XXX Olympiad - August 8

[Bob Costas]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

If Team USA ends up beating China in the medal count by one medal, the United States must throw Bela Karolyi a national parade.

Today we'll see an all-American women's beach volleyball final. I'm just glad this means beach volleyball is almost over. LET'S GO DODGERS AND LET'S GO TROOPS!!!

More track and field today as well. The 200m women's sprint should be a fun one.

[marie427]

Today's schedule looks really boring except for the track and field medal events.

[emilyj]

I am the least enthused for today's events than I have been of all the days so far.

I'm still going to watch them all though.

When does the women's soccer gold medal match happen?

[Knight]

Women's soccer is tomorrow. Can't remember what time.

[decemberwedding07]

Is anyone else really impressed by how well little tiny Great Britain is doing? 48 medals vs our 71 and China's 73 (and how many of those were in Badminton, BTW)? GB's population is just 62,641,000, while ours is 311,591,917 and China's is 1,344,130,000, according to the Google.

Oh, and 11 of China's medals are in Badminton. I'm imagining some official in China saying, "OK, we really need to train a bunch of super athletes in a sport that Americans will never give a shit about and that we'll be able to just clean up in. Badminton sound good?"

[taratru]

I need a spoiler thread today so I can get to bed before midnight.

[emilyj]

Moxie, men's volleyball is on NBC right now.

[marie427]

Keeping up with men's volleyball through the London 2012 site. Ugh, first set was so close. Go USA!

[charminglife]

Am I the only one who enjoys beach volleyball? ((waits for the crickets))

[catsarecute]

Aug 8, 2012 10:50:05 GMT -5 charminglife said:

Am I the only one who enjoys beach volleyball? ((waits for the crickets))

I enjoy it! The US v China game yesterday was amazing.

But I also found myself watching Table Tennis and really, really enjoying it. I basically will watch any Olympic sport and find it entertaining.

[decemberwedding07]

Aug 8, 2012 11:06:27 GMT -5 catsarecute said:

Aug 8, 2012 10:50:05 GMT -5 charminglife said:

Am I the only one who enjoys beach volleyball? ((waits for the crickets))

I enjoy it! The US v China game yesterday was amazing.

But I also found myself watching Table Tennis and really, really enjoying it. I basically will watch any Olympic sport and find it entertaining.

Curling?

[marie427]

Curling is fascinating to watch!

[Deleted]

Aug 8, 2012 9:19:09 GMT -5 Knight said:

Women's soccer is tomorrow. Can't remember what time.

It should be the Canadian team playing the gold medal match......damn refs!!!!!

I'm mostly kidding, but holy uproar in this country over that semi final.

[marie427]

Aug 8, 2012 11:47:43 GMT -5 @lauriergirl28 said:

Aug 8, 2012 9:19:09 GMT -5 Knight said:

Women's soccer is tomorrow. Can't remember what time.

It should be the Canadian team playing the gold medal match......damn refs!!!!!

I'm mostly kidding, but holy uproar in this country over that semi final.

For real? But it's not a hockey game.

[decemberwedding07]

Aug 8, 2012 11:47:43 GMT -5 @lauriergirl28 said:

Aug 8, 2012 9:19:09 GMT -5 Knight said:

Women's soccer is tomorrow. Can't remember what time.

It should be the Canadian team playing the gold medal match......damn refs!!!!!

I'm mostly kidding, but holy uproar in this country over that semi final.

So, I just had to read this article to see what the brouhaha was all about.
www.nbcolympics.com/news-blogs/soccer/fifa-investigating-canadas-comments-following-semifinal-loss-to-u-s.html
I'm going to side with USA, not because I'm an American, but because the running down of the clock through stalling is the single most annoying aspect of soccer. It leads to shit like players being totally melodramatic and flailing about on the ground because some other player's ponytail barely grazed them. It's freaking annoying. And bullshit. And the reason I hate watching soccer.

[emilyj]

Aug 8, 2012 10:50:05 GMT -5 charminglife said:

Am I the only one who enjoys beach volleyball? ((waits for the crickets))

I like it. I just watched the women's bronze medal match and it was a great game.

I just think the bikinis are dumb.

[Deleted]

Aug 8, 2012 13:10:08 GMT -5 @littlemoxie said:

Aug 8, 2012 12:52:00 GMT -5 decemberwedding07 said:

So, I just had to read this article to see what the brouhaha was all about.
www.nbcolympics.com/news-blogs/soccer/fifa-investigating-canadas-comments-following-semifinal-loss-to-u-s.html
I'm going to side with USA, not because I'm an American, but because the running down of the clock through stalling is the single most annoying aspect of soccer. It leads to shit like players being totally melodramatic and flailing about on the ground because some other player's ponytail barely grazed them. It's freaking annoying. And bullshit. And the reason I hate watching soccer.

Yeah, given how many times she went WAY over the allotted time and was warned, I don't think you get to be upset. Also, you were ahead 3 different times - you need to capitalize on that.

At first I thought perhaps the ref's call lead directly to the penalty kick, in which case I understand why Canada is so upset. But that's not what happened.

She's saying she wasn't warned, apparently. I don't watch enough soccer to understand, although apparently the refs call (or penalty?) had never been used before. I'm too lazy to find a canadian slanted article

Really, I'm not sure I care. Im just happy we have a decent soccer team!!!

[basilosaurus]

Wait, my tv is playing poland vs russia volleyball. Am I delayed, or did I miss US? If I have to, I'll go watch online, but it's much easier to see that little ball with my big screen.

Curling is awesome. So is badminton and table tennis. Americans have weird tastes.

[basilosaurus]

Poland Russia is over. I'm now on to US Italy (2nd set). So you probably just missed the earlier game.

[pescalita]

Aug 8, 2012 15:29:08 GMT -5 @littlemoxie said:

OK, so I am watching beach volleyball online on nbcolympics and was impressed with the British announcer. Except that he keeps saying "the Americans" and I'm thinking - they are BOTH American, that doesn't help! But that's neither here nor there.

Walsh went to run after a ball and missed and he said, "Good effort by Walsh, mother of two, to retrieve the ball...."

HTF is that relevant?! Why did he feel the need to insert that completely irrelevant piece of trivia while commentating on the gold medal match?

Their uteri and last names are always relevant. It's a beach volleyball rule. HTH.

That's really the only thing I hate about it. That and the fact that they use it as filler in prime time to push the marquee events to 11:45. And I'm convinced it's taken time from gymnastics. But the actual sport is kinda fun.

[Deleted]

I don't know what day I'm in, but what about the male pole vaulters basically saying they weren't going to jump anymore take us all to the final? (15 instead of 12 or something?).

It's funny how no one mentioned the sailing

[basilosaurus]

OK, I tried to watch sailing. It's one of my favorite things to do. I probably sail every month (nice to have a friend with a boat), and I used to be on a team as a kid. However, the only sailing coverage I found is the live 6 hours feed with no commentary. I'm not watching that! Edit so I can watch. They're not showing shit in the US.

[Deleted]

I know Marie will probably never go to another football game with me after I admit this, but I love beach volleyball and I love Misty and Kerri. That was fun to watch last night and I had successfully avoided spoilers so it was exciting.

s/o NBC coverage though - I had DVRed the women's gymnastics from two nights ago (I love to watch even though I know the results) and when the Italian gymnast, Ferrari, did her floor routine I laughed bc it was the first non-America, Romanian or Russian NBC had shown as far as I had seen. I get they are trying to show the most relevant performances, but showing more gymnasts and spending less time showing clips of Jordyn Wieber's mother wouldn't kill them.

[Deleted]

Um, HELLO, where is our post for today?!?

I need to congratulate the Canadian girls soccer team for their bronze