Olympics

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Vrede too
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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Fri Feb 09, 2018 5:06 pm
Two most talked about competitors so far are this (US) curler guy... https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/winter ... ?ocid=iehp

And the shirtless Tongan... http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/in ... story.html
Image

Russia, Anastasia Bryzgalova:

Image
Image

Russia and Tonga win.
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Re: Olympics

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Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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1312. ETTD.

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rstrong
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Re: Olympics

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A "Luge Team Relay" event? Do they hand off a baton at high speed on a banked curve?

The Olympics might be more interesting than I thought.

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Re: Olympics

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rstrong wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 10:31 am
A "Luge Team Relay" event? Do they hand off a baton at high speed on a banked curve?

The Olympics might be more interesting than I thought.
:lol: First I heard of it, had to look it up:
What is the luge team relay?

The team relay event made its Olympic debut at the 2014 Sochi Games.

Each team, or nation, consists of three sleds: women’s singles, men’s singles and doubles.

The competition starts with the women’s singles sled. At the finish, she hits an overhead touchpad, which opens the start gate for the men’s singles sled. Once he finishes and hits the overhead touchpad, the doubles sled makes the final run down the course.

The timing is continuous, so the winner is the nation with the lowest time after all three sleds have finished....
Wimps. It would be cooler if they started the next luge by smashing into it.

Gold: GER
Silver: CAN
Bronze: AUSTRIA
4: USA
http://www.espn.com/olympics/winter/201 ... /event/855

Bastards. Just over half a second separating 1 through 5.
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Re: Olympics

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Vrede too wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 11:45 am
rstrong wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 10:31 am
A "Luge Team Relay" event? Do they hand off a baton at high speed on a banked curve?

The Olympics might be more interesting than I thought.
:lol: First I heard of it, had to look it up:
What is the luge team relay?

The team relay event made its Olympic debut at the 2014 Sochi Games.

Each team, or nation, consists of three sleds: women’s singles, men’s singles and doubles.

The competition starts with the women’s singles sled. At the finish, she hits an overhead touchpad, which opens the start gate for the men’s singles sled. Once he finishes and hits the overhead touchpad, the doubles sled makes the final run down the course.

The timing is continuous, so the winner is the nation with the lowest time after all three sleds have finished....
Wimps. It would be cooler if they started the next luge by smashing into it.

Gold: GER
Silver: CAN
Bronze: AUSTRIA
4: USA
http://www.espn.com/olympics/winter/201 ... /event/855

Bastards. Just over half a second separating 1 through 5.

When I was a baby sleeping in a Swiss hotel dresser drawer, Dad and an American friend he met there went skiing for the first time. The beginners slope looked too steep. So they did what any red-blooded American would do, they went off on their own. The nice easy slope they found was just what they were looking for until it became obvious they were skiing uncontrollably down a bobsled run.

No Americans were badly injured, but I pooped myself, which made me smile.
Trump: “We had the safest border in the history of our country - or at least recorded history. I guess maybe a thousand years ago it was even better.”

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Re: Olympics

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Misleading headline: "Snowboarder breaks neck in terrifying olympics crash"
https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/winter ... &ocid=iehp

Well, technically he did fracture a 5th vertebrae, but got up and finished his run.

Lindsay Vonn: You call that a "terrifying crash?" Here, hold my beer. :lol:

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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 1:13 pm
Misleading headline: "Snowboarder breaks neck in terrifying olympics crash"
https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/winter ... &ocid=iehp

Not misleading at all. Did you watch the video? It made me cringe.

Well, technically he did fracture a 5th vertebrae, but got up and finished his run.

About 30% of cervical spine fractures walk into the ER. Further damage to an unstable C5 fracture can lead to:
Symptoms of a C5 Level Injury

Ability to speak and breathe on their own, but breathing will be weak
Paralysis in torso, legs, wrists, and hands
Paralysis may be experienced on one or both sides
Patients may be able to raise their arms and/or bend their elbows
Patients will need assistance with daily living, but may have some independent function

Lindsay Vonn: You call that a "terrifying crash?" Here, hold my beer. :lol:

No one with a broken arm would ever say that to someone with a broken neck.
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Re: Olympics

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Well, you'd probably look at it different from your perspective as a medical person, but as a garden variety fan of athletic mahem, I think several others have fallen recently in crashes more worthy of "terrifying." Not to say he wasn't injured or that it wasn't painful, but I think Shaun White's faceplant on the edge of the pipe was worse, and I still say Lindsay's are more cringeworthy. Wasn't just a "broken arm" BTW. That one was her humerus, but it was the femur break that was worse than awful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zU0kJ4wpjGA

My comment was actually more about respect for Lindsay than anything negative about the snowboarder. It wasn't him that wrote the headline, anyway.

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Re: Olympics

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Opps, wrong wreck. Femur fractures can be deadly, too.
O Really wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 5:46 pm
... My comment was actually more about respect for Lindsay than anything negative about the snowboarder.

Pffft, she didn't finish her run. :P

It wasn't him that wrote the headline, anyway.

Terrifying to a lay TV viewer and terrifying in reality can be different things. The headline is still accurate.
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Re: Olympics

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Skeleton riders are totally crazy.

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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Thu Feb 15, 2018 8:56 pm
Skeleton riders are totally crazy.
:thumbup: The name predicts the outcome.
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Re: Olympics

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Bad American skier games the system to make Olympics

Let’s not beat around the bush: Elizabeth Swaney is not a good freestyle skier. She can’t do any tricks, can’t get any air, can’t do anything but go up and down the halfpipe like anyone at the local bunny hill might....

As Jason Blevins of the Denver Post explains, the international field for ladies’ halfpipe is not exceedingly deep. Qualifying for the Olympics involves recording a certain number of top-30 finishes in qualifying events and many of these events don’t even feature 30 people....

“She would compete in them consistently over the last couple years and sometimes girls would crash so she would not end up dead last,” FIS judge Steele Spence told the Denver Post....

Elizabeth Swaney Ski Halfpipe Qualification Run

:lol: The announcers played it straight.


Liz Swaney- Lake Placid NAC Skeleton Race

She's like the George Plimpton of winter sports.
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Re: Olympics

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Re: Olympics

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The Olympics is the only time when the phrase "Great execution by North Korea" seems okay.

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Re: Olympics

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Vrede too wrote:
Mon Feb 19, 2018 11:59 am
She's not good, and doesn't deserve to be in the Games. But she qualified under the rules set forth by the Olympic committee. They create bad rules, somebody follows them to their personal advantage, and we say she "gamed the system." Maybe we should say "Sloppy rule-making allows awful skier to pretend to "compete."

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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Mon Feb 19, 2018 5:18 pm
She's not good, and doesn't deserve to be in the Games. But she qualified under the rules set forth by the Olympic committee. They create bad rules, somebody follows them to their personal advantage, and we say she "gamed the system." Maybe we should say "Sloppy rule-making allows awful skier to pretend to "compete."
I thought the halfpipe run was precious and she's quirky enough to be entertaining to me. WTH, if I could get into the Olympics with minimal skill and effort, I sure would. The headline is accurate, but I don't share the negative connotation that some would from it.
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Re: Olympics

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Oh, I would too.
But "gaming the system" does have a negative connotation, even if all definitions are not necessarily negative. What she did isn't different in principle from those who get there by building a team and then picking a country to be "from." Entertaining and heart-warming story though it may be, did the Jamaican bobsled team really belong there? Or shirtless Tongan "cross-country skier"?

I would have preferred a story (and headline) that highlighted her effort and creativity to get to the Games, knowing she wasn't really in that league.
Here's a better one. Yeah, I know, it's the Post, but still... https://nypost.com/2018/02/19/the-story ... rformance/


Sign of the times, though - find something to bash.

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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Fri Feb 09, 2018 5:06 pm
Two most talked about competitors so far are this (US) curler guy... https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/winter ... ?ocid=iehp

And the shirtless Tongan... http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/in ... story.html
In a not very alternate universe, shuffleboard is an Olympic sport and curling is a kids game played on icy sidewalks and parking lots.
Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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1312. ETTD.

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Re: Olympics

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I think I remember somebody here commenting that it would be fun to put a generic-average skill guy in each competition to show just how great the real competitors are. I guess we did that in womens' half-pipe and cross country skiing. :lol:

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Re: Olympics

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O Really wrote:
Tue Feb 20, 2018 9:11 am
I think I remember somebody here commenting that it would be fun to put a generic-average skill guy in each competition to show just how great the real competitors are. I guess we did that in womens' half-pipe and cross country skiing. :lol:
Like we did with POTUS?

Maybe not skeleton.
Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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1312. ETTD.

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