2018 Winter Olympics

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bookworm
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2018 Winter Olympics

Post by bookworm »

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Post by Catspaw »

I'm super excited! \:D/ I love the Winter Olympics and I'm looking forward to watching again soon! I'm bummed that the men's hockey will be missing the top talent *glares in Gary Bettman's general direction* but the Olympics will still be great. I'm really looking forward to the ice dancing - Canada's Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir are so beautiful to watch, and I have high hopes for a gold medal. O:)
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Post by bookworm »

This is earlier than I usually start the thread, but there's already big news so I wanted to get some discussion going.

Reaction to the IOC banning Russia from competing?

I definitely approve, but I was extremely surprised to hear about it after they refused to do it in Rio. What changed?
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Post by Catspaw »

That is really big news! I was wondering if Putin would tell athletes to boycott, but apparently that is not the case, so I guess that's good? If I was a clean athlete from Russia, I think I would be upset about not being able to wear my country's colours and hear the anthem etc. but at the same time, with such a widespread issue, I see why the IOC wanted to make a strong statement. I hope that this makes for a better competition in the future, though of course the worry always is that the cheaters will just get sneakier.
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Post by bookworm »

More big news. North and South Korea will enter the opening ceremonies together under the unification flag for the first Olympics since 2006, and will form a joint team in some sports for the first Olympics ever.
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Post by Catspaw »

I was very surprised to hear that on the news, but hopefully that's good news!

In awesome Canadian news, our opening ceremony flagbearers (yes, plural) were announced a couple of days ago, and I was very pleased to see that Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, my favourite ice dancing pair, received the honour! \:D/ They are amazing athletes and strong ambassadors of Canadian sport (not to mention gold and silver medalists in 2010 and 2014) so I was so happy to see the news!
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Post by bookworm »

If the agreement was made in genuine intent to ease tensions that's awesome, this is what the Olympics are about. But the cynic in me can only see it as a superficial propaganda play by the North, putting on their best image at a home Games.
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Post by Catspaw »

I'm sure that there are less than altruistic motives on North Korea's side, but it still feels like a positive step where they at least are trying to look like they can get along. That's still better than being antagonistic.
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Post by bookworm »

They start this week! \:D/

Share reactions to the events here once they begin!
Readers be aware that there will be spoilers.



I've also set up a Chatroom channel. With time zones and different networks there will be issues with spoilers and people won't all be seeing the same things, but I figured there's no harm in at least creating a channel so it's available if anyone wants to try using it. If no one does that's fine, the real discussion will be here in the thread as usual, but if anyone is interested you can join #Olympics for real time, if not live, discussion.
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Post by ~JCGJ~ »

Yes, I will be watching as much as I can. :mrgreen:
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:mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:
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Post by bookworm »

American viewers: I used this schedule during the last Olympics and found it to be very accurate for what will be on tv when. They update when an event is changed or moved. I like how it's divided by channel and showed which blocks are going to be live and which are taped.
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Post by 321tumbler »

I wasn't able to watch the opening ceremony last night (last minute science fair preparations), but I'm hoping to watch that soon.
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Post by bookworm »

Feb 8th broadcast:



It's weird to have events going on before the opening ceremony.



A shocking start to the skating events with multiple mistakes and falls throughout the first night, even from superstar Nathan Chen. I wonder if something was odd with the ice? There were so many.



The moguls commentary was funny. They were like 'Woah huge air! That's so rad!' :P

I was surprised the one guy laughed off when the other asked if it was hard on the knees. 'That's the funniest question I've been asked.' Really? My mom says that literally every time this event is on. I think it's very natural to wonder when you see it.



Mike with a nice shout out to Bob Costas in the closing. I miss him already. He's the iconic voice of the Olympics to me. I can remember him hosting my earliest Olympic memories from the Torino Games.
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Post by Catspaw »

Bookworm, I didn't watch any moguls, but I totally agree that asking if it's hard on the knees seems like a reasonable question that must come up a lot to viewers!

I really enjoyed watching the figure skating team competition today, with the women's and ice dance short programs going already. Ten countries compete in the short and then the top five move on to the long program, and there was definitely a clear gap between fifth and sixth. Obviously I'm hoping/expecting that Canada will win, but I love watching so many beautiful skaters performing! The Korean lady did a really beautiful program (as did others, but hers stood out to me), and the Russian lady was amazing! I enjoyed basically all of the ice dance programs, but as always, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir stood out to me as a head above the rest with a wonderful performance! I love to watch them. :inlove:
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Post by bookworm »

Feb 10th broadcast:



The US delegation is the largest ever in a Winter Games \:D/



First photo finish I think I've seen in short track speed skating - two thousandths of a second!



Incredible showing by the South Korean women in the relay, coming back from a fall to not only get back into their race but actually win! Complete dominance.



Very unusual sight, nine skaters in the 1500m final. South Korea gets gold before a roaring crowd.



Slopestyle snowboarding is crazy! How do they manage to get in so many flips before landing? So impressive to watch. USA gets the gold! I thought the Canadian took it on the last run, he looked perfect to me. Exciting competition.



USA advances to the next round of the ice skating team competition. Only the second Games for this new event. I like it. It's like the gymnastics team event in Summer, everyone does a component for points toward overall standing for the team.
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Post by Petrichor »

I've been enjoying what I can watch of the Olympics, although that leads me to an Olympics-related technical question: Do you need to have a cable service to stream the Olympics on NBC? Our TV service varies from sort-of-okay to unwatchable, and I thought I remembered watching online for the last Olympics, but I don't seem to be able to watch more than a few minutes anymore. :-k
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Post by bookworm »

Unfortunately, yes, live streaming through NBC does require cable verification. (Even for the stream of what is shown on free broadcast NBC, which doesn't make sense to me.)

You should be able to watch full video of all events afterward on nbcolympics.com which is better than nothing, but for watching live I don't know of a free option aside from a physical television.
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Post by Catspaw »

Woohoo! I loved the ending to the ice skating team event, with Canada wrapping up first place before the last lady even skated, with the entire ice skating long program event still to go! :mad: Yay! There were tons of beautiful programs. Obviously I loved the Canadian performances, with Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir being a major highlight, but those Russian ladies are going to dominate the women's event! They had two different people compete in the short and long programs, and they were both amazing!
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Post by bookworm »

Feb 11th broadcast:



Amazing story in the skiathlon. Norway sweeps the medals, that wasn't so unexpected, but who did it definitely was. Krueger crashed at the start, broken pole, got hit in the head, fell to the back, but somehow made it all the way back to the front and won the gold!



Interesting report about the Norway speed skaters changing from red to blue uniforms because it was allegedly scientifically proven that blue is the fastest color.



The Dutch sweep the women's 3000m skate, coming off taking 23 of the 36 speed skating medals in Sochi. Such dominance.



First ever men's singles luge medal for the US! \:D/



Snow actually falling during the moguls final, that was neat.



High winds postpone some events, and affect others that still went on like women's slopestyle where the qualifying round was completely cancelled and they went right to the final, but had to change to best of two runs instead of best of three. Unfortunate.



Mirai Nagasu lands the triple axel! Only the third woman to ever do it in Olympic competition! \:D/



USA takes bronze in the ice skating team event, as they did in the first one in Sochi. It turned out in the end Chen's fall at the start didn't affect the standings; even if he had gotten the team full points in that event they would have finished third overall still, so that's good.
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Post by Knight Fisher »

Snowboard Cross starts the 14th. \:D/
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