The OFFICIAL 2014 Winter Olympics Thread

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Do the team figure skating scores reset for the finals, or do they carry through?  If it's the latter, the US is probably out of contention for anything better than bronze...

Just checked, and they carry thru.  At this point Russia is guaranteed at least a silver, Canada is the only other team that can win gold, and the US, Italy, and Japan are all fighting for bronze with a theoretical chance of silver.  Whoever designed the scoring system was stupid.  It all but eliminates any chance for drama.  At the very least, the free skate programs should have been scored 10-8-6-4-2 instead of 10-9-8-7-6 if they weren't going to simply add together the raw scores from each event.  With that simple change, even tho the situation would still be heavily in favor of Russia getting the gold, Canada the silver, and the US leading Italy in the race for bronze, even Japan would theoretically still have a shot at gold right now with three events left to go of the eight.

[Tender Branson]

Woohoo !

First Gold Medal by Matthias Mayer in the Alpine Downhill !





http://kurier.at/thema/olympia2014/matthias-mayer-abfahrts-olympiasieger/50.513.684

[Hatman 🍁]

Canada wins a fourth medal, winning silver in the Figure Skating team competition. USA wins bronze, Russia wins gold.

In Slopestyle snowboarding, Spencer Cooper who was favoured to medal finishes last

[7,052,770]

This would have been the standing if they had just added up everyone's scores instead of the 10-9-8-etc. on the team figure skating:

866.63    Russia
814.28    Canada
784.31    United States
701.46    Japan
695.82    Italy
261.98    France
258.99    China
250.63    Germany
209.48    Ukraine
205.12    Great Britain

Japan and Italy would have flipped.

[Hatman 🍁]

Another gold for Canada, we now lead the medal table (sorted by gold)

However, our men's curling team is doing terrible. They barely got by Germany this morning, and aren't looking very good against Switzerland.

[Franzl]

Wow, all 3 medals to the Dutch in ice speed skating.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

I wonder how many of those 100,000. condoms remain  unused?

[The Dowager Mod]

And the big story today is a russian skater almost showing some sideboob.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

And the big story today is a russian skater almost showing some sideboob.

The Ruskies can't get anything right.

[Tender Branson]

A surprisingly even medal table with about 1/5 completed.

And the "usual suspects" are out in front ...

[Tender Branson]

Tomorrow, we are all Austrian ski-jump fans !

Daniela Iraschko-Stolz (openly lesbian) might win the Gold medal in highly homophobic Russia.

Until Sunday, she dominated the training jumps but Sara Takanashi (JAP) is still very tough to beat.

[Hatman 🍁]

Canada wins another gold & silver in moguls, this time in the men's. We nearly swept the medals, as our third skiier finished 4th.

[NewYorkExpress]

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/sochi-olympics-whats-behind-the-empty-seats-at-the-2014-winter-games/

Empty Seats abound in Sochi, with many venues three-quarters empty or worse.

[Hatman 🍁]

The fans that did show up to the curling events aren't very knowledgeable. Cheering for bad shots that "look good" by the Russian team. When the men's team lost, you could almost hear the collective "wait... is the game over.... why are they shaking hands... did we win or lose?" Of course, even in Vancouver the fans weren't knowledgeable. 

[MaxQue]

The fans that did show up to the curling events aren't very knowledgeable. Cheering for bad shots that "look good" by the Russian team. When the men's team lost, you could almost hear the collective "wait... is the game over.... why are they shaking hands... did we win or lose?" Of course, even in Vancouver the fans weren't knowledgeable. 

Quebec TV noticed that, but said it was worst in Torino (people booed when people "missed" the last shot in order to draw and not give the last stone to the opposing them there).

[Hatman 🍁]

The fans that did show up to the curling events aren't very knowledgeable. Cheering for bad shots that "look good" by the Russian team. When the men's team lost, you could almost hear the collective "wait... is the game over.... why are they shaking hands... did we win or lose?" Of course, even in Vancouver the fans weren't knowledgeable. 

Quebec TV noticed that, but said it was worst in Torino (people booed when people "missed" the last shot in order to draw and not give the last stone to the opposing them there).

You mean when a team throws their last rock through to maintain last rock advantage if the most they could get is 1 point? I can see why a n00b wouldn't understand that. But I remember from the Torino games that the Italians loved the curling, because it reminded them of Bocce.

Anyways, who's doing the Quebec curling coverage? Guy Hemmings? He's awesome!

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

This would have been the standing if they had just added up everyone's scores instead of the 10-9-8-etc. on the team figure skating:

866.63    Russia
814.28    Canada
784.31    United States
701.46    Japan
695.82    Italy
261.98    France
258.99    China
250.63    Germany
209.48    Ukraine
205.12    Great Britain

Japan and Italy would have flipped.

Thanks, I was wondering about that. I really enjoyed the team figure skating but I found the scoring odd - I guess they do it that way because some of the events have different maximum scores - actually, I'm not sure there are maximum scores

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

This would have been the standing if they had just added up everyone's scores instead of the 10-9-8-etc. on the team figure skating:

866.63    Russia
814.28    Canada
784.31    United States
701.46    Japan
695.82    Italy
261.98    France
258.99    China
250.63    Germany
209.48    Ukraine
205.12    Great Britain

Japan and Italy would have flipped.

Thanks, I was wondering about that. I really enjoyed the team figure skating but I found the scoring odd - I guess they do it that way because some of the events have different maximum scores - actually, I'm not sure there are maximum scores

Had they gone with my idea of scoring the finals 10-8-6-4-2 the results would have been:

1-73    Russia
2-58    Canada
3-53    USA
4-41      Italy
5-38    Japan

No effect on the final outcome, but Team USA would still have had an theoretical chance of silver going into the final event if they came in first and the Canadians flubbed and came in fifth.  If nothing else, it would have added more drama to the event. (Not that ice skating needs drama to get eyeballs, but the principle is there.)

[DINGO Joe]

Snowboarders are in a tizzy, apparently temperatures in the 60s are wreaking havoc on what was an iffy halfpipe venue to begin with

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/snowboarders-want-sochi-halfpipe-event-postponed--pipe-cutter-blames-tv--conditions-183637062.html

[Platypus]

'Iffy' is generous. If Torah Bright is actually saying anything negative about anything ever, you know it's really, really, really bad.

Anna Segal has just come 4th in the women's ski slopestyle

[MaxQue]

Apparently, acrobatic skiing is the new Canadian national sport, we won 6 of our 9 medals there (2 in men's moguls, 2 in women's moguls and 2 in women's slopestyle). (The three others are figure skating, speed staking and snowboard).

The fans that did show up to the curling events aren't very knowledgeable. Cheering for bad shots that "look good" by the Russian team. When the men's team lost, you could almost hear the collective "wait... is the game over.... why are they shaking hands... did we win or lose?" Of course, even in Vancouver the fans weren't knowledgeable. 

Quebec TV noticed that, but said it was worst in Torino (people booed when people "missed" the last shot in order to draw and not give the last stone to the opposing them there).

You mean when a team throws their last rock through to maintain last rock advantage if the most they could get is 1 point? I can see why a n00b wouldn't understand that. But I remember from the Torino games that the Italians loved the curling, because it reminded them of Bocce.

Anyways, who's doing the Quebec curling coverage? Guy Hemmings? He's awesome!

Yes, I'm meaning that, Herbie. I understand it's confusing (myself being a confused person at first). But, like in Torino, the crowd knowledge will be much better deeper in the event.

And, yes, it's Guy Hemmings. He is barely known in Quebec, so, I'm very surprised you know him. It's his former curling career? He is retired now, he is a full time teacher, apparently.

Radio-Canada is having duet covarage (CBC probably do the same). Guy Hemmings is the analyst, Justine Boutet is the host (the one doing more general comment). She is a former tennis university player, but is now a sports journalist (and the one usually covering curling news).

[Јas]

I enjoyed the final of the men's Moguls last night. The Canadian gold medal was well-deserved.

[ZuWo]

To my great surprise the Canadian men's curling team is struggling a lot; after a narrow victory over the Germans they lost to both the Swiss and the Swedes. There is no doubt that they have the skills and the potential to win all the remaining games but it's going to be tough.
The Canadian women's team, on the other hand, is playing extremely well. The Swiss ladies haven't played their best so far but all that matters are the two wins they managed to secure.
Unfortunately for the Americans both US teams are looking pretty weak.

[Holmes]

If Canada doesn't get gold in men's and women's curling and hockey, I will be ashamed.

[Tender Branson]

If Daniela Iraschko-Stolz wins the Ski Jump tonight, we would pull ahead of Russia in the medal table.

But not ahead of the US and Germany, because Shaun White and Natalie Geisenberger will win Gold medals in the next hours.