Hello again everybody,
I intended to do a lot more pre-games updates, but I got really busy. I will also be busy during the games, but I intend to do my utmost to update this everyday. Today is DAY 1. On the menu for today, Women's Moguls qualifiers, the brand new figure skating team event starts the short programs, and the Men and Women's Snowboard Slopestyle qualifiers. And then, of course, tomorrow is the Opening Ceremony. I thought it was tonight, but I was sadly mistaken.
Ok in terms of watching these Olympics, important information. Everyday, you can watch all of the events live on nbcolympics.com as long as you have a television package that qualifies you to be able to get the actual NBC channels that the Olympics will be shown on, that is MSNBC and CNBC, USA and the NBC Sports Network starting Feb 8th. This is all live and starts at 3 AM everyday. The NBC primetime begins at 7pm CST. The rest of the daytime tv events will be split with MSNBC, CNBC, and USA and NBCSN will continue their live coverage everyday starting Feb 8th at 3AM
So just to explain the new Team Figure Skating event, each country competing has four components: a Men's Singles competitor, a Women's Singles competitor, a Pair's Team, and an Ice Dancing Team. The US, Canada, and Russia are the most likely contenders for medaling in this event. The benefit of this event for the athletes that participate is that they really get a chance to get a feel for competing at the Olympics before moving on to their individual events. The US has selected Pair's Abbott and Castelli and Men's Jeremy Abbott to compete in the team with the Ice Dancing likely to got to Meryl Davis and Charlie White (I love them) and the women's likely to be split with controversial Olympian Ashley Wagner skating the short program and Gracie Gold most likely skating the free skate. In case you missed why Ashley Wagner is a controversial choice, she places 4th at the US championships behind Mirai Nigasu, but was selected to the team over her due to her body of work in the past four years.
Also, not current but you should definitely all watch Jason Brown's US Championships Free Skate. It's fantastic and he is also a local boy from Highland Park, IL.
Shaun White injured himself during training runs on the Slopestyle course and decided to pull out of that event to concentrate on the halfpipe compeition. It sucks that he is leaving an open spot that someone else could have taken, but I understand the impulse to protect his best event.
Hannah Kearney is already on her way to defending her Vancouver Gold with a first place finish in the Women' Moguls qualifiers.
Ok, I will update more later, but for now, the figure skating team event starts and the Men's Short Program is first up followed by the Pairs.
