August 5th, 2012 at 10:16 AM ^
This Murray - Federer match is pretty good. Go Murray
August 5th, 2012 at 10:40 AM ^
August 5th, 2012 at 11:40 AM ^
August 5th, 2012 at 12:12 PM ^
I think the tight schedule (playing this tournament so soon after Wimbledon) finally caught up to Federer. He didn't seem to have the legs today. I was hoping he could win and get the career golden slam. Oh well. He's still the best ever.
Go Federer
August 5th, 2012 at 10:57 AM ^
Upvote for the reference to "The Science Fiction Sketch".
The only problem is that the blancmanges have apparently failed to leave England empty during Wimbledon fortnight, or indeed, the Olympics. Which medal finalist is from Skyron, I wonder....
ADDENDUM: Murray-Federer is becoming more unreal with each serve.
August 5th, 2012 at 10:55 AM ^
McKayla Maroney gets silver in the vault final.
August 5th, 2012 at 12:39 PM ^
McKayla is expected to win gold by a comfortable margin.
She slipped on her second attempt.
an upset nonethless. She was by far the biggest favorite to win the individual event.
August 5th, 2012 at 11:00 AM ^
"The marathon is a very boring race."
--Emil Zatopek, after winning the first marathon he ever ran (at the Helsinki olympics) and for which he hadn't trained (he decided to enter at the last minute)
August 6th, 2012 at 12:38 AM ^
I agree. I just don't get why people make comments like this. The tactical skill that goes into the long distance running races is just amazing to watch (of course, you also have to know what you're watching for, though). I suspect virtually anyone could say the same thing about one sport or another. For example, I'd far rather watch any of the long distance running events than basketball or beach volleyball (which is a sentiment that I bet a substantial number of people here agree with and a substantial number of people here disagree with, but isn't exactly popular to say).
All the prime time focus on that and I accidentally see high jump qualifying at 1:00 am.
August 6th, 2012 at 10:29 AM ^
The comment was really about Zatopek, not the marathon. I think he was bored because he liked chatting up his competitors during races and he got so far ahead in the marathon he didn't have anyone to talk to for the last hour or so.
For what it's worth, I love watching Olympic distance races, especially the 5k and 10k. It's about the only set of events post-college where they haven't hired rabbits and it's left to the runners themselves to sort things out tactically.
It was a great race to watch. Full of drama, and as someone who has run a handful myself, it was impressive to see those kicks at the end. The Russian woman in particular showed quite a bit to catch back up to the pack after letting them get away earlier on in the race.
August 6th, 2012 at 12:28 AM ^
I agree. It was an excellent race. I'm actually not sure whether I'm more surprised at how well Petrova Arkhipova did (as you mentioned, that charge she put forth was awesome to watch) or how much Kiplagat fell off at the end (going from the lead pack of five to finishing 20th and over five minutes back, all in the course of a couple of miles). I fully anticipate that the men's race will be just as good.
August 5th, 2012 at 12:40 PM ^
August 5th, 2012 at 12:54 PM ^
And if you were watching this great game, you got to see a little extra courtesy of nbc: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4GgawcsBTE
Handball is an underrated sport. It's like water polo on land.
Whoa...
Flipped to NBCSN (Sports Network) and came across this athlete...
http://www.dispatch.com/content/graphics/2012/07/14/arace-mangold-art-g…
I mean, not to judge, but I was just shocked. Kinda awesome, kinda embodies America all too well..
Carl Lewis, 1984 & 1988.
Shit. How can I forget bout Lewis....
edit: Forgot 88 was the Ben Johnson race, where Lewis was awarded the gold after Johnson tested for steroids. A gold nonetheless!
So I think it's all juiced. Still a blast to watch, though, and that slight benefit of the doubt is enough to keep me from being disgusted by it. Of course, I enjoy cycling, too.
One counterpoint to this: improved training techniques and whatever else have lowered 100 times, but the 200 record has been much harder to beat, even by someone as naturally gifted for it as Bolt.
Don't forget the evolutions in technology. Much better track surfaces, evolution of track spikes, deeper understanding of training techniques, etc. Times will always decrease as technology increases. I'd be curious to see what a Michael Johnson or Carl Lewis could have done in today's environment.
Are they allowed to change the track surface that much? I assumed they wanted it to be as constant from year to year as possible to keep the integrity of the records.
August 5th, 2012 at 11:26 PM ^
All of those improvements were true... But when cycling moved to a better, aggressive bio-passport program, climbing performances dropped right back to the old "mortal" levels.
There has been a lot of development since the days of Owens, but as technology improves the rate of gain should flatten out as peak efficiency is approached; there just hasn't been that much change since 1996, but the record has been steadily cut away at an astounding rate.
Again, I still enjoy the event and don't hate the participants, but in today's high-tech doping age with such amazing sprint times being produced, it's hard to believe that juice isn't involved.
Somehow, it seems like the pace of improvement is growing, which doesn't make sense at all. Instead of shaving off the occasional .01 second off the record, which was the case for awhile, we're seeing guys periodically rip off .04 or .05 at a time. It's eyebrow-raising.
A lot of sports are disproportionately dominated by a couple of nationalities. The British were all over the rowing and track cycling events, for instance. Korea and Italy dominated fencing. Swimming was pretty much U.S./China/France.
August 6th, 2012 at 12:54 AM ^
Ah, OK. I get what you were saying.
Instead of covering the men's 100m final live—one of the signature events of any Olympics—NBC instead gives us horse jumping and beach volleyball. What a colossal cock-up.
I thought the same thing. It's Sunday at 5 PM - people will watch a race that takes under 10 seconds to run. What a waste!
August 5th, 2012 at 11:07 PM ^
No, but I've seen the Slovenian Triple Jumper. WOW!:
August 5th, 2012 at 11:13 PM ^
I have absolutely no interest in making a point of tuning into NBC this evening to watch the stale re-run. I can watch it any time in the future since there will be plenty of youtubes available before too long. In other words, I'm not watching anything on NBC. What a bunch of nitwits.
I don't give a crap about volleyball, and if I want to look at attractive women, I can do that anytime at a billion websites.
I do care about track & field, but if NBC doesn't care about broadcasting it live I'm doing something else with my time, like finishing the kitchen paint job I'm in the middle of.
And the great thing about the 100m is that it happens so quickly their media player won't have time to crash.