XX Olympic Winter Games - Torino, Italy

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Does the US have any live coverage of the Olympics anywhere or is it just that primetime thing and late night recaps? I mean, doesn't NBC pay ridiculous sums of money for the broadcast rights? Yet they don't show anything LIVE? That doesn't make sense. Are there any special packages you can purchase or are you left with nothing?

Especially since there are over 300 million Americans and just over 30 million Canadians. We have wall to wall coverage on 2 networks with Bell Expressvu ( a satellite service) clumping all the Olympic channels together on the one spot on the channel listing, there is one channel with 6 picture in pictures showing what is one all the Olympic coverage channels at once. And I forgot to mention French CBC and French TSN known as RDS.

ETA 3-3 Latvia - US men's hockey, still in the third, Latvian powerplay starting now
 
Utoo said:
Just saw an interview on CNN with Emily Hughes----she was SOOOO pumped & excited to be going to the Olympics!! :)

Can I just say how glad I am that she's going instead of Michelle Kwan?? Besides the fact that Kwan shouldn't even have been eligible for the Olympics, she's rubbed me the wrong way for a while now. Ever since the last Olympics when she was expected to get gold, then sucked & got bronze....THEN went ahead and skated in the unjudged event post-medal-awarding to "Fields Of Gold," wore a gold outfit, and cried the whole time. The fact that they pick that program well before they even get to the Olympics, that means that she fully 100% expected to get the gold. How obnoxious is that?!?!

Anyway, I'm extremely happy for Hughes---it's just awesome that this young woman now gets to experience the Olympics, as she rightly should. What an unbelievable experience!
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Michelle had chosen the music as a tribute to someone who died at the age of 32--and it was about mortality. Yes, her dress was gold, but that didn't have to carry significance of any kind. Even if she did expect to win gold--who'd have thunk that the fourth place skater after the short would win the damn GOLD?
 
US and Lativia tied, 3-3, wow, what an upset.

CBC carried the whole third period even though they weren't planning on it. Even bumped commercials to keep showing the game, now the commercials are playing. Gawd, I love our coverage. Sorry, have to have a positive post about the media to match all the negative ( and rightly so) posts about US coverage.
 
trevster2k said:

Especially since there are over 300 million Americans and just over 30 million Canadians.
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Yet I'd be willing to bet there are more Canadians who care about the Olympics than Americans. They probably don't show tons of coverage because the ratings would stink.
 
Chizip said:


Yet I'd be willing to bet there are more Canadians who care about the Olympics than Americans. They probably don't show tons of coverage because the ratings would stink.
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Yeah. American sports fans are notoriously provincial, if it's not Americans they're not interested. It could also be that NBC's coverage is abominable while I understand that other stations are doing better. Too bad we're stuck with NBC.
 
Don't the Big 3 have a huge bidding war for the Olympic broadcast rights or is that just when the Olympics are hosted in a Western Hemisphere timezone like Atlanta or the upcoming Vancouver winter games?

Well, I have always suspected that in general, the American fans are mainly interested in their own, look at the popularity of NASCAR vs F1 in the US and the world. NASCAR is nothing in the world while it is the number one racing in the US while F1 is the king worldwide but a joke in the US. But man, it's the Olympics, despite all it's flaws, where else do we get to see the world join together and compete in so many different disciplines. It's great to hear the stories and struggles of different athletes who represent their nations. Probably the only regular celebration of humanity in mainstream society so I feel we have to embrace it. Ok, I know those last few lines were ridiculously idealistic or Canadian, take your pick!:wink:

Funny thing is about the Olympics is that we don't even do that well in most events either. We have the odd success but generally we ain't an athletic power. Our athletes don't have proper funding and as a result struggle to keep up with the Jones. Right now, CBC is analyzing the women's downhill and are totally focusing on the competitors who won and American Kilgore's courageous comeback after her horrific crash during her training run.
 
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trevster2k said:
. Probably the only regular celebration of humanity in mainstream society so I feel we have to embrace it. Ok, I know those last few lines were ridiculously idealistic or Canadian, take your pick!:wink:
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I'll embrace that! I haven't really caught the spark yet, but I'm sure that'll change as the hockey games get more important.

Our local guy from Newfoundland is doing very well for Canada...two straight victories! :bump: (unofficial curling smiley)

HARDERRRR!!

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so, I'm sitting here watching some skiing, and the commentator (don't know who it is) is talking about the next athlete and compares him to a U2 album! He says "this guy is like a u2 album, he comes out and gets gold, then lays low for awhile then comes back for gold again". Kind of cool, worlds-colliding type moment!
 
love2bmama said:
so, I'm sitting here watching some skiing, and the commentator (don't know who it is) is talking about the next athlete and compares him to a U2 album! He says "this guy is like a u2 album, he comes out and gets gold, then lays low for awhile then comes back for gold again". Kind of cool, worlds-colliding type moment!
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i heard that too

it was about the most intelligent comment they made all night:wink:

and is apollo anton ono (sp?) the be all, end all of the winter games?

well is he???

sure seems like he is based on the amount of hype & ads NBC has on about him



i was glad to see that american downhill skier who crashed the other day complete her run today :up:
 
MrsSpringsteen said:
The last skater I saw last night was Johnny Weir. He might be a weirdo :wink: but that boy can skate. k
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To my way of thinking, Weir is the most interesting thing to come out of American men's figure skating in a long time. He's an absolute delight. I may and do change my schedule to watch Plushenko skate, but I often skip by most of the other skaters, but when Weir skates, I am seduced into watching. He's brash, funny, honest. I don't bother listening to most of the interviews--blah, blah, blah. But I know he's going to say something delightfully outrageous. During Michael Weiss's reign, I paid no attention whatsoever to the American men. It was bland beyond belief.

I know women's figure skating is the marquee event, but outside of Kwan and Slutskaya and a few of the Japanese, I usually find it boring. I much prefer the men's skates. (Although I am wondering why Joubert chose an exhibition style skate for his short program. I think we got it without seeing the 007 on his back). The men's skating is often more innovative, artistic, and obviously more explosive. Although the new system is sometimes a little dubious (and I think it may have hurt the women and dance, which is now way too busy), it seems to have upped the level of the men's skating positively. Or to put it frankly, forced them to skate more Russian.
 
The Swiss hockey team defeated the Czech Republic 3-2 today, wow, we may actually have a tournament in the Olympics, since it appears even the teams like Switzerland, Latvia, and Germany are putting on a good performance. Normally, these are walkover teams. Awesome!
 
I like Johnny, too. He's a great skater and a very interesting person. Never a dull moment with Johnny. Plushenko is an awesome skater but no one is as interesting as Johnny. The ladies won't come up with anyone as interesting. Maybe Irina Slutskaya's story. A couple of years ago they didn't think Irina would skate again. She had some sort of heart infection and spent two months in the hospital. She competed in Worlds and managed a ninth place finish. Then she developed vasculitis and has had to be treated with some medication. She still has the vasculitis and still takes the medication, but she's skating and is probably in the best shape of her life, against alot of odds. If she wins the gold, and I think she will, then man, what a story the whole thing will be. She will have done the whole thing sick.
 
2 more medals coming for Canada in short track team pursuit, we just don't know whether it's gold or silver. Yay for short track, we seem to do rather well in that sport.:up:
 
Bono's shades said:
I missed all the drama with Zhang and Zhang because I switched over to the Comedy Channel to watch The Daily Show. :mad: I forgot that I could just tune in at midnight for the TDS re-airing.

It sounds like the woman skater was incredibly brave and I'm sure it was very moving, but I don't remember anyone taking a major spill and still getting a silver medal, or even a bronze, in the past. Does it have something to do with the oh-so-confusing new rules for figure skating?
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I don't know why they gave them a silver medal with a fall, but it's happened before. In 1998 Bereshnaya and Sikheralize fell *twice* during their freeskate and got the silver medal, much to my shock and outrage. It was a joke.
 
nbcrusader said:
I can't wait for the snowboard "derby" event. Four people flying down the hill - first one wins.
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The men's event was pretty cool, you'll be happy with the outcome.
 
2 silver's for Canada in team pursuits, good effort, but the silly thing was Catriona Le May Doan suggesting Canada's strength is at the end of the race while watching the Canadians fall behind lap after lap.

But our tradition of just coming up short continues even when favoured to win, for the men's team anyway. Still 2 more medals for Canada. Congrats to Italian men and German women!!
 
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How cool was the snowboard Cross?!! :hyper: The dirty play of the first semi-final, the final that was sooooo close..... it was great :up:
 
TheQuiet1 said:
How cool was the snowboard Cross?!! :hyper: The dirty play of the first semi-final, the final that was sooooo close..... it was great :up:
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I could totally see a MADMAX sport evolving from that event and short track speed skating too.:wink:
 
Guess who won the gold in men's figure skating with highest scores ever in both programs under new format even with a double instead of a triple. So far everyone else hasn't even come close to a clean skate.
 
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