Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

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April
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Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by April »

This happens to me every time they start up. I get Olympic fever and become incapable of doing anything other than sitting in front of my TV, blinking only when necessary, and being completely captured by whatever event is going on, even if it's something I have no interest in. For example, last night: Women's weightlifting. I was enthralled. Why? I don't know.

Anyway, I guess I was just wondering if anyone else here follows the events so closely. My personal favorite to watch is swimming (Ryan Lochte is my favorite athlete EVER), but I also love watching gymastics, as do a lot of people, and track and field. I think the beach volleyball games always looks so fun to attend, too.

I thought London did a great job with the opening ceremony. Full of great music, dancing, and storytelling. It felt timeless, yet at the same time, it was so contemporary.

I know we have Roswell fans all over the world who post on this board, so I'm interested to know, who are you guys rooting for at these Olympics? What events are you most excited to see?
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CandyliciousLovah
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by CandyliciousLovah »

I don't really get into the Olympics, but I did watch Marion Ross bike across the finish line this morning before I went to church. I'll most likely watch gymnastics for Shawn Johnson, as I've watched her on Dancing with the Stars several years ago.
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April
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by April »

I hope the girls this year put up a Shawn / Nastia type performance.
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killjoy
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by killjoy »

Twice....back in 84 when it was in LA I was addicted to the whole thing.That was around the time my grandfather died and so I was staying a lot of weekends with my grandmother.We sat and watched just about all of it cheering for the US!

Than in 92 I think it was we watched The Dream Team beat the tar out of everyone in basketball.

The last one I didn't see much out of it but I did get a HUGE kick out of the fact our swim relay team beat the heavy favored French team.....after they ran their mouths about how they were there to beat us! :lol:
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April
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by April »

Spoilers ahead: Don't read if you haven't watched.





American broadcasting's bias towards Michael Phelps makes me kind of sick. Never mind the fact that his first gold of the games came with the help of 3 other guys on the relay. Let's just focus the entire medal ceremony on him, zoom the camera in to him and no one else, as if it were an individual win when it WASN'T. I get that he's the most prolific Olympian of all time now. It's incredible that he's won so many medals. And I can't deny that his 8 golds in Beijing had me riveted. It was history in the making. But the fact that this 4x200 relay will go down as Michael Phelps' race rather than a team race makes me mad.

Plus, he's kind of an ass.

Ugh. And if I hear one more commentator attach the word "arguably" to Ryan Lochte's name when saying that he's been the best swimmer in the world for the past four years, I might just punch out my TV.

Anyway. Had to get that out.

On a lighter note . . . whoa, women's gymastics made me proud to be an American tonight! After the men sucked so bad, this was really cool to see.


ETA: Candyliciouslovah, I just noticed you're using an icon I made! That makes me glad. Usually I'm the only one who uses the icons I make. :lol:
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by Heavenli24 »

April wrote:Spoilers ahead: Don't read if you haven't watched.
American broadcasting's bias towards Michael Phelps makes me kind of sick.
How about the fact that during the opening ceremony, NBC showed a Ryan Seacrest interview with Michael Phelps instead of the moving tribute to the London terrorist attacks of July 7th 2005 (the day after London got the Olympics)?
On a lighter note . . . whoa, women's gymastics made me proud to be an American tonight! After the men sucked so bad, this was really cool to see.
Yeah :). For us, GB were the other way around - the boys did amazingly well, while the girls weren't quite as on top (but still did incredibly well).

I'm especially interested in the gymnastics because my brother is a former international gymnast and he knows several of the British team (I met Beth Tweddle when she was on the GB team with him at the World University Games in Serbia, and Imogen Cairns is a local girl... she trained at the same gym as him when they were kids :)).
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by killjoy »

One thing I did like about this Olympics was how Bob Costas had a moment of silence to honor the 40th anniversary of the murder of the Israeli team by Islamic animals in the Munich games. The moment of silence that the people in charge of the Olympics were to chicken shit to approve because they were scared it might 'offened' the Arab nations in the games :roll:
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April
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by April »

killjoy wrote:One thing I did like about this Olympics was how Bob Costas had a moment of silence to honor the 40th anniversary of the murder of the Israeli team by Islamic animals in the Munich games. The moment of silence that the people in charge of the Olympics were to chicken shit to approve because they were scared it might 'offened' the Arab nations in the games :roll:
Yeah, that was great. Bob Costas is the man. I think it was really important that he did that.
Heavenli24 wrote:How about the fact that during the opening ceremony, NBC showed a Ryan Seacrest interview with Michael Phelps instead of the moving tribute to the London terrorist attacks of July 7th 2005 (the day after London got the Olympics)?
Are you serious? I thought it was kind of weird that they just broke in with a Phelps interview, but I didn't know they showed it in place of that tribute. That's awful. That should just NOT happen.
Yeah :). For us, GB were the other way around - the boys did amazingly well, while the girls weren't quite as on top (but still did incredibly well).
That was so cool! NBC just stopped showing the American men because it got so depressing, so I got really into watching the British men. It didn't matter what country you lived in, because you felt their elation when they won a medal. I felt so bad for the Ukrainians, though, thinking they had the bronze and then having it overruled.

Man, there's been some weird, crazy stuff happening in these Olympics. Favorites to get on the podium or even win in the swimming events haven't even medaled. I don't know what's going on with the Australian men in the relays. The Chinese have that freakshow of a female swimmer who came home in the 400 IM as fast as Lochte did? WTF?! I don't even know what to think about her. And then with gymastics, the current world champion almost blew a medal for his team with a wacky dismount on his last apparatus. And then poor Jordyn Weiber of the U.S., not getting her well-deserved shot at the all-around because of a stupid 2 gymasts per country rule. :roll: It's just weird. I feel like I can't predict anything that's going to happen.
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by Heavenli24 »

April wrote:
Heavenli24 wrote:How about the fact that during the opening ceremony, NBC showed a Ryan Seacrest interview with Michael Phelps instead of the moving tribute to the London terrorist attacks of July 7th 2005 (the day after London got the Olympics)?
Are you serious? I thought it was kind of weird that they just broke in with a Phelps interview, but I didn't know they showed it in place of that tribute. That's awful. That should just NOT happen.
Yeah, the choreographer of that section was pretty upset that NBC cut it because they did not think that it was 'tailored for a US audience' (despite the fact that at least 1 US citizen died in the attacks and there were pictures shown of US servicemen during the tribute).

Plus, they don't even air half of the Olympics events live in the US - the ceremony was delayed by 4 hours and the sports are often shown at prime time, hours later than they actually happened. They claim that they live stream all the events, but if that was the case, then most of the coverage would start at 4.a.m EST and continue through until about 5 pm.

On the other hand, the BBC has 3 channels dedicated to non-stop live Olympic coverage 12 hours a day (with only breaks for the news), with options to watch different live events through the interactive channels and online, so you can chose what you watch from a number of different sports.

I was living in the US during the 2008 Olympics and I was very frustrated that they only seemed to show the US and the Chinese during the gymnastics. I had to dial into my UK university VPN and watch the coverage on the BBC to see anyone else performing!
Yeah :). For us, GB were the other way around - the boys did amazingly well, while the girls weren't quite as on top (but still did incredibly well).
That was so cool! NBC just stopped showing the American men because it got so depressing, so I got really into watching the British men. It didn't matter what country you lived in, because you felt their elation when they won a medal. I felt so bad for the Ukrainians, though, thinking they had the bronze and then having it overruled.
It was great for GB because this was their first men's team final (and medal) in 100 years! Our gymnasts just haven't been great before and it's only in the last 10 years or so that they have even managed to qualify for the Olympics, let alone win any medals :P.

I was looking back over some old articles and found some pictures of the 2004 and 2005 British Championships in the gymnastics - you can see a very young Daniel Purvis, Kristian Thomas and Louis Smith in the Under-16's competitions :P:
http://www.gymnasticsonline.co.uk/html/ ... ps_05.html (top left picture is Louis Smith with cornrows, then the two pics right below are my little brother, and right near the bottom, are Louis Smith, Kristian Thomas and Daniel Keatings (who for some reason didn't make the Olympic team and was replaced with Max) on the podium).
And Daniel Purvis and Louis Smith (and my brother :P) are in the 2004 pics as well: http://www.gymnasticsonline.co.uk/html/ ... ns_04.html
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Re: Olympics: Anyone else addicted?

Post by secretk »

I'm watching some of the games mostly volleyball in door, because our national team (Bulgaria) competes. We are small country and our team had a lot of problems to qualify on those Olympic games, but so far we made the surprise in this tournament - we defeated Poland and we are on top of our group (luckily it's the easier one).

I'm too much more fan of Lochte than Phelps. Sadly last night (for me, those time zones :lol: ) Lochte didn't have a day and got bronze and silver instead of gold. I think that he was also tired, because he competed in two disciplines.
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