Wednesday, February 24, 2010

2010 Vancouver Olympics - "Well, this sucks..."

I just read an article from Yahoo! Sports this morning about a speedskating mishap that cost a favorite a gold medal. No, it's not Apolo Ohno, but it's Sven Kramer of The Netherlands, who made a sort of "wrong turn" during the 10,000m race. The way it works is every lap they need to move from the inner lane to the outer lane and vice versa in order to even out the time sustained during the race. Do I find it confusing to go in and out for a whole 7 1/2 miles or so? Yeah, absolutely. But Kramer is apparently taking the blame for this as he should have remained focused. In the article, he was quoted:

“I wasn’t getting tired at all." “I skated one of my best 10,000s ever, if not my best. I thought something was wrong but you have to decide in a split second.”

He threw his glasses off after the disqualification and dealt with a screaming coach. Many skaters have dealt with this happening (even in World Championships) firsthand and know the pain that ensues. From experience, they know that the fault is by the unfortunate skater.

As a millionaire coming from a country that lives on speedskating, Kramer is definitely going to have a hard time swallowing this Olympic-sized mishap.

View the Yahoo! Sports article here: Coach sends Kramer on embarrassing wrong turn

--AZ

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