Winter Olympics

[declansdad]

Well then. We better cut curling out of the Olympics. Also cut bobsledding down to one rider and eliminate Biathlon because the shooting portion isn't athletic in the least. And if you eliminate the shooting what is left is cross country skiing and that is already an event.

In the summer olympics we can eliminate dressage, Table Tennis, Badminton, Air rifle.

If you don't think there is anything athletic about those sports, you should go try them. The technical components of figure skating are very athletic. The coordination you need, the cardio needed to complete the programs, the strength you need to do the jumps...all very athletic. The music, the costumes, the choreography..not so much.

 

[Planogirl]

Well then. We better cut curling out of the Olympics. Also cut bobsledding down to one rider and eliminate Biathlon because the shooting portion isn't athletic in the least. And if you eliminate the shooting what is left is cross country skiing and that is already an event.

In the summer olympics we can eliminate dressage, Table Tennis, Badminton, Air rifle.

I think that ice dancing might be questionable too.

 

[Jennasis]

Well then. We better cut curling out of the Olympics. Also cut bobsledding down to one rider and eliminate Biathlon because the shooting portion isn't athletic in the least. And if you eliminate the shooting what is left is cross country skiing and that is already an event.

In the summer olympics we can eliminate dressage, Table Tennis, Badminton, Air rifle.

Excuse me? You think dressage isn't an athletic endeavor? I am a professional instructor and rider and I personally invite you to my farm for a free riding lesson any time.

 

[cabanafrau]

I think that ice dancing might be questionable too.

When my oldest was in HS she wound up in a weight conditioning gym class with the varsity and junior varsity football squads because it was the only thing that fit her schedule. It was taught by the football coach and he was a little lost when he wound up with my daughter and a couple of her friends in the class, none of whom participated in any sports through school. He told the girls not to worry, that the evaluation of their results would be based against their own weight, so they didn't have to worry about the fact that they were working next to guys who were much larger than they were. The coach was absolutely thrown for a loop when my daughter ended up able to straight up lift more than any of the guys without even factoring in the discrepancies in their size and weight.

He just looked at my daughter and said, how, how can you do that? She told him it was years of dance. By the end of the term she almost had him convinced that he needed to consider some ballet training if he wanted the team to improve core strength. Dance is absolutely sport. Its cousin ice dance absolutely qualifies as well.

 

[Turn the Page]

When my oldest was in HS she wound up in a weight conditioning gym class with the varsity and junior varsity football squads because it was the only thing that fit her schedule. It was taught by the football coach and he was a little lost when he wound up with my daughter and a couple of her friends in the class, none of whom participated in any sports through school. He told the girls not to worry, that the evaluation of their results would be based against their own weight, so they didn't have to worry about the fact that they were working next to guys who were much larger than they were. The coach was absolutely thrown for a loop when my daughter ended up able to straight up lift more than any of the guys without even factoring in the discrepancies in their size and weight.

He just looked at my daughter and said, how, how can you do that? She told him it was years of dance. By the end of the term she almost had him convinced that he needed to consider some ballet training if he wanted the team to improve core strength. Dance is absolutely sport. Its cousin ice dance absolutely qualifies as well.

If you can blow out a knee or break a bone I consider it a sport. So dance and riding definitely count.

 

[kmb584]

If anyone is interested, the Scranton Times/Sunday Times had a very nice front page article on Adam Rippon who is from Clarks Summit, PA. It told about how much he had to overcome (injuries/money) to get to the Olympics and the article said that he speaks his mind (loved the comment about the Xanax and drink to calm him down!!) and he is really a very genuine person. Nice to see him do so well last night and he certainly helped the US win bronze.

Off topic here, but we must live in the same area. The Scranton Times is my local newspaper and Clarks Summit is a 10-minute ride away on the highway.

 

[cabanafrau]

Excuse me? You think dressage isn't an athletic endeavor? I am a professional instructor and rider and I personally invite you to my farm for a free riding lesson any time.

Can I just say I agree without a lesson? Have a friend who competes and I could never even think to begin in my wildest dreams.

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

I think that ice dancing might be questionable too.

Keep in mind I'm not the one questioning it. The argument I made is that artistry should be left in. The one that claimed it was supposed to be an athletic competition is arguing that it should be out. So my point is, if we're going to take the artistry out of skating, and requiring pure athletics, then we should cut some of those other things where there are more artistry or skill involved too.

If you don't think there is anything athletic about those sports, you should go try them. The technical components of figure skating are very athletic. The coordination you need, the cardio needed to complete the programs, the strength you need to do the jumps...all very athletic. The music, the costumes, the choreography..not so much.

If the music, costumes, choreography and the like are part of the show, they should be judged. Figure skating isn't the only event with style points. Even ski jumping, which I am watching right now isn't just who has the furthest jump. There are style points involved. Many of the freestyle skiing and many of the snowboarding events involve style points.

Excuse me? You think dressage isn't an athletic endeavor? I am a professional instructor and rider and I personally invite you to my farm for a free riding lesson any time.

The point isn't that these things involve no athleticism. If you'd concentrate half the energy on getting my point that you concentrated on getting upset, it was easy to get. my point regarding dressage as my example is if we're going to eliminate style points because they don't involve athleticism, then why do we even have dressage, or more skill oriented things. Dressage at beginner level where my horse would be is about competing tests. But at an olympic level, they're all competent at completing those tests and it becomes who can do it with the most flair. If you eliminate the style, what's left to do at that sort of level? Sure from time to time we'll see a refusal. But a refusal is complete disaster. The gold, is separated from the silver, from the bronze by style.

 

[pryncess527]

Thanks to the event streams on NBC, I've been able to watch a lot of uninterrupted, almost commercial-free coverage of EVERY athlete. I'm really enjoying it!

Now, if only they'd have a nice, safe way to locate those streams without seeing a spoiler for the event on the main page first . . . both the men's and women's snowboarding were spoiled for me by NBC when I was trying to navigate to the event feeds

 

[AlohaNow]

Message to cabanafrau's daughter: drop the mic, girl.

 

[Jennasis]

Keep in mind I'm not the one questioning it. The argument I made is that artistry should be left in. The one that claimed it was supposed to be an athletic competition is arguing that it should be out. So my point is, if we're going to take the artistry out of skating, and requiring pure athletics, then we should cut some of those other things where there are more artistry or skill involved too.

If the music, costumes, choreography and the like are part of the show, they should be judged. Figure skating isn't the only event with style points. Even ski jumping, which I am watching right now isn't just who has the furthest jump. There are style points involved. Many of the freestyle skiing and many of the snowboarding events involve style points.

The point isn't that these things involve no athleticism. If you'd concentrate half the energy on getting my point that you concentrated on getting upset, it was easy to get. my point regarding dressage as my example is if we're going to eliminate style points because they don't involve athleticism, then why do we even have dressage, or more skill oriented things. Dressage at beginner level where my horse would be is about competing tests. But at an olympic level, they're all competent at completing those tests and it becomes who can do it with the most flair. If you eliminate the style, what's left to do at that sort of level? Sure from time to time we'll see a refusal. But a refusal is complete disaster. The gold, is separated from the silver, from the bronze by style.

But skill and athleticism go hand-in-hand in these more sports. It takes skill to pull off those movements in dressage/figure skating/gymnastics, but it also requires an immense amount of athleticism to make it look so seamless and to do it well. Heck, the half-pipe and slopestyle snowboard events are judged on style, as is freestyle skiing and ski jumping. All things that have a very big subjective judging component.

The bottom line is that there are simply some sports that require a subjective style portion of the judging...we may not agree with the system and how points are awarded. I do miss the days of the perfect 10 in gymastics or the 6 in figure skating.

 

[declansdad]

But skill and athleticism go hand-in-hand in these more sports. It takes skill to pull off those movements in dressage/figure skating/gymnastics, but it also requires an immense amount of athleticism to make it look so seamless and to do it well. Heck, the half-pipe and slopestyle snowboard events are judged on style, as is freestyle skiing and ski jumping. All things that have a very big subjective judging component.

The bottom line is that there are simply some sports that require a subjective style portion of the judging...we may not agree with the system and how points are awarded. I do miss the days of the perfect 10 in gymastics or the 6 in figure skating.

Style judging in sports like slopestyle, freestyle and ski jumping is still based on the technical aspects of how they perform the skill. Style or artistry in figure skating is not technically based and is probably closer to synchro swimming judging.

 

[Planogirl]

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely consider ice dancing a sport. However if you take out the finesse and artistry as the other poster suggested than why bother? It just becomes stunts.

 

[declansdad]

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely consider ice dancing a sport. However if you take out the finesse and artistry as the other poster suggested than why bother? It just becomes stunts.

You mean gymnastics.

 

[elphaba91]

I would venture to say that the U.S. is the most diverse country out there, and the Olympic teams show it.
Which makes me wonder about the so called America is not diverse or tolerant enough 'haters'.

But, anyhow, it is true that it must be too easy for athletes to find a way to compete under another flag, if perhaps they might not be good enough to make the U.S. team.
One I saw really stood out to me... a pair, neither of which seemed to have direct ties to the country they were competing for... The guy was an all-american from New Jersey???

There was quite an outrage in the gymnastics community a few years ago when 2 American gymnasts who had no Belarusian heritage and had never even been to Belarus were given citizenship and allowed to compete at Worlds and then one at the Olympics. It was organised by their coaches and the President of the Women’s Technical Committee for the International Federation. These girls couldn’t even qualify for US nationals and weren’t leaps and bounds ahead of actual Belarusian gymnasts and I believe the whole thing was financed by their parents so it really seemed like they bought their way in.

In general though, as any Australian politician will tell you, citizenship laws are very complex and many countries are keen to claim you as one of their own despite very weak ties! Many people are actually dual citizens without knowing!

Australia won their first (and possibly only) medal last night - a silver in men’s moguls.

 

[Julie's Haircut]

Rippon has a bronze now so everyone that wished him ill didn't get their wish. And he was instrumental in us getting it.

I guess you haven't seen the comments that claim the only reason he got a medal is because the rest of the team carried him.

Just a guess on my part but I would say under their old system it was all subjective. This system does seem to reward the skaters that attempt more technical programs vs those who play it safe.

I like the new system better. Kristi Yamaguchi won the gold in 1992 by playing it safe. Most of the other top competitors were docked points because they fell on more difficult routines.

No, they didn't. You might get a shot of your country's favorite out there with a couple comments about how the compulsories are not their strength and some thoughts about how far down in the rankings they could finish before it hurts their shot at the gold, but that was it until it was short program time and you were told where everyone stands after compulsories.

Brian Orser would have stood atop the podium in '84 and '88 were it not for his compulsory placements. The very next Olympics in '92 was the first without compulsories. He had to have been truly dreadful at them, because Scott Hamilton really struggled with compulsories himself and was held back by them often.

Then there was the case of Beatrix Schuba, 1972 women's gold medalist from Austria, who excelled at school figures but was relatively weak in short and long program. She built up such a commanding lead after the compulsories that she was able to coast to victory with an 8th place finish in the long program.



By the way, I suppose I'm one of the few who doesn't understand the hype over the American skater's triple axel. When you need to place TWO qualifiers on the feat (American woman and during the Olympics), it's not all that impressive.

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

I guess you haven't seen the comments that claim the only reason he got a medal is because the rest of the team carried him.

I haven't read them no. I certainly don't agree with them. He got third. We got third And the announcers and most thought he should have had 2nd. Nobody carried him. He did his job. I really don't think anyone got carried.

But if someone is going to claim someone got carried.
Pairs got 4th and 4th.
Our man in the short got 4th.
Our woman in the short got 5th

But again I think everyone did their part. Even a perfect performance from our guy in the short doesn't elevate us to Silver and everyone else did just about what they could.

Haters are gonna hate. Of course they're going to try and run him down. He earned that bronze medal just like everyone else did. I'm proud of our team. The whole team.

 

[Disney_Alli]

I wonder how NBC feels about the US marching relatively early. I remember they tried to get Rio officials to change the order from Estados Unidos to United States, but Rio said no. NBC was concerned ratings would nosedive after the US entered, and they were right.



If he's interested, I might still have some VHS tapes from the 1988 Calgary and 1992 Albertville games down in my basement. I'll let them go cheap.



On Thursday evening I watched the curling mixed doubles and men's downhill ski training runs on NBC-SN. But tonight they were showing Notre Dame college hockey. I'll have to check out the other NBC affiliated channels.

I suddenly wish I had a VCR I'd kill for figure skating tapes from 88 and 92!

 

[hopemax]

By the way, I suppose I'm one of the few who doesn't understand the hype over the American skater's triple axel. When you need to place TWO qualifiers on the feat (American woman and during the Olympics), it's not all that impressive.

The first one was landed in 1988. It's been 30 years and Mirai is still only the 7th woman to ever do it. Considering how fast sports can change, 7 people in 30 years is still pretty impressive to me.

 

[AlohaNow]

Does it make anyone else nervous with how little space the skiers/ski jumpers/slope snowboarders have at the end of their course to come to a stop? Every single time I'm like, they're going to hit the wall! Yet they always manage to stop in time and not hit the wall. I guess that's what makes them Olympic athletes and me the person sitting on my couch watching the Olympic athletes, while eating chips.

Also, I love the Carnival ad with Shaq. It cracks me up every time I see it!