Olympics

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 12:15 am

Who's winning the Olympics?

I mean, according to the States, America is in the lead because it has the most medals. According to Australia, Australia is ahead because it has the most medals per capita. And according to everyone else, it's China, because they have by far the most golds.

Burt · Post by **Burt** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 12:23 am

Michael Phelps.

fluffmonster · Post by **fluffmonster** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 12:42 am

I shun these olympics.

Veilan · Post by **Veilan** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 1:02 am

Over here, we count lexicographical, i.e. most golds win, if tie, more silvers win, if tie too, more bronzes win.

The "total medal" count seems to be a phenomenon unique to the north american continent.

The notion of counting per capita is interesting.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 1:17 am

Burt wrote:Michael Phelps.

Should be disqualified on account of being a mutant freak.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 1:20 am

Veilan wrote:Over here, we count lexicographical, i.e. most golds win, if tie, more silvers win, if tie too, more bronzes win.

That's how we do it here too. Maybe they should do a points system thing. Gold 3 points, Silver 2 points, Bronze 1 point.

*looks at TV*

...

Damn those shotputters are fat.

HATEFACE · Post by **HATEFACE** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 4:04 am

kmj said it best and this isn't an exact quote; "The olympics is an international dick waving competition."

Unlike fluff, who prefers to boycott msnbc (or other american television affiliates) by not viewing the olympics (I can tease him later about his misplaced altruism.) I have been watching the competitions with interest.

I haven't really been paying attention to overall metal count and I mostly pay attention to the competitions I am interested in. I think what Michael Phelps is doing is cool but swimming tech and training has some impact on breaking old gold count records set by Mark Spitz.

I was a bit disapointed with how America did with mens/womens judo.
Fencing/Epee was pretty cool but I was only able to catch a little bit of that. Archery was cool to watch simply because it was raining pollution on everyone but the Koreans can still shoot despite being half-blinded by acid rain! ;f Women's beach volleyball was awesome, mostly because I don't mind it when women sweat. Fit, hot, glistening bodies in the. . . Oh?! Uh, where was I? Ah, yes. I watched some Equestrian riding today, germany did awesome. ;o

I like watching the 'non-mainstream' sports because they seem to be more interesting. (except for water polo, that's totally laaame ;o )

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 4:56 am

HATEFACE wrote:kmj said it best and this isn't an exact quote; "The olympics is an international dick waving competition."

I guess so, in the same way that all competition is dick waving. The Superbowl is an interstate dick waving competition, any world cup is also an international dick waving competition.

Mayhem · Post by **Mayhem** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 7:14 am

For an "official" overall score, I'd like to see medal counts divided by either population of country (in millions, perhaps) or number of competitors sent.

Or even the countries GDP, which would make for an interesting set of stats.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 8:06 am

http://users.skynet.be/hermandw/olymp/reloly.html

Up to the prior olympics. I think it includes winter olympics.

Medals per capita isn't really all that fair a statistic because people sent isn't based on the population of the country, so smaller countries have a big advantage.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 8:27 am

A walking race. How ridiculous! How can you have a race where people are not allowed to go as fast as they can? It's almost as stupid as synchronised diving and synchronised swimming.

Zelknolf · Post by **Zelknolf** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 8:39 pm

NickD wrote:
HATEFACE wrote:kmj said it best and this isn't an exact quote; "The olympics is an international dick waving competition."
I guess so, in the same way that all competition is dick waving. The Superbowl is an interstate dick waving competition, any world cup is also an international dick waving competition.

A dick waving competition amongst the best dick wavers in the world.

To the first post, America's not winning, and I hope America knows it's not winning behind the silly "most medals lulz!" argument. If all of your people come in 3rd place, you're #3, even if more of your guys are #3 than the other guys' are #1.

Medals per capita is equally silly. Failing to produce quality dickwavers is failing to produce quality dickwavers. If ya don't think you have enough people in your country, we all know how to make more, and y'all shoulda thought of that a couple decades ago! Good luck in 2028, I guess.

More to the point, though, aren't the athletes winning, and not their countries? Disturbing, I know, to think that olympic athletes get good by caring about their sports and not by being driven by ridiculous mouth-frothing nationalism.

Mulu · Post by **Mulu** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 10:59 pm

Given how many athletes are foreign born to their patron country, I've always seen it as the individuals more than the country.

And whenever someone does really well at the Olympics, everyone applauds. It's a win for humanity when someone raises the bar.

But yeah, China is kicking ass. The advantage of having 10x more people to draw from (and the ability to take them from their families and make them do nothing but train). Heck, China has more honor students than the US has *students.*

Magile · Post by **Magile** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 11:07 pm

WE FINALLY HAVE MEDALS! YES! GO CANADA!

*sigh*

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Sat Aug 16, 2008 11:27 pm

Magile wrote:WE FINALLY HAVE MEDALS! YES! GO CANADA!

*sigh*

New Zealand's the same. Start of yesterday we had no medals at all. Then yesterday we got a couple of golds a silver and a couple of bronzes.

Those were all our best hopes. Not sure if we'll get many/any more.

Saw the silver Canada got in the rowing. That was a pretty good effort, unfortunate that you got beaten by Australia at the end.

The rowing side of things in this Olympics was pretty dodgy. Our best rower got very very sick, had to go on an IV drip because he couldn't keep food or water down and he only ended up with a bronze. And it was mentioned that over a dozen other rowers from other countries got pretty sick too. And there was a bunch of complaints about weeds in the lanes, wrapping around rudders and stuff from all countries too.