Early Highlight of the Games

I nearly went to bed last night before the Men's 4x100m Freestyle Relay at the Beijing Olympics, but I'm glad I didn't. Entering the race, which featured Michael Phelps, the French team was a heavy favorite (don't get me started on the French) and had been talking smack about "smashing" the Americans.

Really? You want to go with "smashing" right there? All right.

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If you watched the race it appeared that the French would win, it was said their anchor leg couldn't be caught. Phelps swam a good leg, the two unknown swimmers for the USA in the middle swam great legs, but still Jason Lezak hit the water behind the unstoppable Alain Bernard (who ironically was the guy who'd been talking before the race).

On the first (of 2) lengths of the pool it appeared Bernard would pull away from Lezak, but at the turn Lezak surged and suddenly there was hope. Still Lezak trailed by 1/2 a body length with less than 25m to swim. But in a classic example of why you don't run your mouth before you prove it on the field (in the pool) the cameras captured Bernard visibly "tightening" up and Lezak swimming for all he was worth.

At the wall, Lezak "out touched" Bernard by .08 (which is a whisker in swimming) to not only deliver the gold, but smash the world record.

A couple of thoughts on this:

- This is an example of why I love the Olympics. The only thing better than a team that out performs expectations is when it's the US team that does it. It's amazing to me that that a team with Phelps on it could be an underdog, but swimming is a unique sport.
- Relays are my favorite part of speed sports. Why? Because it's not as simple as the fastest guy or girl wins, you just never know what might happen. Plus it takes an individual sport and makes it a team sport.
- Kudos to Michael Phelps for putting his fate in the hands of his teammates by swimming 3 relays in his quest for 8 golds (2 down, 6 to go). I'm guessing he could have just entered 8 individual events, and perhaps even 8 that he would be favored in. But instead he has chosen to swim for his country, choosing to go for gold for something more than personal glory.
- The IOC is eliminating some sports before the next summer games - baseball and softball are among them (I love baseball, but could care less about Olympic baseball, the timing precludes the inclusion of the best players in the world anyway, so who cares). I'd like to make a motion that all sports whose outcomes are determined by judges (so gymnastics, diving, etc.) be eliminated. I'm sick of screwed up scoring systems and biased judges creating an uphill battle for certain countries (read: the US can pretty much count on getting rough scores). Anyone who thought the US gymnastics team could go into communist China and get a fair deal was smoking crack. Let's do everyone a favor, eliminate those sports and focus on things that use a scoreboard, stopwatch or measuring tape to determine a winner - tough to cheat those.

That's it, off my soapbox...for now.