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| Seriously people...America is a great country. I have been cheering for them in every event where there isn't an Australian (and when there is one, I am wanting the US to get Silver!) and those events are becoming much more common now the swimming is over.
BUT, I remain outraged by the unconventional American-centric medal tally. Again, as I said earlier, it HELPS Australia to tally it by total medals but when you have 17 more Olympic champions (and only 3 less total medals) than another country (as China does over the US), it is an outrage for American medal tallies to say America is in "first place" in the medal tally...
Discuss.
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| On behalf of my countryI'm open to the thoughts of others on this...but my watching of the women's uneven bars competition just now made me think that the Australian judge made a bad call that cost the American, Nastia Liukin, the gold medal. If you agree with that, I apologize on behalf of my country! The Australian media has been protective of the judge, but has a good write up. There's some good American coverage here and here.
I think the IOC or whoever is responsible for the stupid system that requires a convoluted tie break procedure rather than just awarding two medals if two athletes legitimately tie...it happened in the men's vault too (to a lesser extent).
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| Question...I know others in America have noticed it...the US is the only country in the world - that I am aware of - that tallies the Olympic medals by TOTAL medal count and does not start with the country with the most gold medals. (Including the Olympics.com website!)
Lest you think I am self-serving in making that observation, the US system actually benefits Australia. We currently hold 3rd place in total but 7th place when you order by gold medals first. Surely the Olympic championship is more important than pure volume of medals.
In other news...what a swim by Phelps tonight! Ask that Serbian bloke if he'd prefer 2 silvers or the 1 gold he missed out on by .01 of a second!!!
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| Media black out?It's been called the "most spectacular relay in history." On Sunday night, the American men's team won out over the French in the 4x100m relay. The photos of Michael Phelps and his teammates on the pool deck will live on in Olympics history.
It was a fantastic race, not only did all the medal winners break the world record only two teams in the race didn't! Eamon Sullivan of Australia broke the 100m individual world record off the block and American swimmer Jason Lezak set the record for the fastest split in a 100m relay.
The win was made sweeter for the Americans by the fact that French swimmer Alain Bernard had claimed the French would "smash" the Americans. NBC has referred to that comment at least 20 times in the coverage I've seen.
BUT...
The American media has been a little reticent to remember that this is a pattern in the 4x100m relay. During the lead up to the Sydney Olympics in 2000, Gary Hall Jr (usually a modicum of modesty) claimed that the Americans would "smash the Australians like guitars." Only to see this scene on the pool deck when Australian Ian Thorpe out-touched Gary Hall Jr:
 The victorious Australians playing air guitar!
So, memo to Olympic men's 4x100m competitors - talk smack and you lose (and look silly). And, memo to American media - when 8 years later someone uses the SAME WORDS to talk smack, at least casually refer to it when triumphing over America's achievement!!!
I love the Olympics!!!
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