I am a new fan of...
by KevinK on Aug 11, 2008 10:45 AM EDT
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PrintI vowed to limit my Olympics viewing to a bare minimum. 1. because I watched the whole TdF from beginning to end. I even watched some stages more than once. That's just a crazy amount of time spent in front of the TV. and 2. the commercial aspect of the games generally turns me off.
However, the HD coverage sucked me in, and I've been bouncing from event to event, and have been enthralled by some sports I was only dimly aware of.
For example, I'm hooked on handball--lots of action and speed and some mild violence.
How about you? Any sports that are "new to you" that are stealing the hours away from your life?
On the flip side, there are some events that don't seem to belong in the olympics. Air rifle? If that's an olympic sport, I hope darts is too.
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Really?
I’m not sure what you’ve got hold of there, but according to NBC, the only sports in the Summer Olympics are swimming and gymnastics; and figure skating is the only Winter sport. I’m not sure what these sports are of which you speak, but maybe you’re picking up some sort of “foreign Olympics” that doesn’t involve water, young girls, or even basketball (and Prezident Bush). I’d be careful if I were you. It just doesn’t sound right to me.
Please pass the bacon.
red meat with a side of water polo
yeah, the coverage on the main NBC network is a pretty healthy serving of typical fare, but they do have three other channels of HD coverage (at least it’s available through my cable network).
Water Polo
Any else see those guys tread water for hours and still have the leg strength to rise almost to the waist line out of the water and hold it while going for a shot. Very impressive!!
"...The mind has to rule the body and tell the body, shut up and do what I tell you to do..." Jens!
98% of their energy is directed at
pulling the swimmingtrunks off the opponent. I knew a guy in school who played. Those trunks they wear are made of some inpenetrable material making them damn near impossible to budge. Very impressive athletes, that is a very tough sport, the amount of fighting that goes on below the surface is unbelievable.
Carlos Sastre - Tour de France winner - Born From Jets
Yeah... and it's dominated by the Hungarians...
... any sport where you have to compete against Lazslo, son of the 3rd Regimental Hussar Captain, has got to be nasty.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
No... they also have Ice Dancing.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
it's like basketball had a fling with futbol
and they hid their love child away from the accusing eyes of the world…. or something like that.
An aspect of handball that is refreshing is that they regularly flatten each other, but nobody does the community theater style flopping that you see in basketball and futbol.
The boxing coverage has been really good...
the amateurs in the lower weight classes are spectacular to watch. It’s only four rounds so they really don’t have to hold back to conserve energy and those guys WAIL on each other for about 15 minutes straight. And you also get commentary by Teddy Atlas, a personal God of mine.
Why, oh dear god WHY do they insist on showing every… single… damn… heat… for the swimming events. So I had to wait until 11:30 last night to watch the men’s relay (which was a fantastic race if you didn’t see it… catch it online at whatever provider you use for such things).
And why does every damn news organization seem to think that the world revolves around when people on the East coast learn things… Michael Phelps wins X, Y or Z… well, let’s splash it across CNN and on the ESPN ticker three hours before anyone west of the Mississippi will find out.
Oh… and our women’s gymnastics team SUCKS. Wow… and someone explain to me how a girl falls on her ass on the dismount and still gets the highest score of the team???... that’s gotta be the worst example of preferential judging in the history of the last 15 minutes.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
The gymnastics judging confused me a bit as well last night.
It was both the US and China that had a few falls and still scored highly. The landings or falls don’t get counted as much of a deduction? Not sure. But it was odd seeing them land on their butts and still score better than 90% of those competing.
"The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed."
US and China score higher because they have harder routines.
Gymnastics scoring is different now. It starts with 10 points for execution and deducts for mistakes. It starts at zero for difficulty and goes up based on difficulty and number of elements completed. The two scores are then added together.
The US and China gymnasts start with the highest levels of difficulty. So if they deduct .3 points for a large step on landing, the level of difficulty for the routine itself can make up that difference and even more.
This article explains it better.
I think
the men’s relay was shown live, which was why it was on at 11:30.
Unless you’re not on the east coast. If that’s the case, I dunno why they waited until 11:30 to show it to you.
I watched it live (I think) here in the midwest at about 10:30 or so.
"The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed."
it was live
and it was absolutely fan-freaking-tastic
"Wizard's first rule. People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true." -- Terry Goodkind
Show of hands: How many are falling asleep at their desk
due to late night Olympic viewing?
My hand is up!
I too stayed up until Midnight to watch the US Men’s 440M Free Relay.
On the opposite side of the spectrum, watching Huff lose by the same margin an hour earlier was crushing.
here's my trick
swimming finals are scheduled btwn 10am and 12noon local time…
the tivo is set
i take a nap till around 11pm, then fast forward to watch the swimming events.
then crash out again until the regular alarm goes off at 4am…
"Wizard's first rule. People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true." -- Terry Goodkind
Oh? But the 4AM wake up calls for Tour coverage didn't get to you?
It’s nice to know that a mere 7 days after the Olympics, the Vuelta starts…. and that will most likely finally reduce me to a quivering wasted piece of jelly.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
Ah another grand tour!
We won’t have to stoop to the depths of the Tour of Burgos come the end of the month! Anyone up for watching the Tour of Portugal?!
oh, me! me!
waving the arm furiously….
"Wizard's first rule. People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true." -- Terry Goodkind
Excellent.
That little Spanish race really did make last week soo much fun. I can’t believe no one else was interested, least of all the Burgossians!
Here is the Portugal start list
http://www.velo-club.net/article?sid=47208
Quite a lot of people here I’ve never heard of….!
Poor old Enrico Gasparotto
I wonder what he did wrong to get sent there? He’s got to have a good chance.
Otherwise the start list reads like a replay of Puerto. And who has been playing with Isidro Nozal’s Wiki entry. “water will soften his muscles” Right.
i think i can find a live stream
wait for tomorrow
(but the comments are in portuguese…)
by semprenaroda on Aug 12, 2008 3:18 PM EDT up reply actions
I'm on the East Coast, Dude.
I’m in VA and followed the TdF online at work. Wake up calls are Not Applicable to mois.
ditto....
and the commute is just a few feet down the hall…
"Wizard's first rule. People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true." -- Terry Goodkind
oh, you don't know how much i wish i was back in civilization
"Wizard's first rule. People are stupid. They will believe anything they want to be true or fear to be true." -- Terry Goodkind
Hey... is Podium Cafe member FMK around by any chance?
I really, really need an explanation of that signature… I’m totally baffled and intrigued. Anyone else that’s interested, go over to the “Sella Stool Pigeon” thread and check it out.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
Samuel Becket
Sanies I
Sanies I
all the livelong way this day of sweet showers from Portrane on the seashore
Donabate sad swans of Turvey Swords
pounding along in three ratios like a sonata
like a Ritter with pommelled scrotum atra cura on the step
Botticelli from the fork down pestling the transmission
tires bleeding voiding zeep the highway
all heaven in the sphincter
the sphincter
etcetera
Now that was funny!
I been readin’ too damn much, need to watch me some of that comedy channel on teevee. :-)
No one should be allowed to write like that...
... unless their name is Lewis Carroll. Still “pommelled scrotum” is my new favorite phrase… true Dan Lexicon material.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
I watched a
great badminton match last night. Seriously. It was awesome. All sports have a culture and all cultures have sports. This was a great blend of both. I forget how many shuttlecocks they said that they’ll go through during the Olympics. But it was something like 700 dozen…they swap them out every few minutes.
Also picked up some field hockey online. Very cool.
is a shuttlecock the same as a birdie? Thats what we call them.
I love badminton. My grandmother lived in Japan for a few years, picked it up as a sport and us grand kids played it with her every weekend.
by ZoeRochelle on Aug 12, 2008 12:14 PM EDT up reply actions
I hope you'll take the opportunity today...
... to use “Shuttlecock” in a sentence with your coworkers.
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
I tried but couldn't do it with a straight face.
Might have something to do with lunch with another group I work with at a Chinese place. Something about those fortune cookies and added words at the end that had us almost ROFL! Good stuff. Come back and try to add in shuttlecock just didn’t work.
"The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed."
As in
“Does anybody want this last twinkie? I said, the last twinkie! No? Ok, I’m eating it.”
"I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass... and I'm all out of bubblegum."
"So, this Badminton player walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder and a 12" shuttlecock"
Stop me if you’ve heard this before.
"I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass... and I'm all out of bubblegum."
"That's a big twinkie"
"I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass... and I'm all out of bubblegum."
"What about the twinkie?"
"I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass... and I'm all out of bubblegum."
"Everything was fine...
...until the grid was shut down by dickless here. “
I know, it said "als" instead of "ist"... don't give me any crap...
i liked almost sports, mostly in the OG
ops, shots not like, gimnastics sometimes…
Shots for me is not a sport, if someone running from this shots, ok, then is a sport…;)
but know i’m vitiated in water polo, the sports that i actually do.
When we know a sports, when we doing, we can understand every tricks, tatics and feel like a game is…
We can see the sports a lot, but only if we do this sport, we can really understand everything. The water polo is an exemple for me, i saw at live more than hundred games when i was young, but until 3 years ago, that i begin to did, i really understand the pushs the tactics, the tricks and i’m delighted with this game.
I look forward to one day entry in a bunch sprint, maybe in a master race here.
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