Winter Olympics Torino 2006

[JLuvs]

I love him, too Libra! He was fantastic on the half-pipe, gravity-defying! He's such a great athelete, and I love how when that was over he said he realized this was probably the best year he'd ever have. (considering he's won every competition he's entered the in the past year.) I saw him later being interviewed by Bob Costas, and he was really funny, humble and seems like an all-over great guy. I loved the medal ceremony for him as well. I was glad that Danny Kass got another silver, but I sure would have liked to have seen an American sweep again in that event.

I concur and agree with this. I love his nickname from the Italian media. He is just exciting to watch and nice person as well.

[texasgirl73]

I love the "slackers on snowboards!" They're a totally different breed of athlete and I love to watch em!

[lambikins]

Thank goodness for the overnight replays so that I could catch Shaun White's gold medal snowboarding run I've adored him since he started competing in the X Games, so seeing him kick bootay on the half pipe really was great...and super touching with him totally welling up at the medal ceremonies.

I thought that it was adorable that he felt the Gold Medal would be a "Babe" magnet, and held out hope for meeting some sweetie that he knew/met at the Olympics. He'd make any mom proud!

[Mariner]

Oh. My. God. I just saw those women's downhill training run wipeouts. It was so sad to see them yet touching to see how effected the other skiers were by what happened.

[Marleybone]

Jesus, did anyone see the Chinese pairs couple Zhang and Zhang?
They were going for a thrown quad something and she slammed down on both knees with her left leg splayed out when she landed.

She got up, had a quick break, they skated the program and won the silver.
Incredible.

I just now saw that. Holy crap.. good for her for getting back out there and finishing.

[Lucynda]

I love the winter olympics. There is no pressure on our Athletes at all except for Alisa Camplin in the ariels, unless someone does a Stephen Bradbury we are happy if the rest of team come in the top 20.
The snowboarding was great and the down hill is great to watch I even like watching the mogals and find that silly thing like bowling on ice with the brooms just fasinating to watch. (having a mental block on the name)
Stayed up to midnight last night to see the gold medal run of the luge.
After watching two days and four runs of the best sliders and the worst i now know enough about the technical side of it that i could just jump in and give it a go, NOT.

[Zinnia]

Jesus, did anyone see the Chinese pairs couple Zhang and Zhang?
They were going for a thrown quad something and she slammed down on both knees with her left leg splayed out when she landed.

She got up, had a quick break, they skated the program and won the silver.
Incredible.

An Olympic Moment to remember.

And a standing ovation... earned.

[Musicantica]

Yes I cringed when she landed on her knees! They/she really deserved that standing O!

[Musicantica]

On Michelle withdrawing, I can understand why she wanted so badly to have one more shot at the gold but in a way I am disppointed in her for not giving up her spot earlier. After she couldn't compete at nationals the US officials offered to let her go to Turin anyway, provided she was 100% recovered from her injury by Jan. 25 or whatever that deadline was. When that date came she wasn't fully back to competitive health but was saying she was confident that she would be by Olympics time. Not what the deal was, but they let her be on the team anyway.

With the new scoring system I don't think Kwan could have won gold or even silver this year unless most of the others screwed up. Even when Michelle is at her best Slutskaya and Cohen are more flexible and Irina S. jump higher and does more difficult jumps and skates faster, and Sasha and Irina both do more graceful and difficult spin sequences. Michelle is very elegant when she is on, but that won't get you nearly as far with the new scoring system.

Much as I might have loved to see Michelle finally get her gold, I keep thinking about younger skaters like Emily H for whom this might be their only chance to go to the Olympics and I would not have wanted Michelle to deny them that chance unless she really thought she could win the gold.

Lots of top athletes miss out on "the" big trophy for one reason or another.

[femme fatale]

Gold for Sweden! In cross country skiing the short races, relay (I have no idea what it's called in English). The women took the gold, the men are pretty good as well, so maybe I'll come back soon.

EDIT: 15 minutes later, the men came through as well. Two golds for Sweden within 20 minutes