The OFFICIAL 2014 Winter Olympics Thread

[MaxQue]

How did the British men's curling team make it to the finals? They are playing horrible curling right now. Congrats to Canada on winning gold twice.

It's not really improving through the match.

[Hatman 🍁]

Usually Scotland (err "Great Britain") vs. Canada curling matches are classics, especially if they're for the championship. Too bad this wasn't. Actually, I'm not complaining.

So, that's 5 golds in the last 3 days for us. Awesome. Now we're firmly in 2nd in the medal standings.

Still nervous about the hockey game today. 

[The Dowager Mod]

Nåja seger till sverige!

[MaxQue]

Well, the real winter sports country won.

As the silly Canadian Olympic Committee motto is, "We are Winter".

[Hatman 🍁]

Yesssssss......

[Linus Van Pelt]

Yesssssss......

[Tender Branson]

Yesssssssss ..... !

Another 2 Gold medals today, 1 Silver and 2 Bronze.

[Tender Branson]

President Obama has to send 2 cases of beer to Canadian PM Harper ...

Canada defeated the US twice in Ice Hockey and Obama/Harper had a bet:

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[Tender Branson]

Some infos about Julia Dujmovits (snowboard GOLD medal):

Dujmovits was snowboarding in Kaprun during the 2000 ski resort rail disaster, in which 155 people died in a tunnel fire - including some of her best friends. Her brother and she were standing at the entrance of the rail that then went up in flames in the tunnel, when her brother said: "Come on, let's take the gondola up instead." Her friends went into the rail and died in the tunnel fire ...

The ski resort of Kaprun is 1 mile away from where I live. This was definitely an emotional moment for her.

(My older sister back then was a Red Cross worker and was deployed at the scene and she had to witness when they took out the burned victims and charred bodies from the tunnel in Austria's version of 9/11 ...)

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Dujmovits is also from the state of Burgenland, which is the flattest state in Austria (nothing higher than 100 meters there or so). It's also the first Winter Gold medal ever for this state.

[Tender Branson]

For anyone who wants to know more about the "2000 Kaprun fire disaster", I found this English-speaking documentary here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgJAuE1A8JM&t=00m53s

[Tender Branson]

The host country Russia will win the medal table.

Neither Norway nor Canada can overtake them anymore, with only 2 competitions left ...

[Gustaf]

Nåja seger till sverige!

We'll do our best!

[politicallefty]

Nothing against Canada, but they're like the Yankees of Olympic hockey. If you're not Canadian, you almost have to root against them. Go Team Sweden!

[Hatman 🍁]

1-0 Canada. Game doesn't matter for the medal standings, Canada will finish 3rd no matter what (behind Russia and Norway).

[Hatman 🍁]

2-0 Canada. 20 minutes left!

[Tender Branson]

So, Dujmovits is so called Burgenland Croat?

Maybe her ancestors were at some point, because the last name sounds so.

But I cannot find anything about it on Google.

Burgenland Croats, like Carinthian Slovenes, are  not really seen as "minorities" anymore, because they have basically 100% assimilated into Austrian culture already.

[Tender Branson]

Anyway, I predict 4 Gold medals for Austria, 5 Silver and 3 Bronze.

I predict 20-30 medals for Canada and #4th in medals.

We both had pretty good predictions !

FINAL SCORES:

AUT: 4 Gold, 8 Silver, 5 Bronze
CAN: 25 total medals, 3rd in the rankings

[Hatman 🍁]

To be fair, I did provide a huge range in my guess; the range going from an absolute disaster of an Olympics to an amazing best-ever Olympics

I thought Germany, Russia and the US would finish ahead of us. Didn't expect Norway to do as well.

And howabout the Netherlands? 24 medals! Jesus.

[Tender Branson]

Who ruled each sport ?



Alpine skiing — Austria (3 gold/4 silver/2 bronze)

Biathlon — Norway (3/1/2)

Bobsled — Russia (2/0/0)

Cross-country — Norway (5/2/4)

Curling — Canada (2/0/0)

Figure skating — Russia (3/1/1)

Freestyle skiing — Canada (4/4/1)

Ice hockey — Canada (2/0/0)

Luge — Germany (4/1/0)

Nordic Combined — Norway (2/1/1)

Short track — Russia (3/1/1)

Skeleton — Russia (1/0/1)

Ski jumping — Germany and Poland (2/0/0)

Snowboarding — United States (3/0/2)

Speedskating — Netherlands (8/7/8)

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2014/02/olympics-medal-count-russia-sochi-united-states-most

[Platypus]

Closing ceremony much, much better than the opening.

[Hatman 🍁]

Who ruled each sport ?



Alpine skiing — Austria (3 gold/4 silver/2 bronze)

Biathlon — Norway (3/1/2)

Bobsled — Russia (2/0/0)

Cross-country — Norway (5/2/4)

Curling — Canada (2/0/0)

Figure skating — Russia (3/1/1)

Freestyle skiing — Canada (4/4/1)

Ice hockey — Canada (2/0/0)

Luge — Germany (4/1/0)

Nordic Combined — Norway (2/1/1)

Short track — Russia (3/1/1)

Skeleton — Russia (1/0/1)

Ski jumping — Germany and Poland (2/0/0)

Snowboarding — United States (3/0/2)

Speedskating — Netherlands (8/7/8)

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2014/02/olympics-medal-count-russia-sochi-united-states-most

Germany won the ski jumping if you look past top 3 finishes both Poland and Germany had 4th place finishes, but Germany had 2 6th place finishes. Poland didn't even have an athlete in the women's event.

By the way, this is a stat to annoy Hugh: Canada vs Australia (2012+2014 medals)

Canada: 42 medals (11 gold)
Australia: 38 medals (7 gold)

[Platypus]

If only Australis didn't have 2/3rds the population, and the summer games weren't significantly more competitive

[Hatman 🍁]

If only Australis didn't have 2/3rds the population, and the summer games weren't significantly more competitive

True. I was trolling a bit. But we wouldn't even be close to Australia if we won as many Summer medals as Australia won winter medals.

[7,052,770]

Interesting tidbit:  if Vic Wild and Viktor Ahn had competed for their home countries instead of Russia, the USA would have won the medal count.

The US would have risen to 30 with Wild's 2, Russia would have fallen to 28 (not 27 because they probably would have at least still medaled in the short-track relay), and South Korea up to 11 (or 12 if Ahn lead them to a medal in the short-track relay).

The US would have at least tied Norway for most golds with 11, and probably won it outright at 12 since we probably would have beaten Russia in the short-track relay if they didn't have Ahn.

To be fair, I didn't go back and check and see if any of the American medalists were really from somewhere else.

[MaxQue]

The ice dancing competition was having much of them.

An American for Canada, two Japaneses for USA, one Russian for Germany (and her brother was competing for Russia), a Welsh for France....