Olympics

If you listen to our podcast, you know that I love hockey and have been waiting for the 2010 Olympics for so long. In general, I am a HUGE Olympic fan, I love that for the most part Olympians compete for pride of country versus money. Granted, many of these athletes get endorsements, and hockey players get paid through the NHL, but there are many who work every day like you or me and find time and energy to train as well.

To get pumped for the Olympics I recommend the following three Olympic related movies: Cool Runnings (Bobsled; great story, loved the ending about finishing what you started), The Cutting Edge (Figure skating; yes they pan away whenever they are truly doing a move, but a great story), and the best Olympic movie and one of the best sports movies Miracle (Hockey; makes me cry EVERY time....Do you believe in Miracles???)

Speedskating
This year the US Olympic Speed Skating team is being sponsored by Stephen Colbert & his Colbert Nation (letting viewers pledge contributions to team USA Speed Skating.)  Apollo Ohno is back for another chance at capturing medals, can the US beat Norway and Sweden in the skating?  Depends on who you ask, but one thing is for certain, this event is our BEST chance at obtaining medals, due to the number of competitions and our history in medal count.  It's been awhile since we've been competitive in figure skating, ice dancing, or figure skating pairs.  Moguls we usually take one of the three spots, and hockey will be a tough one as well.  If you're interested in seeing Team USA capture a sizeable medal count, be sure to check out the speed skaters!

Figure Skating
Sad to say the Americans have not been as competitive in this category as the Chinese, Canadians, & the Russians.  However, we have had a few Russians break off and compete for the US, our best chance at capturing the gold.  Do you remember Salt Lake City 2002?  The Canadians gave a cutesy and less difficult performance but nailed it (didn't hurt that they were both very good looking) and the Russians gave a much harder but less perfect long performance?  The infamous scandal with judging (the French gave the Russians the gold in exchange for their vote in ice dancing.)  Well the Russians and the Canadians both skated off with the gold.  The Russians undoubtedly try harder technical performances and the Canadians give better artistic performances.  Has the sport ever really come back after the judging scandal though?  And what about the Chinese?  Their fundamentals are usually off but they are always trying for the SUPER HARD tricks, do you think they've improved their program enough to nail the fundamentals AND the tough stuff?  We'll have to see.  In terms of Americans, this is the first year the US is not expected to medal for Women's or Pairs.  Sascha tried to make a comeback, but did not even qualify for the team.  The women have medaled for the past 11 Olympics, and the pairs have not medaled since 1988.  Could be a tough Olympics for the US in terms of figure skating this time around.

Freestyle Moguls
2006 is the year I was most excited about this event, Torino Italy. A fellow camp counselor and friend of mine Toby Dawson was competing in this event. The cool thing about Toby was that he just wanted to be treated like the rest of the counselors and give back to the kids at Korean Heritage Camp. I remember being SO nervous waiting for him to compete, knowing that everyone out there works really hard but how great of a guy he was and how much he deserved it. When he won the Bronze I was stoked for him, proud of him, and excited to attend camp that year. Toby brought his medal and let everyone wear it, hold it, take pictures with him, with it, it was a really cool experience. If you're looking for updates on him via twitter click here and if you want to visit his site and find out more about him click here.

Now the reason I love the freestyle moguls is it combines speed (to do the tricks), control (all those moguls require some navigation), and the complexity/coolness of the tricks are pretty awesome. They have to complete two different tricks per round (2 rounds, if you qualify.) I remember watching in 2002 with Jonny Moseley doing the 'Dinner Roll' and thinking, that's pretty sweet, wish I could do that! Athletes perfect previously completed tricks and create their own. Pretty bomb, if I must say!

Hockey
Some important things to note for these Olympic games for hockey are the difference between the NHL style play and the Olympic style of play. In most Olympic games, the players are on International Ice, which means 100 x 200 ft versus the NHL ice which is 85 x 200 ft. While 15 ft doesn't seem like that big of a deal, it certainly opens the ice up for more creative play making. This year, due to cost saving measures the Vancouver Olympic games will use NHL ice. Because they are using the arena that is home to the Vancouver Canucks, changing it over to Olympic ice would cost a great deal of money but more importantly put Vancouver on an even longer away game streak. Due to the games the Canucks are playing 14 games in a row on the road. A difficult feat that I think every other team should have been forced to do as well, to even the playing field. Back to the ice, this is a HUGE disadvantage to the Swedes, as they are less physical of a team and excel in playmaking, great passing, etc. However, don't discount them just yet!!

Another difference of Olympic hockey is the auto-icing call. In the NHL you can get the puck to the other end of the ice and if your teammates are fast enough they can get to it first and create a scoring opportunity. As you know from our podcast, this has resulted in career ending injuries and is extremely dangerous. In the Olympics, if you put the puck into the other end an automatic icing is called without the players having to touch it. This forces teams to get more creative in their playmaking. And one of the other major differences is no fighting. I love this rule, others dislike it. The reason I love this rule is just like the bigger sheet of ice and auto-icing is that it removes the emphasis on strong-arm hockey and puts te emphasis on talent, agility, speed, play-making, etc.

To end this piece, I thought I'd include a link to the 5 greatest Olympic Hockey Moments. I'd like to note that two of the five include the performances of Avalanche Players. 2002 Canadian Mens Hockey (Former Captain Joe Sakic) and 1994 Swedish Mens Hockey (Peter Forsberg). To enjoy the article & the movies from Vanity Fair, click here.