Winter Games

Athens, Four Years After

wintergames — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 13:26:33 +0000

The Chicago Tribune’s architecture blog “The Skyline” had a post on the legacy of Athens’ Olympic venues four years after. It’s a story that should give planners in Vancouver, London and the potential 2016 host cities pause. The article is too harsh, but just a bit — I was in Athens right after they lost the 1996 Games and twice more in the last years before the games. There were vast improvements in the city’s infrastructure in the years between my first visits. Athens was a difficult city to love — still is — but the changes forced on the city by the Olympics were needed and in most cases, beautiful (the new metro stations built around the city center may have been in the best in the world in the early 2000s). The article points out Greece’s economic growth since 2004, but underplays what a surprise that growth has been (I am a committed and long-time hellenophile, and I never would have predicted it).

It’s a good article and gives post-Olympic Athens some of the attention it deserves.

The Venues

wintergames — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 10:52:38 +0000

Though tis might be an article only an Olympics geek could love, it is a nice companion to the column I linked to in the previous post: a run-down of all of the venues for the 2010 Olympics, with a bit about their budget, current status and planned post-Olympics use.

Vancouver’s Home Stretch

wintergames — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 10:41:03 +0000

A columnist for the Seattle Times, Ron Judd, has a good article on where Vancouver stands now in preparations for 2010 (excellent), what they have left to accomplish and what the hope to achieve. It’s a concise and comprehensive overview of where the 2010 Olympics are at the close of the Beijing games.

And this must been seen as great news:

The realist — and the Canadian — in Furlong knows that nothing of that scale could, or even should, occur in Vancouver, even though it will be the largest metro area ever to host a Winter Games.

That’s why the stark differences Furlong and his staff are predicting for the 2010 Games are more a matter of style. The Games, to be spread between dual Olympic centers in downtown Vancouver, where most ice sports will take place, and Whistler, home of most alpine events, will feel more intimate, friendly, and open, Furlong vows.

The model Furlong most often invokes is the 2000 Sydney Olympics, which are remembered for the celebratory atmosphere that surrounded every event. A feeling of national pride seemed to ooze through the infrastructure, and Furlong believes Vancouver, one of the world’s most diverse cities, can replicate that feeling in a Winter Games.

Despite Appearances, Yes, there is a Plan

wintergames — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:37:25 +0000

At the end of every Olympics, I pledge to follow competition in the Winter sports in the off-years, when the Winter Olympics arrive, I’m not totally lost in the woods. Of course, that’s a promise I forget as soon as the following Autumn comes around, and, come the Winter games, I’m clueless, again.

“Be the blog you want to read” is a good rule; I haven’t found a site that keeps up with the Olympic winter sports and mixes in news about the upcoming Olympics. So, I’ll just do it myself — I’m pretty sure the audience for such a blog is close to 1, but I’m OK with that. Fans of the Biathlon are used to loneliness.

Right now, I’ve got a lot of work to do. This site needs many more links in the sidebar, possibly a better design and I’ll need to hunt down good news sources. Expect posts to be light for a few days with I work those things.

Don’t worry, I’ll be back.

Great Moments on YouTube

wintergames — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 10:43:46 +0000

Just in case you need something to fill the Olympics-shaped hole in your television habits, ubiqui-blogger Jason Kottke has compiled a list of great moments from past Olympics that can be found on YouTube. Good stuff here.

wintergames — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 10:33:25 +0000

Here are the latest, almost-up-to-date numbers from NBC’s internet efforts. And they are good (and good news, I hope, for 2010):

Benefiting from the growth in broadband Internet access, NBCOlympics.com served up more than 1.2 billion pages and 72 million video streams through Saturday, more than doubling the combined traffic to its site during the 2004 Games in Athens and the 2006 Games in Turin. The popularity of the site will very likely make digital rights more significant in next year’s bidding for the 2014 and 2016 Games.

As this Olympics demonstrated, the Internet turns the action into a digital version of the “Choose Your Own Adventure” children’s books, where every sport can receive its time in the spotlight. Enjoy cycling? NBC had 90 videos of the competitions by Sunday. Prefer softball? Yahoo had 186 photos. The Internet is “allowing people to create their own broader Olympics experience,” said Jon Gibs, the vice president for media analytics at Nielsen Online.

Unless NBC is galactically stupid (possible, I’ve seen the ads for “The Biggest Loser”) the 2010 Games in Vancouver will be well represented with video on the internet.

Vancouver!

wintergames — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:15:38 +0000

Now that the 2008 Olympics are over, those of us who regard bobsledding, ski jumping and mass-start cross country races as the real Olympic sports now have the best part ahead of us: the 18-month long run up to the Vancouver Winter Games.

As I write this, there are 537 days and 11 hours until the Opening Ceremonies — a steadily decreasing number that you can track on Omega’s (the official timekeeper for the Olympics since 1932, as I am sure they would like me to mention) website or with widgets (for Mac OS X and Windows Vista) that you can download.

The Vancouver Sun has a special section on its website tracking the new and progress of the preparations, and CBC Sports also has a “Road to the Games” section on its site, with timelines, news and previews of the venues.

NBC has a page devoted to “The Road to 2010″, though it’s sponsored by the tourism bureau for British Columbia, so it is intended to promote Vancouver as a destination more than to provide news. But, Vancouver is so pretty, I don’t think you’ll mind too much. It does include a short “Ones to Watch” story of athletes expected to shine in the Winter Oympics, and a slideshow of the venues — possibly enough to sate your curiosity.

Of course there is the official Vancouver 2010 site, and, I’ll immodestly point out, this weblog — which is intended to keep abreast of winter sports and news out of Vancouver/Whistler relating to the Winter Olympics.

A Last Word from Beijing

wintergames — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 13:33:51 +0000

The Chicago Tribune’s Olympics reporter wrote on the paper’s blog “Globetrotting” a final memory of the Beijing games that might be the best post to close out reporting on the 2008 Olympics ( This excerpt does no do justice to the post. I’m excerpting here because I know how few people click through, but, as they say, read the whole thing; it deserves to be read in its entirety):

Since the 1992 Summer Games in Barcelona, Spain, a few U.S. reporters have taken what now is a traditional lap around the Olympic Stadium track late on the night the track and field competition ends.

When I sized up the situation for taking the lap Saturday night at the Bird’s Nest, I saw Chinese police approaching a few people who were posing at the finish line. But the police let the photo session continue, so my colleague Tim Layden of Sports Illustrated and I walked out of the stands onto the track and began walking around.

[ ... ]

It had been a long, hot trudge at times during nine days of work at the Bird’s Nest.

In 400 meters on the night before the Closing Ceremony, all that faded away, replaced by the exhilaration of being on the track where Usain Bolt had run faster than any man before him.

It was even better because the Chinese volunteers and police and Games workers had let us do it, smiling at what clearly seemed a little goofy to them, leaving us to drip with sweat and feel warmer about the 2008 Olympics.

See the Vancouver Games for Free

wintergames — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 12:29:46 +0000

A trip to the Vancouver Games is out of the financial reach of most of us — certainly for me. But there are a couple of opportunities to win a free trip to the 2010 Games. Even I can afford free.

US Residents: British Columbia’s tourism bureau will give away a trip for two, with airfare, tickets to the Opening Ceremonies, four nights accommodations and tickets to three or four sporting events.

Tyson Foods has a similar contest, but for four people (resulting in much less familial strife in the winner’s family).

Canadian Residents: GE’s Switch and Win contest offers a trip for two to the Winter Games.

The deadlines are approaching, so enter soon.

NBC’s Low Point of the Games

wintergames — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 11:53:36 +0000

A commentator during the BMX final used the word “podium” — as a verb (as in “If he does that, he’ll podium”).

Perhaps 3,600 hours of television coverage is too much.