I'm Erik Stuart, a 30-something married guy living in San Mateo, CA. I'm in eBay's corporate strategy group, and I lead eBay's efforts to look at & develop relationships with internet startups. (Posts about Web 2.0, the internet, and anything else are my fault and don't reflect on my employer, except to the extent that they hired me and continue to keep me around.) I'll also blog about sports, games, musical theater, economics/physics/other science stuff, and whatever else strikes my fancy.
Archive
Top highlight: American Brian Clay winning gold to extend a strong US tradition in the decathlon. His performance in the first 9 events was so dominant (building a lead of more than 500 points) that even a last-place finish in the concluding 1500m still left him 200 points ahead of the silver medalist.
Other highlights, most of which involve US teams:
- Jamaican men winning the 4x100 relay and absolutely shattering the world record in the process, even after some poor passes. (The Jamaican women fell victim to the ridiculous stick-dropping epidemic that’s swept these Games and failed to complete their final handoff.)
- US winning bronze in baseball. As with softball, I sincerely hope that the sport returns in 2016. Hockey has figured out how to let the best players in the world participate in the Olympics; why can’t baseball do the same?
- A red-hot first quarter for the US against Argentina in men’s basketball. The Argentines fought back gamely and cut the lead to six late in the first half, but the US was never really threatened in the second half. It’s a shame Ginobli was injured in the first quarter.
- A gritty win by the US men’s indoor volleyball team in 5 sets against Russia. One test remains, against Brazil.
- A respect-demanding 10-5 destruction of Serbia by the US men’s water polo team, after the Serbians intentionally lost their final preliminary game so that they could face the US in the semis. Be careful what you wish for! The US men face Hungary in the final, in what might be the best Cinderella run among any Olympics team sport.
Top highlight: Definitely two of them, the first being US women winning gold in women’s soccer. I won’t claim to be a soccer expert, so I can’t refute some of the after-match reports that Brazil dominated play, but my view was that the Americans had a clear game plan which they executed well: play a very disciplined defense, and send lots of long balls forward with the notion of getting occasional chances for the speedy US forwards against the less-disciplined Brazilian defense. For a team that lost its best player right before the tournament (and was missing another starter), and then allowed two goals in the first 4 minutes of the first game, this was an amazing result.
Also: the US men sweeping the 400m dash. In a Games where the supposed-to-be-dominant US track team has been hugely disappointing, at least we still rule the quarter-mile. (Of course, Usain Bolt will probably start training in the 400m and win that in London.)
Other notes/highlights:
- An incredible diving duel between Chen Ruolin from China and Emilie Heymans from Canda. Emilie made the women’s 10m platform the first diving event this Games in which the top Chinese diver(s) were tested, and Chen responded with a spectacular final dive to keep the Chinese streak (now 7-for-7) going.
- Gold for the Professor and the Thin Beast on the beach volleyball court - the US duo responded well after a shocking opening loss to Latvia.
- A shocking upset of the US softball team by Japan. It’s sad that softball is being removed from the Olympic program; I hope sincerely that it will be reinstated for 2016. Add to the softball loss the upset of the US women’s water polo team by the Netherlands, and the excellent performance so far of US team sports was slowed a bit. The dominating win by the US women’s indoor volleyball team over Cuba tempered this trend, however.
- An impressive win for Cuban Dayron Robles in the men’s 110m hurdles. I wonder if his dorky-cool glasses will start catching on?
And now for the lowlight: how do both American sprint relays (along with several other teams) drop the baton? This is incomprehensible to me. I ran the 4x100 relay in middle school, and I wasn’t a great runner by any stretch, but we never dropped the baton. How can Olympic athletes fail to get the stick around the track - especially in the heats, where there isn’t any need to shave off hundredths of a second by making perfect exchanges? Sigh.
Top highlight: in possibly the clearest “top highlight” of the Games, it’s obviously Usain Bolt’s 2nd gold and 2nd world record, coming in the 200m. In marked contrast to his showboating and suboptimal finish in the 100m, he went all-out this time, even leaning at the tape when he was leading by several meters.
Before seeing Bolt, I didn’t think Michael Johnson’s record would be broken for another 10 or 20 years; I thought it was one of the most amazing leaps forward in track history, clearly surpassed only by Beamon’s long jump in Mexico City. I was way, way wrong. (… and I’d love to see Bolt start training for the 400m.)
Other notes/highlights:
- Walsh and May capping a perfect (no-sets-lost) run through the beach volleyball tournament. They’re an amazingly complementary pair of athletes. One question: what the hell does that kinesiology tape that Kerri wears on her shoulder actually do?
- Shawn Crawford and Walter Dix took silver and bronze in the 200m after two DQs. How do runners at the Olympic level run out of their lanes? I estimate that giving yourself 6 inches of leeway probably costs you about 0.01-0.02 seconds, which doesn’t seem like enough to accept a serious risk of disqualification. This isn’t gymnastics, where increasing your risk also significantly increases your chances of a medal. Run in the middle of your lane, for Pete’s sake!
- A close men’s basketball game between the US and Australia - for about 12 minutes. The US is playing incredible basketball right now. Also, I thought the officiating was solid in this game - it’s the first time I’ve seen in the tournament that it hasn’t been abysmal. Seriously, where do these guys come from? I complain loudly about Pac-10 referees, but they’re world-class compared to the international refs. I guess the boxing judges are worse (pick any boxing match, and you’re guaranteed to see about a 3-1 ratio of punches landed to punches scored).
- The US men’s indoor volleyball team mirroring their female counterparts, beating Serbia in a come-from-behind, 5-set quarterfinal match. Again, the US continues to show strong team play and highly disappointing track results.
Top highlight: seeing Natalie du Toit from South Africa, who is missing the lower half of her left leg, compete in the inaugural women’s 10km marathon open-water swim - amazing and inspiring.
Other notes/highlights:
- Shawn Johnson finally winning a gold medal, on the balance beam. Of all events in gymnastics - and possibly all of sports - this may amaze me more than any other: how it’s possible to do blind flips and land squarely on a 4-inch beam, I’ll never understand.
- Jonathan Horton winning silver on the high bar, after adding a hefty dose of extra difficulty to his routine. I loved this not just because of the aggressive mindset, but (even more) because it’s a strategic principle that’s so often not applied in competitions of any stripe. If you’re an underdog or behind, increase variance. In something like gymnastics, that means increasing your difficulty. In basketball, that means slowing the game to a crawl (reducing the total number of possessions) and shooting lots of 3’s. In the Amazing Race, that means choosing a different Detour than the teams ahead of you (ideally, a find-a-needle-in-a-haystack challenge). Of course, the converse applies if you’re ahead or the favorite.
- The proverbial thrill of victory for Dawn Harper coupled with the equally cliched agony of defeat for Lolo Jones after she hit the penultimate hurdle. Tangential question: why do men run the 110m hurdles, while women run the 100m hurdles? This doesn’t make sense. The heptathlon at least has historical reasons for being different from the decathlon (e.g., women pole vaulting was very rare when the heptathlon was first introduced).
- Henry Cejudo’s victory in freestyle wrestling. The match was exciting; his joy afterwards was heartwarming; and the cheesy, dramatic music they played in the venue as he celebrated his gold medal was actually really, really nice. It felt like I was watching a movie, complete with soundtrack. The venue announcers were good, too.
- A clutch, come-from-behind, 5-set win by the US women’s indoor volleyball team in the quarterfinal against Italy, continuing the US’ strong performance in team sports.
Top highlight: the US sweep of the men’s 400m. While their dominance of the sprints has faded, the US is still the leader when it comes to the 400 distance (with or without hurdles). Hopefully, this is a prelude to better performance by US tracksters for the rest of the Games.
Other notes/highlights:
- US women win their soccer semifinal 4-2 over Japan after trailing early. They’ve improved their play throughout the tournament as they learn to live without injured Abby Wambach - but Brazil in the final will be a stern test.
- A dominating performance by Kerri Walsh and Misty May in beach volleyball, annihilating a Brazilian team to reach the gold medal match. The other semifinal was a titanic battle between two Chinese pairs, with each of the first two sets going well past 21 points.
- I won’t call it a highlight, but the US-China baseball game was brutally intense. Two massive collisions at home plate were a prelude to a beaning that gave an American batter a concussion.
- Another world record for Isinbaeva of Russia in the women’s pole vault, who seems to be following the Sergey Bubka strategy of breaking the world record by the minimum amount each time. (His practice was clearly due to significant monetary incentives given by the USSR for each new world record; are similar incentives still in place?)
- A gold medal for American Stephanie Brown Trafton in the discus - an extra shout-out for being a resident of Sacramento (where I grew up) as well as throwing the disc (which I did in high school).
- Gold for the US equestrian team in team jumping, and Canadian Ian Millar’s first medal (silver) in 9 Olympics. Extra credit for being one of the Olympic events mixing men and women.
Top highlight: the Jamaican women sweeping the 100m dash - a powerful performance by the suddenly-dominant sprinting power. Jamaica has been a force in sprinting for several Olympics now, but this kind of performance is what we Americans used to aim for. Now, we feel lucky to have won a single bronze in the men’s and women’s 100m. Hopefully, the US team will perform better in the 400 and 400 hurdles.
Other highlights:
- The US women’s eight winning gold in the premier rowing event. During the medal ceremony, the entire team was belting out the Star-Spangled Banner with inspiring joy.
- A victory by the US men’s water polo team against Germany - incredibly,and against all odds, winning their pool (over Italy, Serbia, and Croatia) and earning a bye into the semifinals.
- A gutty, come-from-behind win by the US women’s indoor volleyball team against Poland.
In general, though the US track team has been pretty disappointing during the first two years, the US has been performing well in team sports: men’s and women’s water polo, basketball, beach volleyball, and indoor volleyball; women’s soccer; and softball have all been good. Baseball is doing decently against tough competition, and even women’s field hockey managed a win and 3 draws to achieve a .500 record.
Also, heartfelt sympathy goes to Liu Xiang, who had to literally walk away from the starting blocks and was unable to defend his 110m hurdles title.
Top highlights:
1) Seeing Phelps complete his perfect run, swimming the decisive leg in the 4x100 medley relay. It’s possible to argue that there are other athletic feats comparable to Phelps’ performance in the last eight days; it’s very difficult to argue that there any feat clearly superior to his.
2) A breathtaking sprint by Usain Bolt in the men’s 100m, breaking the world record by 0.03 seconds (a significant, if not huge, improvement), even though he slowed down in the last stride. The hand-waving and chest-thumping might have added a hundredth of a second or two to his time - but the clear deceleration on his last stride probably added several hundredths. Could he have gone under 9.6?
Other highlights & notes:
- The oldest female marathon champion in Olympic history (admittedly, a relatively small sample, since the women’s marathon has only been around since 1984); also, a gutsy run by hard-luck-in-the-Olympics Radcliffe, only eight weeks removed from a femur stress fracture, and an incredibly close battle for silver vs. bronze.
- The conclusion of Dara Torres’ remarkable journey, only 0.01 seconds away from winning the women’s 50m freestyle.
- A sweep for Russia in the women’s singles tennis tournament.
- Continued dominance by the British track cycling team.
- US men’s basketball smothering Spain in surprising fashion. I hope they see Spain again in the final (remember, Spain was taken to OT by China), and I hope to see a better game then.
Top highlight: Phelps’ amazing come-from-behind victory in the 100m butterfly, which almost defies explanation. Whereas the US victory in the 4x100 free relay was incredible, this one was… well, mystifying.
Other highlights:
- The US women’s soccer 2-1, extra-time quarterfinal victory over Canada. I woke at 3am Pacific to see this live, and then endured a 90-minute lightning delay invoked 15 minutes into the match. (I set my alarm 45 minutes forward, slept, woke up, saw that it was still delayed, repeated the process, and woke up again to find the match late in the first half.)
- Rebecca Adlington (from the UK) winning the 800m freestyle, breaking the oldest world record in swimming (previously set by Janet Evans in 1989).
- Zimbabwean Kirsty Coventry continuing her outstanding Olympics by winning the women’s 200m backstroke and breaking the world record. She might be the star of the swimming competition if it weren’t for Michael Phelps.
- A big upset for the US men’s water polo team, upsetting the top-ranked Croatian team 7-5.
Top highlight: Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson winning gold and silver, respectively, in the women’s gymnastics individual all-around finals. Shawn was very good and Nastia was slightly better.
Other highlights:
- Lochte and Piersol winning gold and silver in the men’s 200m backstroke. In a Phelps-dominated swim meet, it was nice to see Lochte earn a gold medal (and set a world record in the process).
- Rebecca Soni winning the women’s 200m breaststroke.
- A strong effort from the US men’s indoor volleyball team against Bulgaria, winning in 3 sets.
- A fine defensive performance from the US men’s basketball squad (I refuse to call them the “Redeem Team”) against Greece. I was concerned about the US coach’s likely stubborness regarding playing man-to-man defense, especially against a Greek squad that’s had difficulties against a zone. Though I still think Coach K’s inflexibility is a weakness, in this case man D was the right call: even though they gave up a number of back cuts, they forced so many steals and got so many easy points that they were able to blow Greece out.
A lowlight: a Swedish wrestler’s demonstration during the medal ceremony, in which he received his bronze medal and immediately put in in the center of the mat and left the hall. I can only presume that he’s announcing his retirement (wrestlers often leave their shoes in the middle of the mat after their last match), since he’s likely to be banned after this display (he’s already had his medal stripped by the IOC). He was upset about officiating during the semifinal match, with which I can sympathize. However, his act was to the detriment of the other medal winners, and they don’t deserve that. (For an example of dignity and class following egregious officiating, see Roy Jones in 1988.)
Top highlight: Kristin Armstrong smashing the field to win the women’s cycling road race. A special shout-out goes to Christine Thorburn, who finished 5th, only 3.2 seconds out of 3rd place - she’s a doctor for my wife Melissa.
Other highlights/notes:
- Levi Leipheimer, in the men’s road race, winning the bronze
- Kosuke Kitajima, defending his Olympic titles in both breaststroke races
- A China sweep of the women’s 200m fly
- An impressive 4x200m free relay by the Aussie women
Sort of a lackluster day, actually. Maybe I’m just getting a bit tired (which won’t improve after the USA-Greece basketball game at 5am and the USA women’s first medal-round soccer game at 3 am).
Also, a note on yesterday’s post and the magnificence of what Phelps is doing: the one other feat I can think of that’s possibly comparable (in addition to Jesse Owens’ 4 world records in 45 minutes and Spitz’ 7-gold, 7-world-record performance) is Eric Heiden’s 5 golds & 5 Olympic records at Lake Placid 1980.
