Events:
- Alpine Skiing : Women’s Super G
- Bobsled: Men’s Two Man
- Cross Country – Men’s 30km
- Short Track – Men’s 1000m, Women’s 1500m
- Ski Jumping – Large Hill
- Speed Skating – Men’s 1500m
Canadian Medal Hopes:
Right now, Canada is a bit behind the expectations pace at this point in the Games but can do itself a tremendous favour by succeeding in a few events that Canada is noted for its strengths.
Short Track speedskating has two medal events tonight. Canada is expected to gain only one possible medal chance tonight in the men’s 1500m event. This event is getting quite a bit of attention as United States skater, Apollo Ohno is trying to set the record for most medals in the Winter Olympic games. He is not supposed to expect a medal in the event either. In fact, the event is expected to more of a South Korean sweep much like the men’s 1000m was shaping up to be on the last turn until the Korean skaters crashed out. This is short track so anything can happen.
Long track speedskating, being a more temperamental discipline will not have the excitement that short track has but Canada has perhaps a better chance with that event to win a medal. Denny Morrison has been winning this event for several years, usually in tandem with Shani Davis of the United States. However, it has been observed from the 1000m event that he did not seem to be his old self. Can he put himself in the right mental frame to compete in this event. That will be seen tonight.
The big event on the calendar today is the women’s Super G event. Lindsay Vonn is the expected winner of the event. Canadians have at best, an outside chance as American, German and Swiss skiers will be the most competitive.
Day 8 of the Olympics brought triumph and disappointment for Canada all in the sport of skeleton. Jon Mongomery won gold in the Men’s skeleton event with a determined effort to first narrow the gap between him and Martin Dukurs of Latvia and to surpass him by 0.07 seconds. This make Canada a repeat winner in this event. Still, this triumph was tempered by the failure of Melissa Hollingsworth to hold onto her second place after the third run and Mike Douglas disqualification for not removing his sleds covers. A sport that gave Canada 3 medals in Torino only gave up one. Needless to say, this does put Canada’s goal of topping the medal count in jeopardy.
Given the relatively light schedule of the day, the other significant placing for Canada was in the Men’s Alpine Super G event where Erik Guay came fifth just a few thousandths out of a medal.
Canadian Notable Placements:
Men’s Alpine Super G: Erik Guay 5th
Men’s Skeleton: Jon Montgomery Gold
Women’s Skeleton: Melissa Hollingsworth 5th
Events
- Alpine – Men’s Super G
- Cross Country – Women’s 15km Pursuit
- Figure Skating – Ice Dance Compulsories
- Skeleton – Men’s, Women’s
Canadian Medal Hopes:
A quiet day leading up to the weekend’s events. Just four gold medals to be awarded but Canada is in a position to possibly win two of them in the men’s and women’s skeleon races. Competition in those events proved to be tougher than expected for the Canadians. Jon Montromery is well positioned ahead of the pack except for the event leader Dukurs of Latvia. Melissa Hollingsworth ran into some control problems on her races and is now in third place leading into the final two races. Mike Douglas is in a pack of racers who are vying for the bronze medal at this stage.
In the cross country skiing event, there is not much there for Canadians to their hopes on.
For the Men’s Super G event in skiing, the situation applies as it did on the downhill event. There are several good skiers in the top tier including Canadians Manuel Paradis and Erik Guay but anyone could possibly win a medal in the event including Miller of the United States, Defago and Cuche of Swizterland. Dark horse candidates abound too on a course that has seen several racers crash due to the hard surface of the slope and its fast speeds.
Events:
- Alpine – Women’s Combined
- Biathlon – Men’s 20km Individual; Women’s 15km Individual
- Figure Skating – Men’s Final
- Skeleton – Men, Women
- Snowboarding – Women’s Snowboard Halfpipe
- SpeedSkating – Women’s 1000m
After a day dominated by American medalists, today is a relatively quieter day with six medal events. The highlight of the day’s events will be the Men’s figure skating final with several men competing for the medals.
Canadian Medal Hopes:
In the previews leading up to these Games, Patrick Chan was expected to well and be able to compete for a medal based on the strength of his silver medal performance last year in the world championships. His short program in the Olympics was good but unfortunately, other men’s performances were better and what was thought to be a strong medal hope now appears to be more of a longshot.
Also a longshot but an intriguing one is Jean Lequelle in the men’s biathlon event. His two appearances so far in the Olympics have been impressive with a 6th and 11th place. If he gets the right sort of breaks, he might be able to get close to the podium.
Skeleton sliding is one of those events that upon their appearance in the Olympics, Canada starts winning medals in it like short track speedskating or snowboarding.. Today is the start of the two day runs for the event in the men’s and women’s divisions and Canada could expect to win anywhere from 2-5 medals in the the events.
But the best chance for a medal today for Canada is in the women’s 1000m speedskating event where Christine Nesbitt and Kristin Groves are considered to be among the medal contenders in the event.
As always, curling and hockey matches continue on.
So after 5 full days of competition, the current top five countries in the medal standings are as follows:
So how does this compare to the predictions by the Associated Press and Sports Illustrated?
For Associated Press, these were the medal counts it expected by this point in the competition:
Germany: 3 Gold, 6 Silver, 0 Bronze – 9 Total
United States: 3 Gold, 3 Silver, 3 Bronze – 9 Total
Canada: 4 Gold, 2 Silver, 1 Bronze – 7 Total
France: 2 Gold, 0 Silver, 2 Bronze – 4 Total
Korea: 2 Gold, 0 Silver, 2 Bronze – 4 Total
Norway: 2 Gold 3 Silver, 2 Bronze – 7 Total
Russia: 2 Gold, 0 Silver, 6 Bronze – 8 Total
For Sports Illustrated, these were the medal counts it expected by this point in the competition:
Germany: 4 Gold, 5 Silver, 4 Bronze – 13 Total
United States: 3 Gold, 2 Silver, 3 Bronze – 8 Total
Canada: 2 Gold, 2 Silver, 2 Bronze – 6 Total
France: 2 Gold, 2 Silver, 1 Bronze – 5 Total
Korea: 2 Gold, 3 Silver, 2 Bronze – 7 Total
Norway: 2 Gold 3 Silver, 2 Bronze – 7 Total
Russia: 0 Gold, 0 Silver, 2 Bronze – 2 Total
From these predictions and the actual results, it appears that the United States team is doing much better than expected while Canada is doing as about expected. Germany is meeting the expectations of AP while under performing according to SI. On the other hand, Russia is severely under performing according to AP while meeting SI’s expectations.
So whose expense is the United States profiting from in the medal count? For the most part everyone as the US team is winning medals across a broad range of sports. It picked up two additional medals in the alpine events, a Nordic combined medal and extra medals in short track speedskating.
If there is one team that is probably losing out in the medal race, it is Norway which historically relies heavily on its biathlon and cross country teams for the bulk of its medals in the Winter Games. But now it is finding its pre-eminence in those sports eroding as other nations, particularly France, have vastly improved their teams and are winning medals. This is unlike Canada or the United States which focus on several sports especially the ones that have added to the Games events in the past six Olympics like curling, short track speed skating, and snowboarding.
As for Canada, there is no sense of worry right now on how the team is performing to expectations. Expected medallists like Paradis in Alpine Men’s downhill who did not placed at all in the top ten is offset by an unexpected medallist like Robertson in the Men’s Snowboard Cross event. As it stands now, there are still plenty of opportunities yet for more medals to be won in the days ahead. Looking ahead to the calendar for the balance of the events, Canada could almost expect to win at least one medal per day.
Events:
- Alpine – Women’s Downhill
- Cross – Country – Men’s Individual Sprint, Women’s Individual Sprint
- Luge – Men’s Doubles
- Short track Speedskating: Men’s 1000m ,Men’s Relay, Women’s 500m
- Snowboarding – Men’ s Halfpipe
- Speedskating – Men’s 1000m
Canadian Medal Hopes:
Day 6 of the Olympic Games is probably one of the most days for medal events on the Games calendar. Several venues are active today and Canadian medal hopes are good in several events.
First off, the marquee event of the day is the women’s downhill event. Quite a few storylines are wrapped around this event. Chaotic weather conditions are creating scheduling issues but the bigger story is US skier Lindsay Vonn. She has quite a hold on the American media through her model looks and her dominating performance on the World Cup circuit. Her recent shin injury lends another dimension to her story as she prepares to head down the slope to what is expected to be a gold medal performance. But as we have seen in the men’s downhill earlier this week, predictions on who wins a medal in the downhill is very much in the air.
As for the Canadians in the event, several of Canada’s best are not at the games due to injuries but Emily Brydon and Britt Janyk have showed that they can compete at this level.
Speedskating, both in the long track and short track, there are opportunities for medal pickups. In the women’s 500m short track event, Kalyna Roberge is a strong contender in that rough and tumble event. She could win gold or she could win nothing depending on how the events unfold.
In the long track event, Denny Morrison looks to compete with gold medal favorite Shani Davis of the United States. However, it seems that South Korea has brought a stronger than expected team to the speedskating events and that may change on who will be standing on the podium.
Looks like plenty of action to watch tonight.
During the Olympics Games when people start feeling flushes of patriotism, they start wanting to show off their patriotism is various ways. Whether hanging a flag inside their living room, painting flag decals on their cheek or starting wearing clothing emblazoned with national colours and symbols.
I have my share of Canadiana. I have a ball cap and a beret type cap and I have my flags. But sometimes I wish I have something more.
What I wish for is one of the jersey or jackets that the Men’s curling team are wearing.
Back in 2006, Brad Gushue of the Men’s curling team had a great looking jacket that I looked in vain to find to buy on-line. But it seems that the same designer has created another great line of uniforms for the teams.
The cut, the use of colours in the design, the choice of red, white or black colours with various trim colours. The outfits come in three choices: short sleeve jersey, long sleeve jersey and jacket. If I had to rank my preferences, it would be the long sleeve jersey, short sleeve and then the jacket.
I definitely would want one of these but the question then would be when and where would wear it?
Another golden day for Canada as Maelle Ricker won gold in the women’s snowboard cross. It was a challenging day for her as weather conditions played havoc with course causing her to put in a poor first run.But she maanged to put it together for the second run to get a great seed and for there on out she dominated her heats all the way to the finals.
Elsewhere, Canadians did fairly well. Jean Lequelle suffered from an official’s effort which cost him penalty time which affected his placement in the Biathlon Sprint race. If not for that 30 second penalty, he would have placed 5th rather than 11th.
In the womens 500m speedskating event, the best Canadian was Christine Nesbitt in 10th place but that was sort of expected as the 500m race was deep in talent. As it is, the Canadian women should be more dominant in the 1000 and 1500m races to come.
Finally, in their first game together, the Men’s hockey team blasted Norway 8-0. Hopefully, the team cohesion will start to meld over the next few games before the medal round games next week.
Canadian Notable Placements:
Women’s Snowboard Cross: Maelle Ricker Gold
Men’s 12.5km Biathlon Pursuit: Jean Lequelle 11th
