Beijing 2008 Olympics

Maybe the Chinese culturally don't care about authenticity like we do?

...then again, we're the ones with all the big, fake ta tas.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Maybe the Chinese culturally don't care about authenticity like we do?

I think it's clear that their main concern was coming off as emminently impressive.

I'm not sure how I feel about this technical muckery. It is a show, after all, and their choreography was top notch. (unless we find out later that they photoshopped that, too).

No, it's BS. It is supposed to be a live event. Not a digitally-altered, pre-packaged, staged ceremony.

No fair! You cheated on your elaborate international dick waving contest! I want my sense of wonderment back!

Wasn't this expected by most?

It's kind of scuzzy to milli-vanilli the girl, but as Cannibal notes it can't be a big surprise to anyone. We should be grateful they didn't bootleg a CD of Celine Dion and have the girl pretend to sing the theme from Titanic.

JoeBedurndurn wrote:

No fair! You cheated on your elaborate international dick waving contest! I want my sense of wonderment back!

Winner!

back to the Olympics I think I'm getting all swam out. The gymnastics was a nice change of pace but at the same time they make it look so ridiculously easy its sometimes hard to appreciate the crazy stuff they are doing.

*shrug* The lines of entertainment are so blurred, how much does it really matter that they CG a few things? As long as they leave the athletes out of it, I'll continue to watch.

Ok... my local NBC affiliate just cut out Shawn Johnson's entire balance beam performance in favor of that stupid EAS test.

Not like I expect anything from the same pool of broadcasters that pre-empt the [b]entirety[/b] of Game 4 of the NBA Finals to show wall to wall weather reports.

F*ck this state... seriously...

Wow. I cannot believe how much ass-kicking there was in swimming. I swear that one dude... he was a dolphin in his past life. True story.

My wife watched one of the segments on Phelps and said the guy eats 11,000 calories a day. He's like this weird biological machine that can take in food and convert it to energy faster than anyone else. When he's in a couple of races the same day, the announcers said that he needs to spend the time between races eating to replenish his energy. He's like something out of X-men. A mutant.

The women's gymnastic team finals was awesome last night. Even though there were a few falls, I thought they did a great job!

Where the heck did all these awesome Chinese athletes come from? I ducked out of watching the Oly's for the last 12 years and back then China was a joke. A particularly funny joke at that. Now it's like they are medal contenders in practically every event in which they compete.

Paleocon wrote:

Where the heck did all these awesome Chinese athletes come from? I ducked out of watching the Oly's for the last 12 years and back then China was a joke. A particularly funny joke at that. Now it's like they are medal contenders in practically every event in which they compete.

I heard they really ramped up their program, wanting to win their home Olympics. I heard they have entered more events than any other country.

Ronda Rousey has become the first American woman to medal in Judo.

Paleocon wrote:

Now it's like they are medal contenders in practically every event in which they compete.

Aren't they competing in every event?

Fedaykin98 wrote:

I heard they have entered more events than any other country.

Well the host country does get an automatic berth in every event.

There is a distinct upside to hosting the Games, if history can be a guide. Roush estimates that a host country enjoys a 30 to 40 percent increase in the number of medals won compared with previous Summer Games.

That medals surge may be a result of the normal increase of funding for a country’s Olympic team soon after that country wins a bid for the Games. Or it may be the effect of competing on familiar ground, in a familiar culture, without having to travel very far. The host country receives automatic berths in all sports, if its athletes accomplish predetermined levels of proficiency.

Paleocon wrote:

Where the heck did all these awesome Chinese athletes come from? I ducked out of watching the Oly's for the last 12 years and back then China was a joke. A particularly funny joke at that. Now it's like they are medal contenders in practically every event in which they compete.

12 years of a better diet!

Anyways its diving and gymnastics which they are dominating. They will drop off heavily come the track and field events and back up again for table tennis!

Paleocon wrote:

Now it's like they are medal contenders in practically every event in which they compete.

They benefit from a strong presence in events with a lot of medal classes like shooting, archery, weightlifting, and diving. If you wanted to win a lot of medals, it's good to concentrate resources on events that provide more than one medal and those which probably get little funding and attention in other countries. There can be only one soccer gold, but how many medals are available to the archery, weightlifting and shooting teams?

They also seem to do much better in individual sports rather than team sports, but it's still early in many team sport rounds. Maybe it's too early to make that judgment.

bennard here with the Olympic soccer report.

The US Men's soccer team is out of the games today, due to a 2-1 loss to Nigeria today. The USA team played with 10 players almost all of the game due to getting a red card in the 3rd minute of play.

On the soccer front, Nigeria and Netherlands advance from Group B, Ivory Coast and Argentina advance from Group A, Brazil and Belgium from Group C and Italy and Cameroon from Group D. Quarterfinals begin on Saturday. Matchups are below:

Nigeria v. Ivory Coast
Italy v. Belgium
Argentina v. Netherlands
Brazil v. Cameroon

From what I've seen, Italy and Brazil are the teams to beat this year. Neither team had a goal scored against them in the prelims. Brazil scored 9 goals in prelim play and Italy has scored 6.

I didn't realize ping pong had doubles.

You know despite all the plastic of the opening ceremonies I still think that the performance was incredible. What worries me in that the next summer games are being held in London. I can imagine men in pubs holding their heads over the Chinese opening ceremonies hoping to figure out how to top it. Maybe free beer?

Zen Mutty wrote:

I can imagine men in pubs holding their heads over the Chinese opening ceremonies hoping to figure out how to top it. Maybe free beer?

Midway through the opening ceremonies, squads of soccer hooligans run up into the stands and start beating the crap out of anyone who isn't waving a union jack?

Funkenpants wrote:
Zen Mutty wrote:

I can imagine men in pubs holding their heads over the Chinese opening ceremonies hoping to figure out how to top it. Maybe free beer?

Midway through the opening ceremonies, squads of digitally inserted soccer hooligans run up into the stands and start beating the crap out of anyone who isn't waving a union jack?

Now we're getting somewhere.

JoeBedurndurn wrote:
Funkenpants wrote:
Zen Mutty wrote:

I can imagine men in pubs holding their heads over the Chinese opening ceremonies hoping to figure out how to top it. Maybe free beer?

Midway through the opening ceremonies, squads of digitally inserted soccer hooligans run up into the stands and start beating the crap out of anyone who isn't waving a union jack?

Now we're getting somewhere.

Only if they're Liverpool hooligans. (ducks)

Somebody needs a time-out.

That's pretty pissy, and so was a story I read about the US women's gymnastics team blaming their missteps on the judges - for nothing more than allegedly "icing the kicker," if you will. There's no need to throw those kinds of bombs and show your ass like that if there hasn't been a really tangible, glaring c*ck-up.

Rat Boy wrote:

Somebody needs a time-out.

His complaint is valid. His opponent fled the mat several times and the ref didn't call it. He then called Ara for fleeing the mat even though he did not. Not only was it a BS call; but the official refused to review the call on instant replay as well.

Bela Karolyi is enthusiastic.

There have been several bad calls this year though. In mens tennis, one player would not admit that he had faulted despite what the instant replay proved. The judge wouldn't go back on the call either and called his opponent the one with the "unsportsman-like conduct." It was quite disappointing to think that despite catching the whole thing on camera, they still went with the bad call.