The 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang

What a moment. Did anyone see Ester Ledecká?

She created a sensation by conquering gold on the Super G. After a very exciting match she surprisingly was the fastest. Ledecká is a double world champion snowboarding! On the skis she led an anonymous existence. Five times she participated in the Super G World Cup circuit, with a 19th place as best result. On the downhill she was seventh once.

She skied a far from flawless race, but nobody did. Once downstairs she was shocked to realize what she had just done.

Before her race, Anna Veith was already extensively congratulated with the prolongation of her title. You could scrape the disbelief from her face when Ledecká finished, just 0.01 faster.

Victory for Veith would also be a wonderful Olympic story. As Anna Fenninger she dominated in women's skiing in 2014 and 2015. However, a serious knee injury threw her back. Only this season she booked another World Cup victory. The favorites Lara Gut, Lindsey Vonn and Sofia Goggia went down much faster on large parts of the course, but all three made a big mistake.

After Ledecká crossed the finish line she could not believe she had one. Someone told her and she replied. "Must be some mistake".

Unfortunately I can't find video footage of it now.

Ester Ledecká interview (German voice over):
Anna Veith interview (German):
 
Both British women got medals in the skeleton - gold and bronze. Lizzy Yarnold is the first British athlete to win two gold medals at the Winter Olympics (today she retained the gold she won in Sochi). The BBC have a montage of all the British gold medals from the Winter Olympics. It's not very long as Lizzy's second gold was the eleventh overall for British athletes, but the British men's ice hockey team actually won gold once, even beating Canada on the way. I think that was in the 1930s though.
 
Curling? Really!

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The admission of Russian athletes into the Winter Olympics ran the risk of greater ridicule on Sunday after one of their team failed a doping test.

A spokesman for the Olympic Athletes from Russia confirmed to Sportsmail that they had been notified of an adverse finding.

They would not confirm the identity of the athlete, but it was reported by Reuters to be Alexander Krushelnitsky, who won a mixed doubles curling bronze medal. They reported he tested positive for meldonium.
 
bearfan said:
Curling? Really!

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The admission of Russian athletes into the Winter Olympics ran the risk of greater ridicule on Sunday after one of their team failed a doping test.

A spokesman for the Olympic Athletes from Russia confirmed to Sportsmail that they had been notified of an adverse finding.

They would not confirm the identity of the athlete, but it was reported by Reuters to be Alexander Krushelnitsky, who won a mixed doubles curling bronze medal. They reported he tested positive for meldonium.
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Lol.
 
Cheers!

These Games are going great for us, with milestone wins in several diciplines and events. The 500m today, as mentioned, has not been won by a Norwegian since 1948, and the ski jumping team event has never been won by Norway. The same with the men's downhill. The bronze in women's GS was also a milestone.

I look forward to the 1000m, although I would assume Keld Nuis to be a clear favourite to win that.

Another thing I, as a Norwegian, like about these Olympics is that we are now getting proper competition in cross-country, also for women, and at the same time Norwegians win these afore mentioned events that have been "cursed" for us for so long.

We still stink at ice hockey though ...


@Forostar - who will be the next Dutch winter athlete to compete at top level in a sport without skates? ;) Are there any prospects? If the Danes can send an alpine skier (he lives in Norway ...) you could as well!

Fun note in the end: After the ski jumpers won the team event, coach Alexander Stöckl was asked what they were going to do now: "Go out and get pissed" ...:cheers:
 
I'm afraid there is not enough financial backing to invest enough in sports that need to be practiced 6 hours away. Strict qualifications norms do not help either. We do have some talented people on snowboard. But they did not do well on these games. E.g. there was a talented guy (17 years) but he broke his upper arm on his first training, due to a gust. Careful, the fall @ 0:43 does not look nice.
We might hear of him again the next Olympics, who knows.
 
Ouch. That was a nasty fall. The slopestyle event is very vulnerable to wind because an extra meter of altitude makes a lot of difference in where you land - and that can be the difference between leaving the arena on a stretcher or on your feet ...
 
It would be very difficult to train for downhill skiing in the Netherlands. Of course, Australia gets medals in downhill events, so it is possible.
 
When Norway didn't win the women's team sprint in cross-country skiing, I'm happy to see the USAians take it. Randall/Diggins are so enthusiastic, they create such a great atmosphere around :) (not to mention that Diggins is very cute :innocent:)

Today also saw another surprise silver medal for Ragnhild Mowinckel! Even more surprising this time around since she has yet to finish top 3 in a World Cup downhill race.

On the other hand, the ice hockey result was absolutely no surprise. Lost 1-6 to "Russia" and I did honestly not expect much better.

Also, Sundby/Klæbo did the job in the men's team sprint, secured gold no. 12 for Norway, and maybe there's one more chance with the speed skating team event (coming up soon).
 
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LooseCannon said:
It would be very difficult to train for downhill skiing in the Netherlands. Of course, Australia gets medals in downhill events, so it is possible.
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I would think it's not that difficult to set up training camps in other countries. The question is whether there is enough interest in such countries to produce athletes of Olympic quality in these sports.
 
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