stone of the Olympics, the Swiss talked over their options and Ott knocked Sweden out of the zone. That meant if the Swedes could convert with the hammer, the gold medal was theirs.

They called timeout.

The crowd made some noise.

And then it fell quiet again.

Swedish skip Anette Norberg pushed out of the hack and let the rock slide. It curled into the target area and knocked away both Swiss rocks for the victory.

I especially love “The crowd made some noise. And then it fell quiet again. Some people went to get some hot dogs from the vendors in the hallways. A woman with a cold blew her nose. A man in an orange hat yawned…”

Dad • 02/24/06 • 9:36 PM:

There’s also a Gaelic sport called Hurling, which is similar to field hockey, except the object is to throw up on the opposing team’s goalie. Just kidding. I don’t think it’s an Olympic sport. With luck, it never will be.

Dan • 02/25/06 • 12:35 PM:

Dad and I were talking about this last night. He swears he saw highlights of an aerial skier soaring off the jump followed by one of his skis soaring off his foot. We looked online for about a minute to confirm this but we found nothing. I hope it’s true and I hope I see the highlight. Anyway, we came up with another really good sport,

Untied/laced/clipped-boot Aerial Skiing

Wouldn’t you want to see those guys plan out what to do once their skis detach and there are 3 things flipping and spinning wildly in the air at the same time? Bonus points for landing on your neck and surviving.

I saw Curling the other day also. It looks like a lot of fun. It’s just a large-scale shuffleboard game—on ice! Now that would be fun! And to be one of those sweeper guys? I wonder if they wear special shoes for the ice.

Patrick • 02/25/06 • 2:37 PM:

The question: What should our family do together next time we’re in Utah?

The answer: Curling!

Dad • 02/25/06 • 5:27 PM:

Curling on the hovercraft!

Post a comment

Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)

Please capitalize your name properly and use the same information each time you comment. We will not send you spam, and your email address will not be posted.


Remember me?

Formatting
*bold*=bold
_italic_=italic
"link":http://url.com=link


Related Entries
  1. Olympic Excellence
    Joey Cheeck won Olympic gold and silver and donated his bonuses to charity.
  1. Why is it necessary to know who said it?
    Is not life a hundred times too short for us to bore ourselves?
  1. London 2012 “Branding”
    What do you guys think about the new identity and branding campaign for the London 2012 Olympic Games?
  1. What’s wrong with the NBA
    New York Times writer Michael Sokolove writes about the state of the NBA in his article, Clang!, where he lashes out against the dunk shot, the maturity of players, the three-pointer, and the Team USA 2004 Olympic performance, while suggesting rule changes to get the professional game back to how it should be: Watchable.
Validation

XHTML & CSS