yeah I know

I'm a faggot, I get it

the trolling is unnecessary

I thought this was a serious board

it's kind of hard to take seriously with all you irritable bastards on it

8/19/2008 2:55:22 PM

Quote :

"I thought this was a serious board"

you were badly misinformed....

8/19/2008 3:04:21 PM

Does anyone know when the women's gymastics balance beam finals are tonight? All the websites I've looked at for TV scheduling says its on between 8-12 midnight, which isn't very helpful. Not to mention NBC's official site already showed me who won. Thanks a lot assholes, tell me who won on the SAME page as the TV schedule!

8/19/2008 5:44:04 PM

It'll be on around 10:30 or 11:00 I'm sure, Pat...

They always run the most watched stuff around that time...

8/19/2008 5:57:11 PM

http://i38.tinypic.com/ipbimb.jpg

8/19/2008 6:24:08 PM

Quote :

"It was on USA faggot."

8/19/2008 6:29:39 PM

Quote :

"Does anyone know when the women's gymastics balance beam finals are tonight?"

Haven't seen the 'spoiler' yet, so this is more of a prediction:

One of the Chinese women win the gold by scoring higher after they face-plant on the dismount knocking out their two front baby teeth in the process.

8/19/2008 6:57:56 PM

i hate that i can't check any sports sites, because i'm sure they'll have the results plastered on the front page

8/19/2008 7:25:03 PM

^^Lol, I actually made a joke about baby teeth to a friend last night. Good call my friend

8/19/2008 9:37:08 PM

Why in the hell did they show taped events instead of Live Beach Volleyball?

I mean it was USA in the Semi-finals. They've shown all the other matches live. I don't get it.

8/19/2008 9:48:07 PM

^ i know...it's ridiculous

8/19/2008 10:04:48 PM

our track team has seriously been blowing it all week

8/19/2008 10:44:32 PM

LO LO PWNT STAY HOME >.<

8/19/2008 10:54:08 PM

she'll have a career in modeling, so i can't feel too bad for her

8/19/2008 10:57:17 PM

Matt are you doing anything other than watching the olympics?

8/19/2008 10:58:34 PM

BS on that score wtfx. no way she should be that high with like 3 obvious wobbles

8/19/2008 11:02:29 PM

Quote :

"the triathlon is coming down to the last 20 mins! it's gonna be clooooose! go simon, go simon!"

Quote :

"holy hell -- the triathlon went down to wire! incredible!!!1one"

i just watched it on nbcolympics.com, and only when they got on the bike I remembered of the retarded rules that Olympic-style triathlons use, that are different than nearly any other USAT or ITU-sanctioned event (including all Ironman events) - in a misdirected attempt at making the triathlon more exciting for spectators, Olympic triathlons are now "draft legal" on the bike portion. In 95% of other triathlons (again, including all Ironman and half-Ironmans, the most popular tris in the world), you are not allowed to draft on the bike, so you get a fully individual effort from each person. There are enforced no-drafting zones behind and around each bike that another cyclist cannot enter. Anybody who rides a road bike knows the drastic difference in effort drafting can make.

One side-effect of the non-drafting rule, though, is that you often get long solo break aways and people riding and running by themselves for miles and miles, because no one else is allowed to leech off of their wheel. To prevent this, they allow drafting now in the Olympics, which has the following effects, which may or may not be good for spectators, but are definitely not good at determining the best triathlete:

1) Since drafting on the bike is legal, weak cyclists can tuck in behind stronger cyclists and draft off of them. In a real tri, the bike is the longest leg (time and distance wise), so people who really put forth the effort can get a big, well deserved advantage. In draft-legal races, most decent cyclists will just all finish together as a pack.

2) There is no motivation to exert yourself on the swim. A good swimmer can get 1-2 minutes advantage during the swim, which may be difficult to overcome in a standard, non-draft tri. But In a draft-legal tri, if someone really puts forth the effort on the swim and gains 1.5 minutes or so, they will simply be reeled back in by a big group of riders on the bike. Just like in the Tour de France where breakaways rarely stick until the end, a large peleton of cyclists is almost always faster than a single rider. Therefore, everyone will generally swim together and get on the bikes at the same time.

3) There are more and bigger bike crashes, argueably making it more fun for spectators, but much more dangerous for athlete. Triathletes are not known as the best bike-handlers, because they usually ride by themselves. When they get into big groups, bunched together going around tight turns, there will inevitably be big pile ups. In a regular tri, bike crashes are usually single-person events.

4) since we've determined that there is no motivation to swim hard, and that most decent cyclists will just stick together in a pack because there is very little chance of breaking away, in all the non-draft-legal races, most athletes are still together at the beginning of the run. Then the entire race just comes down to who is the fastest runner. But we already have dozens of races to determine fast runners - if you want to see runners duke it out, watch the 10k or marathon. If you want to see the best triathletes, though, let them race individually, even if that means large margins of victory.

8/19/2008 11:15:23 PM

hey lets all complain about the difference in rules olympic competition and otherwise!!

in basketball, they can pull the rebound off the rim and the lane is trapezoidal!

what is the deal with that!?!?!

yay!!

8/19/2008 11:20:53 PM

hooray balance beam

8/19/2008 11:22:55 PM

^^ do those rule changes make it so you can take a mediocre basketball player who has a skill in one area and turn him into a gold medalist? i doubt it.....
The triathlon rules changes are arbitrary and were implemented completely to make the sport more "spectator friendly", with no regard of how it affected the athletes

8/19/2008 11:26:45 PM

Quote :

"Matt are you doing anything other than watching the olympics?"

not really


you?




Shawn Johnson is too damn cute

8/19/2008 11:37:34 PM

mhum, in the interview she is really stunning. in a non-pedo kind of way.....

8/19/2008 11:40:43 PM

Horton just knocked it out the box

8/19/2008 11:59:09 PM

the cheap judges will still give it to china

8/19/2008 11:59:28 PM

i knew it, those fuckers

8/19/2008 11:59:57 PM

wow, that guy nailed it. better than the chinese routine...

8/20/2008 12:00:19 AM

but the shiesty judges still give it to china, even his routine was way better

8/20/2008 12:01:15 AM

attn: george bush

send in assassins to deal with each and every judge in the gymnastics competitions as well as the chinese they dealt with behind the scenes, do this before you leave office and it will actually have you leave on a positive note

8/20/2008 12:02:22 AM

I thought the Chinese guy's set was more impressive.

Horton had the cooler dismount though.

8/20/2008 12:06:55 AM

he got cheated by the bribed judges

8/20/2008 12:18:30 AM

Quote :

"Shawn Johnson is too damn cute"

haha, i made a thread about her last year when she was 15 - but it was all about her skills though, she did just win the 2007 all around world championship

8/20/2008 12:30:49 AM

8/20/2008 12:31:19 AM

lol, BMX

This shit is fucking funny to warch

8/20/2008 12:52:19 AM

Shawn Johnson freakin rocks! Props for making a thread for her last year man!

She's done for the olympics though, sniff sniff.

8/20/2008 12:58:05 AM

Quote :

"hey lets all complain about the difference in rules olympic competition and otherwise!! in basketball, they can pull the rebound off the rim and the lane is trapezoidal!"

ok, i have to make one more analogy, then i'll drop it
The no-draft triathlon rule would be like changing the dribbling/traveling rule in Olympic basketball. Come play basketball in the Olympics, and you don't have to dribble the ball! it will make the game much faster and higher scoring (much fewer mistakes, easier/faster to move down the court), and therefore more exciting to the fans! Nevermind that it completely changes the dynamics or intent of the original game

8/20/2008 8:55:09 AM

It's funny because they don't allow drafting in track cycling at the olympics

8/20/2008 9:09:14 AM

Supposedly FIBA is getting rid of the trapezoidal lane and moving the 3 point line back after the olympics.

8/20/2008 9:16:30 AM

Quote :

"not really you? Shawn Johnson is too damn cute"

The same and yes.

Forgot about the winter olympics taking over my life.

8/20/2008 10:32:06 AM

i guess none of you just saw what Bolt did in the 200m???

[Edited on August 20, 2008 at 10:39 AM. Reason : ..]

8/20/2008 10:36:11 AM

^ way to ruin it asshole

8/20/2008 10:51:01 AM

its all over the web already

he is not ruining anything

8/20/2008 11:05:53 AM

Usain Bolt grew up in my mom's neighborhood - big ups to Jamaica, dem run tings

8/20/2008 11:25:22 AM

^^^how was that giving anything away? he might have fallen flat on his face or could have done what was expected of him? give your head a shake.

8/20/2008 11:48:32 AM

blame NBC dont blame Bolt

[Edited on August 20, 2008 at 12:05 PM. Reason : ]

8/20/2008 12:05:07 PM

While generally we don't want any SPOILERS in this thread, the men's sprints results are hardly a surprise at all.

8/20/2008 12:15:08 PM

haha i was just trolling. but has anyone found video of the race online yet? only pictures so far...

8/20/2008 12:53:18 PM

I've been looking, no video yet. NBC are being assholes

8/20/2008 12:54:22 PM

Aside from Mens basketball and baseball (only if we play the f'ing Cubans in the gold medal game) the Olympics are dead to me now.

I really enjoyed the swimming and the gymnastics, but now it's sort of blah...

8/20/2008 12:55:46 PM

Jesus, Jamaica won Women's 400 too. Didn't realize that.

hopefully these olympics prove to the idiots that Jamaica isn't full of a bunch of weed-smoking rastas

8/20/2008 12:58:23 PM

yeah you know NBC is gonna hold on to that footage like no other. sportscenter just did a couple minutes on the race and only could show pictures, etc.

8/20/2008 1:01:12 PM