And lo, the 2008 Olympic games begin

[Braedley]

Wish they had Alison Sydor doing the race commentary.

That would be nice. I didn't see the race live, and probably won't see it tonight due to nice weather. The only other thing I'd like to see is Van Koeverden's race, even knowing the outcome.

[thejester]

I love the near hysteria developing in Australia that we 'only' finished 6th in the medal tally. Ignoring the dubious nature of this as a yardstick...we're a nation of 20 million people, I don't think there's any great dishonour in being alongside the likes of Germany and the UK, much larger nations with more money to throw at the caper.

[Gerald Tarrant]

No story about the Olympics is complete without addressing the issue of doping

Perhaps the strangest doping case this year was the suspension of four horses and their riders from Olympic show jumping after preliminary tests revealed a derivative of chili peppers, which is used to treat horse injuries, had been applied to the horses' skin. The chili pepper derivative is banned because it can be a mild stimulant.

Link

[mr friendly guy]

A Fairfax newspaper has calculated that $16.7 million has been spent for every gold medal won by Australia in Beijing.

The figures were based on the 13 gold medals which Australia had won before diver Matthew Mitcham's victory in the 10 metres platform last night.

link

Given the thoughts of privatising the AIS in this thread, I thought this would contribute to the discussion.

[thejester]

It'd be interesting to see how they arrived at those figures. The funding that goes to the ASC/AIS isn't solely directed at Olympic sports - the four professional football codes (union, league, soccer, footy) all have junior development programs through the AIS, as does cricket. Likewise funding goes into programs from this elite level down to grassroots stuff like Little Aths.

[Falkenhayn]

As I said, the original Olympics were a pure human athletic competition. The athletes literally competed in the nude.

Except for the hoplitodromos. It was an 800 meter race, initially run in full panoply (~60lbs of armor), which was later reduced down to a helmet and shield (~20lbs of armor).

Also, for the sake of your balls n' shaft, competitors could wear the 400 BC equivalent of a jock.

[Broomstick]

Yes, because you wouldn't want anyone to trip over their genitalia while competing.

[sketerpot]

In the closing ceremony, what the hell did the UK do? They did a big dancing thingy with a tricked out double-decker bus and a bunch of people doing some weird modern dance thing, and then some pop star came out of the top and started singing "Whole Lotta Love" with accompaniment from Jimmy Page. And then Jimmy Page started just rocking out, and it was weird as hell. I alternated between laughing and gaping the whole time.

Thank you, Britain. Thank you for making the world stare at you. Thank you for giving every TV-equipped nation a fit of nervous laughter. Japan could have done it even more hardcore, but you were magnificent.

[FSTargetDrone]

I have to agree, the end of the ceremony seemed quite strange. The pop music really didn't fit with everything else.

Those glowing wheel-bikes were really cool, by the way.

[Dartzap]

Bah! They should have sung London's Calling! I mean, who wouldn't want to hear that the next host was full of zombies?

[Hillary]

I now look forward to four years of the British media alternatively complaining about how much the London games will end up costing and bemoaning the fact that they won't be as good as the Chinese ones.

Sadly for the London Evening Standard and the Daily Mail, they won't now be able to blame Ken Livingstone for either.

Personally, I'm rather looking forward to having the whole jamboree on my doorstep.