I watched the Olympics for the first time last night. It was mostly swimming, with some women's gymnastics thrown in.
It's been a while since I've had cable (almost four years now) so maybe I'm behind the times, but the amount of commercials was appalling. I've watched the Olympics before and it was never as bad as it was last night.
And I'm officially done caring about swimming. I watched four races last night - and they were all world records. At one point, it was two qualifying rounds of the same event in a row, and the world record fell both times. Is this normal? I've heard about the new speedo suits, and about the "water cube" and how fast it is, it just seems to devalue swimming WR's with so many records falling. Phelps won a gold medal in the butterfly (I think?) in a world record time, then had to swim again in less than an hour. Doesn't seem like it takes a big physical effort for a WR. Track & Field starts soon, maybe my faith in the Olympics will be restored when the conversation turns from easy world records to performance enhancing drug use.
And what was up with the panda sex clip? Who the hell is that Andre-the-Giant in women's clothing NBC has working? How awkward was it when she asked that tiny panda zookeeper about pandas gettin' it on and if the guy panda (named Lulu, FYI) ever gave the women pandas any chochlate? Even Bob Costas seemed a bit taken back by that one.
I certainly don't miss having cable. Wasn't a total loss though - I got to watch election returns and it was nice to see local DA John Newsome get his ass beat!
13 comments:
"Doesn't seem like it takes a big physical effort for a WR." You are witnessing the best athlete of all-time(Phelps). As far as the new swimsuits are concerned, it is just another progression in sport.
I agree with the ridiculous amount of commercials. It would be nice if they just went to a different venue or added commentary on the great stories of athletes participating.
Can you imagine someone breaking the world record in the 800 meter run (1:41.11 - roughly close to the same time Phelps's butterfly record took) and coming back in less than an hour to win the 1500 meters? No, it would be impossible, as that 800m effort would prevent one from competing at a world class level in such a short recovery time.
FYI, the 800m world record was set back in 1997. He improved the previous WR (set by Sebastian Coe, 1:41.73) by .62 seconds. And Coe had set that record in 1981! So it took 16 years to improve the new world record by just over half a second. I watched four world record swims in less than 16 minutes last night. Something just doesn't seem right.
And the relays have been crushing WR's - by as many as four seconds. That's like the marathon gold medalist running 1:58. It's just not supposed to happen like that.
That must be one cool ass panda.
Yeah, all he does is eat and fuck. Imagine that.
The panda sounds like Phelps- eat, swim, sleep. Don't know about the fucking, he's too young, even tho he's from Balmer. He does eat 8,000-10,000 calories a day, so maybe there is fucking involved.
He already has a DUI, so I'm sure he's been puttin' it to some of those swimmer chicks.
It shows the difference in training specificity. Runners typically don't need to give all-out efforts in that time span, so they are not going to to train that way. They have several hours or days in between events/performances. I will agree that the frequency of WR's being broken is unusual to say the least, but I would be willing to bet that times/performances will plateau off during the next several years.
And yes, panda's have the life!
I agree, too many commercials. I will say this, however, about swimming: there has been a drastic shift in body position in the water over the last few years, and that has a lot to do with the WR stuff. Rotating in the water...yada yada...
To equate it to running would be like saying if you only started running sideways eventually you'll run a marathon in 1:58, but it will take you a few years to relearn that form & get the hang of it.
I'm about burned out of Phelps this, Phelps that..there are other great swimmers there. And yes, I was weirded out by the Panda story. It would have been fine if s/he hadn't taken it "there"
The water cube was built for records to be broken inside of it.
Instead of 3M, they made it 6M deep. The troughs on the side are meant to reduce surface tension on the water. That combined with the depth (6M) provides an almost flawless surface for swimmers to break records.
China wants people talking about their Olympics FOREVER. Even through records.
I guarantee that these records will hold in London, 2012.
Hey Net,
We question whether or not you even take baths, so WTF you knowing all this shit about the Cube pool? (I can Google search too, ya know...)
Actually, I used to swim and play water polo in my younger years.
A love for aquatic sports has kept my interest in the cube going.
Wasn't trying to be a know it all.... just had kept up on the cube's construction.
Just as you enjoy sexually harrassing women at the hash, I too have an interest.
But don't worry, I'll never question your knowledge of yours... I am all too aware that you don't have to google search how to chase tail at the hash. You probably wrote the book... or wikipedia entry.
I heard they send some kind of high frequency sonar crap through the pool to break up surface tension, which helps swimmers cut through the water better. After the Olympics they'll use the cube to drown any citizen who even mentioned Tibet during the olympics, nice to know they'll still get some use out of it.
The records will fall at the next swimming world championships.
Bet you a beer that at least 75% of them will hold.
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