XXX Summer Olympiad

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Strangler Lewis

Hmm. There was some way in which Spitz's achievement was supposedly purer and better than Phelps's.

He set a world record on each of the 7. Whereas "only" 7 of Phelps' 8 were world records (the eighth being "only" an Olympic record). Perhaps that's what you were thinking of.


I MIGHT be okay with subjective events if everyone would just accept that they are subjective and dispense with the charade of technical judging standards. Just have everyone do their routine, let the judges talk, then say "These were the 3 we thought were the prettiest." In the end it's not the subjectivity that bugs me most (though it bugs me in part), it's the disturbing, robotic, vestigial "dance" elements that remain a required part as a side effect of more and more perverse attempts to justify their subjective results.

The X-Games generally does the best job of this (not perfect, but closest). Very little focus on ways of winning or losing fractions of points, much focus on, "HOLY CRAP THAT WAS AWESOME THAT CHICK SHOULD TOTALLY WIN!"