Posts from The 2010 Vancouver Olympics!

To be honest, the opening ceremony, which I watched for all 3 hours, didn't impress me. :( I wasted my time watching this event.
I can say that the organizers were very poorly prepared for this.

I'm sure that the Sochi Olympics will be three times better in this regard!

IMHO!

And about the death of the luge athlete, I won't even comment... I can only express my condolences to the family of the deceased and hope that this is the first and last death at the Olympics, although...

http://news.mail.ru/sport/3380492

Sincerely, VDV_forever

...yes, a sad start...

But, despite this, I want to wish OUR team good luck :) I hope they won't disappoint.

Skobrev won the first medal for Russia at the 2010 Games!:smile02:

http://news.mail.ru/vancouver/speed_skating/3381926/

Women's biathlon, they performed poorly:(

Sincerely, VDV_forever

Demchenko finished 4th, just 3 hundredths of a second behind... In pairs skating, they came in fourth... 19th place overall after the third day (with one bronze medal). It's all a bit depressing so far for our team at these Olympics. And the interview with someone from our team about finishing in 14th place, claiming it's an achievement, makes me not even want to watch and find out the results.

P.S. And other minor things, like Chudov finishing in 63rd place (didn't qualify for the pursuit race), and our biathlon team captain and skiers finishing in the 40s and 50s.

Yeah... everything is just awful. If it continues like this, it's going to drive me crazy!!!

Figure skating was the most disappointing :( They fell so many times... I don't even want to count.

Finally, today at midnight Moscow time, our Russian skiers overcame the streak of bad luck!

In the cross-country sprint in the classic style, Nikita Kryukov and Alexander Panzhinsky brought us GOLD and SILVER, respectively!

It was a difficult race. Our guys literally had to fight for every centimeter to make their way to the final. Throughout all the stages, they barely managed to reach the final, where they faced three Norwegians and one Kazakh who had taken the lead.
And then came the final, where from the very beginning, our athletes subtly but surely took the lead, although the three Norwegians were right on their heels. Then Kryukov and Panzhinsky worked well together to prevent the Norwegians from taking the lead, occupying two lanes. By the middle of the race, they were confidently in the lead - Panzhinsky moved ahead, leading by several meters, while Kryukov was a little further back, fighting with the same Norwegians. Closer to the end, something went wrong at the turn, and the Kazakh and one of the Norwegians fell, thereby losing their momentum. And our athletes were already in the lead - Kryukov, anticipating an imminent victory, took a new turn and started to catch up with the leading Panzhinsky...

and both Russian athletes crossed the finish line almost shoulder to shoulder with a time of 3.63 minutes! The turn taken by Kryukov at the end literally allowed his ski to move ahead by a couple of centimeters and win the gold, but Panzhinsky was not upset, especially since his debut at the Olympics was so successful. And the Norwegian Petter Northug finished third, аж 9 seconds later.

Finally, our athletes broke through all the unlucky days, defeating the Norwegians - the undisputed favorites in this sport!

Well done, guys! Now it would be even better if all the biathlon competitors' rifles broke down along the way.

Tonight, neither in speed skating nor in biathlon were our Russian athletes able to win any medals.
In biathlon, in the 20 km individual race, Evgeny Ustyugov came closest to winning bronze, and for a long time, he held that position, trailing only two Norwegians. Gold was won by one of the early starters, Emil Svendsen, and silver by his compatriot, Ole Einar Bjørndalen.
For a long time, Svendsen, Bjørndalen, and Ustyugov – all of whom started early – held the top positions; they clearly had an advantage, as it is believed that the track becomes more difficult for all biathletes who start later, which affects their speed...
But one of the 20th starters, our neighbor from Belarus, Sergei Novikov, managed to break ahead and secure a place on the podium, essentially sharing SILVER with Bjørndalen. Unfortunately, our Russian athlete, Evgeny Ustyugov, was relegated to 4th place due to this turn of events and failed to win a medal.
Ustyugov, like the two Norwegians, had only one miss, which determined his fourth-place finish, as he was hopelessly behind the Norwegians in terms of time, which is very disappointing. But even more disappointing was the fact that the rifle mount of Nikolai Kruglov, it is difficult to say, was probably not properly secured, but the rifle literally fell into his hands right during the race, which caused him to be distracted twice and spend a lot of time fixing the weapon. Nikolai Kruglov completed all the shooting ranges flawlessly, but it was the unfortunate strap that determined the athlete's significant lag...

Well, we can only be happy for the Belarusian team and Sergei Novikov – silver is a truly great achievement for them!

And once again, luck wasn't on our side, this time in figure skating. The program was truly very challenging, very demanding, and the American who took first place, Evan Lysacek, ultimately proved to be more agile, more powerful, and performed his program flawlessly. But despite the dire predictions and statements about the "old age" of our most respected figure skater, Evgeny Plushenko proved that even at his age, he can handle the workload and the program that was chosen for him. Zhenya performed almost flawlessly, but the commentators occasionally noted that during one of the spins, "Zhenya was tired." It was then clearly visible that the break between the spins was a little longer than usual, and perhaps the lack of jumps and the delay affected the judges' scores. And the Japanese skater, Daisuke Takahashi, took third place; I shamelessly skipped his program, only catching glimpses of him in a few scenes. Well, Japan is close geographically, but far in spirit. So: GOLD was won by the American Evan Lysacek. SILVER was awarded to our compatriot, and I'll say it straight, he's the best of the best for us, Evgeny Plushenko. BRONZE went to the Japanese skater Daisuke Takahashi

and they blew it in hockey =(( what a disaster... where is the world heading? %)

Friends, I have a good acquaintance who is an official from the sports committee and is at the Olympics. I called him, and it seems everything is fine with them. It's fun there; the Russian house is the most visited, and everyone envies us. After the Olympics, a significant number of Olympians will become deputies, which, in my opinion, will ensure a comfortable retirement for them. Even if Tyagachev leaves, it will only be for a promotion; his reputation is growing. No one is suffering; everyone is happy there. So, why should we be upset if the Olympians are doing well? Let's genuinely be happy for our skiers, for Plushchenko, and for the hockey players (you'll see what a great game they'll have against the Canadians). More positivity.

So, another medal was won by our compatriot, Russian athlete Alexander Tretyakov. As the news vividly reports, his surname is directly related to the location. Yes, he won BRONZE in the skeleton competition. I didn't watch the competition, unfortunately. But we should at least be happy about the bronze, as in interviews, he mentioned that he really gave it his all. And, of course, we know what a mess those unfinished tracks in Vancouver were, and that our athletes definitely weren't given the chance to familiarize themselves with them in detail, unlike the Americans...
So, bronze is a really good achievement in these "unclear" conditions of the Vancouver tracks...

So, today turned out to be another surprise for our fans. Until now, our athletes have only experienced setbacks in biathlon, but today, two athletes turned the tide.
The hero of the biathlon was Evgeny Ustyugov, who won GOLD in the mass start. Yesterday, Ustyugov also showed good results in the 30 km race. He had every chance to become at least a silver medalist, but in the very last downhill stretch, he was overtaken by the Swedes... it was very disappointing that he couldn't hold on, but today he finally pleasantly surprised our fans. Unfortunately, I missed it, which is a shame.
And in the same mass start, Olga Zaitseva won SILVER in the women's relay, showing all the other women in our country who have been performing poorly so far how to win! We need more victories like this – gold and silver in one day, and the more, the better.

Separately, it should be noted that the Russian national hockey team defeated the Czechs with a score of 4-2. This was like a breath of fresh air after the defeat against Slovakia, after which I couldn't recover. We can still redeem ourselves – the hockey players didn't lose heart!

Zhenya did a great job, I'm happy =^_^=