All Out Sports

If you think the start of the Winter Olympics snuck up on you – they light the torch Friday evening – then imagine how the people of Vancouver feel. There’s almost no snow in the host city. Organizers have been forced to truck and helicopter some in to make at least one venue skiable.
“I’ve skied on rocks, I’ve skied on ice, I’ve skied in the rain,” U.S. freestyle skier Hannah Kearney told the Associated Press. “This is nothing.”
Hey, if that doesn’t get you in the winter spirit, nothing will.

At least a little humor about a Winter Olympics without the winter has served to remind people that the Olympics are coming. In the States, other than when one figure skater’s goon squad is whacking a rival’s knee, the Winter Games don’t garner the same widespread interest and anticipation as the Summer Olympics.

Vancouver is also dealing with comparisons to the 2008 Games that captured American attention due to both the historic charge by swimmer Michael Phelps and its exotic location in Beijing, China.

Team USA has no Phelps-level star heading into the games – Subway is still featuring him in ads, even though swimming is a summer sport – and while Vancouver is known for its sophistication and beauty, there isn’t a lot of mystery to Canada. The views of brown, snow-less mountains ringing the city probably won’t help.

That said, it’s still the Olympics and it always finds a way to surprise. So here is an American-centric Olympic primer (wind-breaker edition) to get you ready for the return of the torch.

1. No business like (no) snow business.

This story is like the bizarro local weatherman. Usually a hyperventilating “meteorologist” predicts massive snow fall totals when just flurries are likely. Now we get the opposite. A lot of hype about predictions of little snow that in the end will likely mean nothing.
Yes, it’s been unseasonably warm in British Columbia. The predicted high for the Opening Ceremony on Friday is 48 degrees, which means athletes making their way to Vancouver’s BC Place might ditch the fashionable earmuffs. However, local organizers and the International Olympic Committee say there will be no problem hauling in enough snow to make the Cypress Mountain venue ready for competition. It is home to most snowboarding events and mogul skiing.

Alpine skiing events are at no risk in high-elevation Whistler. Expect NBC to show a lot of scenic shots from those pure-white mountains. And if that melts, they can always get “Ice Road Truckers” (why wasn’t that an experimental sport?) to start filming even further north.

2. Will Lindsey Vonn be healthy?

The downhill skier revealed Wednesday that she is suffering from a deep shin bruise suffered during a training run last week in Austria. The heavily hyped 25-year-old, who appeared on both a Sports Illustrated cover and in the swimsuit issue, said she couldn’t guarantee she’d compete at all, let alone win the five golds some of her marketers had hyped as possible.

“I don’t know [what I can do],” Vonn said. “I’ve got to wait until the first training run on Thursday. I’m going to go up there, put my skis on and see how it feels. I may not be able to do the first training run.”

Vonn’s health will be the early story of the Games. The photogenic two-time World Cup champion had received the bulk of the pre-Olympics promotion in the United States. Her greatest challenge before getting injured was tempering expectations that she’d be the winter version of Michael Phelps and sweep golds. Now it’s whether she can get down the hill while her boots apply pressure against a “deep contusion” on the front of her right shin. Vonn described that feeling to NBA as “excruciatingly painful.”

Vonn has dealt with myriad injuries through the years and has promised to do everything she can to compete. The media will follow every detail of not just her final runs, but her early practices. Vonn became the face of these Games over the last couple months. Now it’s all eyes on her shin.

3. Do Americans love figure skating enough to adopt Kim Yu-Na as their own?

For the first time in decades, the U.S. lacks a medal favorite in women’s figure skating, usually the most-watched winter Olympic event. For decades a steady stream of champion Americans – from Peggy Fleming and Dorothy Hamill to Michelle Kwan and Sasha Cohen – has captured audiences.


Now our two competitors, Rachael Flatt and Mirai Nagasu, are plucky underdogs, not probable medalists. Both will have to lift their performances to contend. And neither has the potential of Kim Yu-Na, a 19-year-old South Korean who has mesmerized audiences around the world with her grace and power.

The question becomes: Will figure skating still be a major draw in the States if it’s a South Korean, not an American, that is performing brilliantly? And will NBC, noted for its pro-American programming, promote the event the same way?

The U.S. does have two skating stars, just not the traditional female singles skater.

Expect the terms “Tanith Belbin” and “pictures” to be the most searched of the Games, as the ice dancer and partner Benjamin Agosto’s quest for gold will receive plenty of camera time. No doubt she’ll dress for the occasion.

Fashion won’t be an issue either for men’s skater Johnny Weir. His ability to cause a stir with wild interviews, outfits and drama is unequaled. Weir has great fun playing with the media (how many adjectives can they use to say something without saying something) and the public, which is both fascinated and befuddled.

He gets everyone to pay attention to a male figure skater, which is his main goal. He’ll again be one of the most-discussed American athletes.
On the ice, Weir will try to make up for the Turin Games, where he blamed his poor long-skate performance on the fact that he missed his bus to the venue. The most disappointing part wasn’t that he failed to medal, but the realization that Johnny Weir rides the bus.

4. Shaun White’s Double Cork


The Flying Tomato and his sport of snowboarding were big winners in Turin, infusing the staid Olympics with a shot of X-Games energy. (After all, how exciting is the biathlon?) White, Gretchen Bleiler and others cashed in on their mainstream appeal.

White now makes millions. That’s produced scorn from some competitors, who hate his wealth and obvious training advantages. Nothing signifies that more than the private $500,000 halfpipe that Red Bull built for him in Colorado and was accessible by helicopter only. It features foam landing spots that White says allowed him to practice tricks that would’ve been too dangerous otherwise.

The big one is the Double Cork, a spinning, double flip that requires between 20 and 25 feet of height. He unveiled it in competition last summer and it’s since been duplicated by a few competitors. This is the big stage, though, and whether he (or others) can land the maneuver with the world watching will deliver drama to a sport that many are still trying to figure out. The potential for a ruinous wreck is tangible.

There have been predictable calls for the IOC to ban the move, which plays right into White, Red Bull and the sport’s hand. Nothing is better for all three than being considered too dangerous for the establishment.

5. Miracle on Ice, the sequel?

It’s been 30 years since a group of big-dreaming American college kids dared to knock off the mighty Russians and then win gold in Lake Placid. They were immediate legends, testaments to the power of teamwork and celebrated in books, a movie and countless television specials.
This year’s Team USA isn’t quite the same loveable bunch of innocent “kids.” Chris Drury, for instance, will make $8 million this year playing for the New York Rangers. However, our NHLers are facing just about as menacing of a foe as the old Red Army, actually two of them.
The Russians (again) and Canada.

Both teams are absolutely stacked with talent and the predicted gold-medal clash between the two nations has the hockey world in full pant. The subplots are outstanding. Canada is led by Sidney Crosby and Russia by Alexander Ovechkin. The two have become bitter rivals in the NHL.
Crosby plays for the Pittsburgh Penguins, where Evgeni Malkin is his co-star. Malkin is Russian and, therefore, will be going against Crosby and playing alongside Ovechkin.

Then there is the duel pressure cooker for the Canadians. First, they need to reclaim gold after failing to medal in Turin. Second, they must defend their native country or live with the indignity forever. Compared to Americans, Canadians don’t get angry about much. Losing the hockey tournament on home soil would count as “much.”
So why shouldn’t Team USA come along and ruin the party? In Ryan Miller, it has the best goaltender in the tournament and the 2010 answer to Jim Craig. In front, there are young goal scorers and plenty of grinders. No, this wouldn’t be a “Miracle” – our pros beat your pros isn’t quite the same.

It would be a big, satisfying upset nonetheless; kind of like snow in Vancouver.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/news;_ylt=AjTMpl2344aU6couR6pB8Nt9sbV_?slug=dw-vancouverstorylines020910&prov=yhoo&type=lgns