04/23/24
February 12, 2006
Men's Cross Country Pursuit: Now that's racing! Spoilers inside -- but if you get a chance to watch any of today's men's 30 km pursuit from Torino, do.
Not meaning to totally bash the Olympics, but in the four days there have been 10 topics posted on the Olympics with a grand total of 89 responses. The obvious question is, does anyone really care about 90 percent of the Olympic events? I heard how ticket sales were so poor as of last week they were thinking of bringing in school children to fill seats and give the impression there was a crowd. Tickets sales, reportedly, picked up since that time, but still.
posted by dyams at 10:23 AM on February 12, 2006
dyams Oh I get it. This is PopularSportsOnlyFilter! Amateur Thanks for the FPP. I enjoyed the read and all the Olympic Post. Thanks for keeping it real.
posted by skydivedad at 11:17 AM on February 12, 2006
dyams, how do the Olympics posts take away from your enjoyment of SportsFilter? They've all been clearly marked "Olympics," so they're easy to avoid. Just skip them and go read the posts about "the next Derreck Lee" or whatever turns your crank. As long as there are half a dozen people here who want to talk about the Olympics, I'll keep posting.
posted by Amateur at 12:10 PM on February 12, 2006
Did I mention anything about anything taking away from my enjoyment of SportsFilter? Yes, I can read and understand which items have to do with the Olympics. What I was asking had to do with the overall popularity of the Olympic Games, and if anyone else felt they were not really interesting anymore. I really didn't mean to hurt anyone's feelings. My apologies.
posted by dyams at 03:16 PM on February 12, 2006
I watched this race just now and I am very impressed with Estils performance. The guy came back from being run over and breaking a ski to silver medal. Great job. I don't understand why the NBC announcers made the comment though about the Gold medalist from Russia being a poor sport. Did anyone see what he did to warrant this?
posted by skydivemom at 04:04 PM on February 12, 2006
I'd love it if I never saw saw the phrase "Nobody cares about this sport, do they?" again. Never mind that it's wrong. (10 posts? 89 comments? Obviously someone cares.) It's awfully rude. I missed that too, skydivemom. Did he taunt somebody or slow down crossing the finish line or something?
posted by chicobangs at 04:37 PM on February 12, 2006
If it were popularsportsonlyfilter, skydivedad, we wouldn't have a non-stop stream of baseball and NFL, which most of the world doesn't give a shit about. I think its NorthAmericanSportsFilter that dyams is after.
posted by rodgerd at 05:26 PM on February 12, 2006
Sorry dyams. I re-read what you wrote, and I misinterpreted it. (I wasn't the only one.) Your point about the relative lack of interest is a valid one.
posted by Amateur at 05:37 PM on February 12, 2006
I watched the race on CBC and I didn't catch anything about the Russian's sportsmanship. As spofi cross-country correspondent, I'll see if I can dig anything up.
posted by Amateur at 05:37 PM on February 12, 2006
in the four days there have been 10 topics posted on the Olympics with a grand total of 89 responses. There are two Olympic topics int he locker room with a grand total of 180 comments, so whatever. Wait until the Olympic hockey starts... It was a great finish, though I am disappointed that Scott couldn't get a medal in the women's event.
posted by mkn at 06:18 PM on February 12, 2006
The issue about the Russian poor sportsmanship was that he let others do all the drafting/pulling through the whole race, thus having fresher legs at the end. Good tactics, not necessarily a way to endear yourself to your fellow athletes.
posted by ursus_comiter at 05:23 AM on February 13, 2006
Thanks for clearing that up, ursus. In the last few kilometres, it seemed that the Swede and the two Italians were not too worried about anybody but themselves, and were quite happy to lead out. I guess the Russian didn't take his turns in the earlier sections.
posted by Amateur at 05:43 AM on February 13, 2006
The issue about the Russian poor sportsmanship was that he let others do all the drafting/pulling through the whole race And I thought it was the high-stepping as he crossed the finish line.
posted by The_Black_Hand at 08:25 AM on February 13, 2006
A mass crackup at the start, and a brilliant finish. Two Italians and a Swede exchanged the lead several times over the last few kilometres, but in the finishing sprint Russia's Eugeni Dementiev and Norway's Frode Estil surged from behind to finish 1-2. Estil was involved in the start crash and had to replace a damaged ski. The women's pursuit came down to a two-woman race. Kristina Smigun of Estonia raced past Katerina Neumannova of the Czech Republic to take gold. Canada's Beckie Scott finished sixth.