2010 Winter Olympics Recap and Highlights

With women’s Alpine training runs again delayed by heavy rain and snow, American favorite Lindsey Vonn successfully tested her bruised right shin on her own rigorous slalom training session, and her husband declared her ready to race.After a weekend of Winter Olympics goodness and action, it’s time to put up a post to recap the weekend’s highlights. This might not include everything, but I’ll try my best.

Opening Ceremonies

• The opening ceremonies began with a pretty impressive shot of a snowboarder coming down a mountain while listing the previous 21 Winter Olympic games years.
• The snowboarder entered a Maple leaf (the Canadian national symbol) design made with torchbearers and ended with the snowboarder coming down a ramp into the stadium.
• The underlying theme was mostly related to the First Nations of Canada.
• This was followed by a 4-part celebration, with the first part showcased Aurora Borealis on circle screens which came down from the stadium’s ceiling. The most spectacular part was when the display of orcas moving across the floor and water spouts shooting out of the floor.
• The second part of the show was related to Quebec, featuring a fiddler in a canoe coming from the ceiling.
• The third part was about the prairies of Canada. It was a simple one man acrobatic show, with the the floor featuring the prairies as the acrobat performed.
• The final part of the show featured the Canadian Rockies, where skiers and snowboarders came down from the ceiling as to appear riding the awesome rockies.

Medals Overview

• USA now has 8 medals, followed by Germany with 5 and France with 4.
• Switzerland has 3 Golds, followed by USA with 2 and France with 2.

Snowboarding

• Kelly Clark who won a gold medal in the last Olympics can do a 900 degree spin which is basically spinning in the air and rotating more than 2 full times around. If she lands that, she will most likely receive the gold medal this year.
• Her counterpart on the men’s snowboarding team, Shaun White is no small contender either. He won gold in the last Olympics and is expected to medal again. U.S. snowboarding is quite dominant and it is a fun sport to watch.

Men’s

• Alexandre Bilodeau won the gold medal in men’s moguls, the first time a Canadian has won an Olympic event on home soil. Canadians failed to win a single gold at the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal and the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary. Congratulations Alexandre!
• Jason Lamy Chappuis who competes for France, edged Johnny Spillane of Steamboat Springs, Colo., to win the Nordic combined. Spillane’s silver was the first medal for the U.S. in 86 years of competing in the sport that combines ski jumping and a 10-kilometer cross-country ski race.
• Five-time Olympic champion Ole Einar Bjoerndalen struggled with his shooting in failing to win his sixth gold medal. He still has four more opportunities at these games.
• Jung-Su Lee from S. Korea, Apolo Anton Ohno from the USA, and J.R Celski from the USA win the Men’s 1500m Gold, Silver, and Bronze respectively.

Weomen’s

• With women’s Alpine training runs again delayed by heavy rain and snow, American favorite Lindsey Vonn successfully tested her bruised right shin on her own rigorous slalom training session, and her husband declared her ready to race.
• Martina Sablikova gave the Czech Republic its first speedskating medal by winning the women’s 3,000 meters.
• Jenny Potter scored three goals in the first 22 minutes as the U.S. opened the preliminary round of the women’s hockey tournament with a 12-1 romp over China.
• Hannah Kearney from the USA, Jennifer Heil from Canada, and Shannon Bahrke from the USA win the Ladies’ Moguls Gold, Silver, and Bronze respectively.

Misc

• The Chinese pair, Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo won the gold for the the pairs free program figure skating competition.