We've seen all the major medal ceremonies. Maybe they show them on the late broadcast? We Tivo everything so I don't know when stuff is on.

I have no complaints about not showing enough or too many commercials - again, because we Tivo everything. As it is, we've been staying up late to keep up, and we're watching for most of the day. I don't have an interest in hockey, so I can see where that would be an issue.

I actually thought that Yevgeny Plushenko should have gotten the gold and was almost disappointed that Evan Lysacek won since I felt his performance was so-so. Lysacek is a handsome man, though.

*shrug*

I agree that Johnny Weir got totally hosed on his scores in an awful way. Now, he's one that always makes me smile. I do wish he had better transitions in his music.

What makes me sad about figure skating is in how opposite it's starting to feel from snowboarding today or figure skating of yesteryear. Pushing the boundaries, taking risks and creating new moves on the ice was once rewarded. Now, the punishment for the tiniest error is such that the risk of innovation isn't worth it anymore. Torino was the first time I'd noticed it (scoring changes after the 2002 Olympics), but this is even worse. I mean- why ever do a quad if it's not going to be rewarded?

A quad DOES have a higher point value than a triple IF it is landed. Plushenko landed his and was scored accordingly. However, where Lysacek really made up for not having a quad was in the amount of difficult jumps in the 2nd half of the program (which count for more points). Plushenko's program was all leaps and jumps in the first half and the last minute and a half of his program was just fluff and footwork.

There was also the fact that nearly every one of Plushenko's jumps was way of axis, he barely landed them. Actually, the fact that he landed them at all with how off he was was an impressive feat, but not what the judges award you for.

I have to admit I don't get it, but I have an already stated bias against judged competitions and am not really looking to get into that.

Honestly, the announcers of the sport are as impressive to me as what they can do. I have no idea how they can tell one thing from another, and how they (and the judges) can have the eye for the analysis they make is amazing to me.

It almost reminds me of my (music) form and analysis class in school. Take the beauty of the music, over analyze it, and suddenly it isn't as beautiful, it's just a sum of a bunch of technical aspects.

Probably just me.

Plushenko's routine bored me to death. Front stacking his jumps and then just cruising around the ice for the back half reminded me of someone at a Jr High Skate Night. Totally boring. I don't believe he deserved gold at all. If all you have to do is one (wobbly) quad to get gold, then why have an entire routine? Just go out, do the quad, stand there and wave, and maybe kick a triple on your way off the ice.

You have to program the entire performance. I'm completely happy that than Lysacek won gold, and honestly, I thought it was totally douchey of Plushenko to hop on the gold platform and make it about him. You didn't skate well enough to win. Show respect, Comrade Ass.

Haha, that was one awards ceremony I missed.

I guess I just wasn't super impressed with Lysacek's short program from earlier in the competition and he was closer in points to Plushenko than I figured he would have been. I was more impressed by his free skate, but I dunno... I guess that the feeling just wasn't there for me, and I was overall surprised by the result.

On the other hand, Plushenko is clearly a douchebag, and I do call BS on all his crying and ranting about it.

My gripes are with figure skating overall.

This article on CNN sums it up best for me.

It's the inherent problem with judged events. If you leave the judging standards loose and aesthetic, you get disagreement and anger because it comes down to subjectivity. If you start to quantify it to take the subjectivity out, you're ruining the soul of the sport. Lose-lose.

Another reason I like the snowboarding events. They seem to have thus far been able to just say, "Screw it, it's subjective, we're not going to break it down by individual points for particular elements. We're going to give it to the run we liked the best." And the competitors seem okay with that.

At least that's how the sport has been until it got into the Olympics. Already this Olympics there's been grumbling that the judges seemed to be rewarding pure height, and giving less weight to the difficulty and execution of the tricks. If that kind of thing persists at the Olympic level it's only a matter of time until riders start tailoring the rest of their competition runs to match, which would be a shame.

It may not be fair, but I find myself equating women's halfpipe with women's basketball, i.e., after the men, it's barely worth watching.

What a tool. I hope he falls on his ass next time he tries a quad.



On a different note, Shaun White was just on and gave Portland some love! He said this is his favorite place to go because he can skate all day and board all night on Hood. Go PDX! We got hippies and world class athletes! :D