Have you all been watching the Olympics? Why the hell are they putting gymnastics on at 11:00 pm? That's ridiculous!
That being said, I totally stayed up until all hours to watch my second favorite Olympic sport (figure skating being my fav). I was rewarded by a good amount of sportpersonship.
First, I totally have no problem with the Chinese winning. In fact, I was rooting for them. After reading story after story on the Karolyis, I don't think the Chinese machine is any more brutal, just more structured. I find it hilarious that Tim Dagget and Elfie Schlegel are making snide remarks about the Chinese Olympic team and how they get plucked at age three to have a life dedicated to gymnastics. Mind you, I don't think that's humane at all and I have huge amounts of worry about what happens after these girls stop competing (which is where the U.S. system is infinitely superior in terms of supporting the gymnast as a PERSON). But then the commentators are all bitchy about the decline in Romanian gymnastics and the fact that the Romanians are no longer subjected to soul-destroying brutalizing training regimens. I nearly keeled over when Tim noted that one Romanian actually got to text her friends during training. BAD gymnasts! Who told you that you get to have a life?
Anyway, I am really proud of the USA gymanstics teams. First for the men who blew the pommel horse and were still immensely happy with the bronze. I loved their reaction and how happy and releived they were to be standing on the medal podium. While the women weren't at all happy about their silver, I was moved by the solidarity they showed to Alicia Sacramone. It was touching to see everyone hugging her and trying to console her. I hope she gets a medal in the vault to take away some of the sting of her bad performances. But nonetheless, I like that our gymnasts seem to be good people along with being good athletes.
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2 comments:
I've been loving it too, until i heard this morning that Team USA (aka Bela and Marta) are accusing the Chinese of "psychological warfare" and making Alicia wait so long before starting her routine is what killed her balance beam, and thus led to the silver rather than the gold. Sore losers are BAD losers. And silver is fantastic - we should all be proud, not griping.
As i said on J-Lo's blog, I do have to give it up that the Chinese routines, especially floor, were just better.
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