Beijing Olympics - Day 11
The Rants:
- First of all, NBC News, you are being sent to the Naughty Chair. Thanks SO much for ruining the outcome of the Balance Beam tonight. I spent the entire day doing my best to avoid finding out the results ahead of time, and then you nonchalantly spoil the results that are going to be shown later on your own station! Wth??? I have been watching the Nightly News during the Olympics because 1) you have cool stories about the Olympics and 2) you haven’t spoiled the results that follow in primetime…up until now. Won’t be making THAT mistake again.
- Softball is losing its status as an Olympic sport at the next games in London. Why? Well, I don’t know for sure, but speculation says that it’s because the USA dominates the event. Okay, if that’s the case, let’s also get rid of Table Tennis and Badminton (which are not really athletic competitions anyway, if you ask me) since the Asian nations are the ones who always win all the medals anyway. Oh, and let’s also just wipe Diving off the boards as well since no one wins Gold medals in that sport except China. (I miss you Greg Louganis!) Especially the most boring sport ever invented - Synchronized Diving. Could there possibly be anything more boring than that? I bet if it was some other country dominating softball other the USA, it would be kept in.
All right, enough ranting, on with the results…
The Incredibly Disappointing:
- Lolo Jones, the American hurdler, was the favorite going into the race. We’ve heard many times that the hardest thing to do is win when you’re expected to, and this held true unfortunately. She was leading pretty much all the way, then clipped the 2nd to last hurdle and finished well out of the medals. The good news is that another American won, but I felt so bad for Lolo, who proved herself to be an incredibly class act. She congratulated the medalists. She gave interviews. She didn’t make excuses. She conducted herself like a true champion. And yes, she did cry, but so would anyone in that situation. Lolo Jones may not have won a medal, but she gained a fan in me. And I hope to see her on the medal stand in London in 2012.
The Great and the Surprising:
- First the great - Shawn Johnson and Nastia Luikin again finished 1-2 in a gymnastics event - this time the Balance Beam. The difference is that this time Shawn got the gold and Nastia got the silver. It was a fitting ending to a great Olympics for both of them. Shawn ended up with 4 medals - 1 gold and 3 silver. Nastia earned 5 - 1 gold, 3 silver, 1 bronze.
- On the men’s side, Jonathan Roberts gave the performance of his life on the High Bar and earned a surprising silver medal.
The Feel Good Story of the Olympics:
- This story happens to involve an Arizonan - a 21 year old son of undocumented Mexican immigrants. The youngest son of a single mother, who grew up in poverty, but whose mother always told him he could do anything he set his mind to. It makes me cry every time I see it or think about it. Here’s to gold medalist Henry Cejudo, a 121 pound wrestler, who is truly living the American and Olympic dream.
I need a tissue now!
