Olympics 2010, Saturday, Feb. 20

Today I watched:
Ice Hockey, Norway vs. Switzerland
Ski jumping, men's large hill, finals
Skiing, women's aerials, qualifcations
Cross country, men's 15,000m pursuit
Speed skating, men's 1500m (long track)
Two-man bobsled, men's
Skiing, women's Super G
Speed skating, men's short track, 1000m, quarterfinals, semifinals, finals
Speed skating, women's short track, 1500m, heats, semifinals, finals

We're more than halfway through the Olympics!

I don't think I have ever watched aerial skiing in the Olympics before, which is difficult to believe, since my research tells me it has been an Olympic event since 1994. I really loved the event and am excited for the finals.

The cross country was, yet again, exciting! The race featured a Swedish skiier, Johan Olsson, who took off during the freestyle portion of the 15,000m pursuit, which the commentators said was unheard of. They said that the field usually remains tight until near the end of the race. Apparently skiing at the front all alone is more difficult than skiing with the pack. Olsson did get tired near the end of the race, and ended up with a bronze, but he seemed thrilled with the result.

The Super G was less crash-filled than the women's downhill was a few days ago, which was good for the competitors, but not quite as good for the drama. Today also featured a lot of speed skating, which is always fun and easy to watch.

I wasn't planning on watching hockey today, but am really glad I caught the Norway vs. Switzerland game, which was far more exciting than I had anticipated. It went to overtime, with Switzerland winning 5-4. It was great to see two of the weaker teams in the tournament play so well.

Today's events were exactly what I needed after being so exhausted yesterday and having a big day ahead of me tomorrow. I liked everything I watched, other than the bobsledding. And it's not that I don't enjoy the bobsled, but as I have said before, races like luge, skeleton and bobsled can get boring to watch after awhile--they are all going down the same track of ice and there is no way to really know how they are doing compared to the field.

Tomorrow is going to be a huge day. There are three major hockey games: Russia vs. Czech Republic, Canada vs. USA, and Sweden vs. Finland. The first match features two great teams, and the Russians really need to pull out a win so they can get a bye in the first elimination round of the tournament. I also just read an article that says Malkin is being moved up to Russia's first line to play with Ovechkin and Semin, and Datsyuk will be playing on the second line with Kovalchuk and Afinogenov. I was actually thinking that the team should do that during the game against Slovakia, because Datsyuk didn't seem to be fitting with Ovi and Semin, and the Malkin line was going absolutely nowhere. Canada vs. USA is obviously going to be huge--the two teams are the only ones that are made up exclusively of NHL players. Sweden vs. Finland is a rematch from the gold medal game in the 2006 Turin Olympics (Sweden won the gold, Finland settled for silver). That's 7.5 hours of solid hockey.

But there's more than just hockey tomorrow: there's more ice dancing, the men's Super G, women's speed skating and women's cross country. Additionally, the event of ski cross makes its Olympic debut. I loved the snowboard cross, so I'm sure I'm going to love ski cross as well.

I'm going to rest up for a very big day tomorrow!