Here come the W-Olympics. What's your favorite event?

[Master Seblaise]

The women's hockey is shaping up to be a great tournament so far. Also that kid who won the snowboard slopestyle last night...literally petite. 5'5" 117lbs, but can fly. I think he's like 17 too, which is cool.

Can't wait for the women's slopestyle finals tonight, and big air later next week.

Curling has been cool so far, mixed doubles is a neat concept. Last night they were saying the IOC is planning to add more mixed events to the Olympic program for both seasons. Summer we will see a couple of mixed relays in swimming and track, and I'm hearing about some in speed skating, short track, and alpine skiing. I think mixing the genders is good, shows little kids that boys and girls CAN indeed play together, which is a wonderful thing that does a lot for inclusion.

Not gonna lie I've been enjoying figure skating as well. I've always enjoyed ice dancing, but now I find myself enjoying all of it. Those outfits are cute too, maybe I'll have to try this.

Waiting for alpine to start tonight, I've watched some training runs. Looks like a nice downhill course, should be a fun competition to watch. Mikaela Shiffrin tonight! Yay!

Considering swimming, there are already mixed relays during the World Championship ... hope it will become an Olympic race


Watched again the race of our Perrine Lafont in women moguls ... and she is only 19!!!!

[ThreadJack]

Considering swimming, there are already mixed relays during the World Championship ... hope it will become an Olympic race


Watched again the race of our Perrine Lafont in women moguls ... and she is only 19!!!!

It sounds like it's in the IOC's plans for Tokyo 2020. Should be good. I don't think we have any mixed events in the Summer games right now aside from tennis. http://www.bbc.com/sport/olympics/40226990

It looks like the mixed team event in alpine skiing is set to debut during these very games! (Yay!)
 
Sadly I missed the moguls final, but I did catch the qualification. It's a fun watch.

[Taegin Roan]

As much as I want US to win everything, I've gotta say, the Canadian and OAR figure skating teams are incredible. I would be fine with them beating USA, because they would definitely deserve it.

Also seeing Red Gerard win that Gold was awesome.

[ThreadJack]

As much as I want US to win everything, I've gotta say, the Canadian and OAR figure skating teams are incredible. I would be fine with them beating USA, because they would definitely deserve it.

Also seeing Red Gerard win that Gold was awesome.

Yeah they do seem to have awesome teams. Pretty usual for the Russians, Canada usually has at least one or two good athletes or pairs it seems, so no surprise there either. Not liking this team event though, seems a bit contrived to me, but can't wait to see the regular events!

[ThreadJack]

These winds are really killing these games. Two days in a row it's caused events to be postponed/cancelled or shortened.

Yesterday, the Men's downhill was postponed (will take place on Wednesday).

Then today the Women's Giant Slalom was postponed(also to Wednesday), and Women's Slopestyle started late and was shortened to two runs per rider(as opposed to the usual three runs per). And quite frankly the competition tonight has been meh. None of the ladies are going particularly big and are being conservative due to conditions. Lots of crashing and plenty of girls are being forced to bail and not take jumps, due to the wind. I'm watching girls who I've seen throw down, and throw down BIG, looking like your average park rat at the local resort.

I'm a snowboarder myself, so I understand why, but a lot of lay people tuning in probably DON'T, and are wondering what's going on, what's so special about a lot of these tricks, and why wind matters. Well wind blowing in your face can slow you down, make turning harder. Blowing in behind you can push you and cause you to go faster than you intend. Coming in from your sides is fine, if you're not planning on jumping. If you're just riding the piste at your local hill, it's not too much of an issue from any direction, as long as you're smart. Doing jumps like these girls? Strong gusts of wind are all kinds of NOPE. Speed is key, you need the proper amount, too far outside the window is not good. Too slow, you may not clear the jump and hit the lip. This will either cause you to wipe out(usually) or it can kill your momentum if you're able to save it and stay up, which in turn could mean you're going FAR too slow coming into the next jump and may not be able to take it. Too fast and you'll land too low. Same scenario as hitting too high. Gusts from the side could even throw you completely to the side off the jump trajectory. Hella not good.

In short? Wind is bad when sliding down a mountain.

[Taegin Roan]

I still haven't figured out how the Canadian and Russian guys got higher scores than the American, but whatever.

USA has four women snowboarders in the half-pipe finals!

[ThreadJack]

I still haven't figured out how the Canadian and Russian guys got higher scores than the American, but whatever.

USA has four women snowboarders in the half-pipe finals!

I'm hoping for a sweep! I'm rooting for Ariel Gold, because of the name. She needs the gold medal!

I actually think Chloe Kim wins it though. I'm disappointed no Torah Bright, she's always a favorite of mine, even though she's Australian.

Also GO JAMIE! She's still my favorite, can't wait to see her in big air.

[Master Seblaise]

Women Biathlon .... What a race!!!!

Impressive to make a 5/5 on the last shooting after a race like this ...

[ThreadJack]

I'm watching Women's Ski Jumping right now. Always an interesting time, ski jumping. I'm amazed at how far they can go. It's literally the closest (wo)man can get to flying without an aircraft.

[ThreadJack]

Okay, as usual Americans are basically cleaning up the golds in snowboarding. However even I'm a bit perplexed by this judging at times. It's like they took the figure skating judges who didn't make the cut and said "you're judging snowboarding."

"Judging the what and the who now?"

"You know snowboarding? It's basically what you're used to, but on snow and all the elements have weird names. Like 'McTwist,' 'Japan air,' and 'method grab.'"

"Okay... is there, like, a video or something?"

"Not really. I mean we have this video of the Dew Tour... you should watch it. Here I'll put it on."

*Watching video, bewildered.

"So that's it, that's her routine?"

"Um they're called runs in snowboarding. And that's a he."

"Well I saw the long hair and bright neon costume, and figured..."

"It's not a costume. It's just pants and a jacket, we don't have a name for it."

"Okay that was a terrible quad..."

"It's not a quad, it's a frontside 1800 stalefish."

"A wha.... can you repeat that in English please?"

"He took off from his front edge, did four rotations, and reached behind to grab his heelside edge immediately to the left of his binding."

"Okaaaayyy.... I don't like this. Isn't their anyone who's done this before and knows what's going on?"

"Nope, sorry, you figure skating judges are too expensive. We had to cut corners so you alternate judges will have to help out judging other sports. Just go along with it, you'll be fine!"

*sigh* "Okay.... what's a.... Double McTwist 1260 again?.... is that what he called the spinning flippy thing?"

[Saso Is-kor]

*sigh* "Okay.... what's a.... Double McTwist 1260 again?.... is that what he called the spinning flippy thing?"

Whenever I hear them mention the "McTwist" I think it's some McDonalds product. LOL, I know nothing about the sport so I think I might make it as one of those judges XD

[ThreadJack]

Whenever I hear them mention the "McTwist" I think it's some McDonalds product. LOL, I know nothing about the sport so I think I might make it as one of those judges XD

So do I, and I DO the sport(I can't do a McTwist though). lol

It's just baffling. They give really amazing runs the scores they deserve, really amazing ones. However some of the less than stellar(but still very good) runs get head scratching scores. Plenty of times I was like "Um hello, that run was waaay better than that. Should be in the 80's not 74.XX!" Perhaps I'm judging the degree of difficulty wrong. Though to be fair, that's slightly relative(like most judged sports). Women we're getting runs scored in the 90's with tricks that would get the men laughed out of the half pipe or off the slopes, because that's where the field happens to be at progression wise. (Most what the women do are still extremely cool tricks, regardless) The announcers even said during qualifying runs for men's pipe, that run would have WON 4 years ago." (Qualifying runs tend to be simpler, as they "leave something on the table" for the final).

Also, these alpine delays are getting kinda ridiculous. Though I am looking forward to seeing so much ski racing in the next few days!

[DaddyFlip]

I've always wondered how they judge that. Are they looking at what we can see on the TV or do the judges see something else? Also, I remember paying close attention to figure skating one year and the explanation that while a move can look really good to the casual observer, it can get a low score because it didn't follow the accepted form for the move. I immediately thought of dog shows!

I can ski, but I can't SB worth a lick. I like SB video games tho - like SSX and Amped - old school now I guess.

[ThreadJack]

I've always wondered how they judge that. Are they looking at what we can see on the TV or do the judges see something else? Also, I remember paying close attention to figure skating one year and the explanation that while a move can look really good to the casual observer, it can get a low score because it didn't follow the accepted form for the move. I immediately thought of dog shows!

I can ski, but I can't SB worth a lick. I like SB video games tho - like SSX and Amped - old school now I guess.

It's kind of a bit like that. Most people will be like "OH nice, what huge trick!" and I'm like "It was good, but a bit sketchy, he mssed the grab." They also take height into account. A CLEAN 900 with really good jump height will net more points than a sketchy 1080 with barely enough height to land the trick. Unless you're in the Olympics, apparently.

[Taegin Roan]

I am proud of the USA Olympic snowboarders this year.