Is anyone else annoyed with the olympic medal count?

[roadie gal]

When you watch the olympics you hear over and over again how the games promote unity and cooperation between nations. BUT in the next breath they give the medal count. Somehow that seems the complete antithesis to promoting unity. In my mind keeping a running count of who has more medals promotes an unhealthy competition between nations (as opposed to individual competition).

[salsabike]

The Canadian channel, CBUT, doesn't seem to do that--that's why we watch it!

[kelownagirl]

The Canadian channel, CBUT, doesn't seem to do that--that's why we watch it!

That's probably because we aren't winning many medals. LOL...

[salsabike]

Yeah, but your guy who sprinted at the end of the men's triathlon was fabulous! The silver medalist. We were YELLING! "Come on, come on!"

And I still think that's not the ONLY reason. The coverage is just more even handed all around---all athletes get discussed, etc.

[Flur]

I'm a bit annoyed the the US coverage seems to be primarily of sports in which the US has a strong contender. There seems to only be limited daytime/evening coverage of events where the US is not expected to do well You CAN see the other stuff, if you stay up all night, and if you're willing to watch it online in the little tiny window they give you.

[OakLeaf]

If it was intended to be a truly open competition, then athletes would compete as individuals (or as representatives of multinational corporate sponsors) and not as representatives of nations. When the organizers decided in 1896 that countries and their respective national sport federations would send the athletes, that decided that the modern Olympics would be a competition among nations.

[Aggie_Ama]

Flur- DVR is a magical thing. I can only take so much of the prime time sports, I even burnt out on gymnastics because the scoring seems so off. We got to see almost all the track cycling, road, triathalon and some other off stuff.

I am most excited when an underdog wins, did anyone catch the whitewater Kayak when Togo won their first medal ever? That was the stuff the Olympics are made of.

[TahoeDirtGirl]

I've been keeping my strong opinions under wraps but I am annoyed at the Michael Phelps thing. I wholeheartedly appreciate his training and determination, but over and over we hear how he basically never needs to work again and will be one of the most endorsed Olympics athlete ever.

All of this going on while Dara is swimming her a$$ off. That is the one I cheered for. That annoyed me even more because I was at a local sports bar and while she was swimming no one was cheering, no one cared. BUT OH when Phelps gets on, the band STOPPED and everyone was cheering. Yeah, he got 8 gold medals, broke the record, but the whole leading up to it wasn't even sportsmanlike anymore, and not really his fault, but the media! I got so annoyed! Dara has been the only Olympic medalist that 'old' and had a child! Just seeing Dara compete makes me think...hmmmmmm...maybe we aren't getting as old as we think


I think my problem is that alot of people are just sheep and just go with what the media is telling them. I didn't even want to watch the Phelps race because he was a sure thing to win. I am glad I got to see Dara win the silver, it was a good race. You could see though how much she *really* wanted the gold. She says she won't be back in 4 years. We shall see!

[arielmoon]

I agree about Dara- she is my hero. In fact I have named my new bike after her!

[Aggie_Ama]

I got tired of the Phelps too. My opinions I will keep to myself because I don't want to offend anyone.

I was much more interested in hearing more about Dara's schedule, how she trains and is a mom. How does she balance the two pulling her time?

[sfa]

I got tired of the Phelps too. My opinions I will keep to myself because I don't want to offend anyone.

I was much more interested in hearing more about Dara's schedule, how she trains and is a mom. How does she balance the two pulling her time?

Apparently a nanny and lots of professionals to help her train, plus a training schedule that focuses less on time spent in the pool (figuring that after so many years, she's got her form down perfectly) and more on strength/muscles working together and good recovery: http://jamieatlas.wordpress.com/2008...n-dara-torres/

I think Dara rocks, and I've been pleased in general to see so many "old" female Olympians--the 38 year old marathon winner, the 33 year old German gymnast, and, of course, Dara Torres. But I don't think she's been slighted in the least in her press coverage OR her likelihood for raking in sponsorships and speaking engagements from her achievement. She hasn't gotten equal time as Phelps, but then, she hasn't achieved what he did. No one has. He did in two Olympics more than she's done in five Olympics. More than any Olympian has ever done in history. Dara's appeal is not her performance so much as her longevity in a sport that favors younger athletes, but I suspect she's the leading edge of something that will become more common--training is getting better, and ever since they started allowing professionals to compete in the Olympics, we've started to see people putting off retirement and continuing to compete where in the past they wouldn't have been able to keep training at that level because they had to go out an earn a living. So I understand the fuss about Phelps (and o.k. I'll admit to some bias since he's the hometown hero), but I don't think it's disproportionate to what he accomplished, and I don't think the fuss about him diminishes the lesser fuss around Torres at all.

Sarah

ETA a link to another, better, article about Dara Torres' training schedule: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/18/sp...ewanted=1&_r=1

[smilingcat]

people take it too seriously. I really don't want to hear about the medal count and the gloating that comes with it.

And the rest is unprintable.

Thank goodness I don't have a TV!!

smilingcat

[ilima]

Don't cry for Dara. She came from major $$$ and has always lived a posh life.

It'd have been nice if she'd swum the 50 just 0.01 second faster and tied for the gold. Two silvers is still a huge accomplishment.

[colby]

Flur- DVR is a magical thing. I can only take so much of the prime time sports, I even burnt out on gymnastics because the scoring seems so off. We got to see almost all the track cycling, road, triathalon and some other off stuff.

I am most excited when an underdog wins, did anyone catch the whitewater Kayak when Togo won their first medal ever? That was the stuff the Olympics are made of.

I find it amusing that there are fewer commercials the longer you watch... down to around midnight when there are very few.

I watched a couple of track (athletics for you canadians ) heats (400m I think?), didn't see any finals, but I really enjoyed seeing the woman from Bahrain win her heat. A teammate of hers had apparently won something like the first medal for that country ever, and here she was hauling butt over favorites to win medals. Even if she doesn't win, at least she became visible.

The Phelps Hype Machine was pretty tiring, I enjoyed his relay team races and the close races the most. He's an amazing athlete, don't get me wrong, but I really wanted to hear more about the others, too (Dara was basically a footnote, while we got to hear all about his "dinner plate sized hands" and "torso of a 6'10" man" and eating 10k calories a day).

I guess coverage of Usain Bolt has been there, even though he's not American (and the Jamaicans in general), along with to some degree the Chinese gymnasts - but that could just be because they are upsetting Americans. I wish there were actual Olympics Channels on TV (or I would even settle for the internet) where you could see everything, not just what they wanted you to see.

[RoadRaven]

unity - schmunity

Its the Olympics
Its about competition
Of course there will be a medal count and comparisons

The point is that its about healthy competition and building relationships