Positive Energy - Olympics highlights, Day 12

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.

Olympics highlights, Day 12

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.

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