hubris, or something

[lauradi7dw]

We watched the (taped, delayed) women's gymnastics vaulting finals last night, unspoiled as to the winner. I was pleased to see that one of the competitors (Oksana Chusovitina) has made it to age 37 in a sport that leaves many aspirants with permanent injuries long before that. There seemed to be some sort of gravity well under the mat - several of the women stumbled, and there was some falling. The NBC commentators were totally convinced that McKayla Maroney was going to win the gold no matter what, but as they say in the investing business, past performance is no guarantee of future results. Her first vault was very impressive (we have no idea what the judging criteria are) but she landed on her butt in the second one. The voice-over people were still convinced that she should win, but she got the silver. Good for the judges.
Apparently Fox news has been complaining that the US athletes have been good sports instead of sufficiently jingoistic & self-promoting (so I've read - I don't watch Fox news). Maybe now they can have MM as their poster girl:



We're hoping to see *pole* vaulting today, if we can figure out when it's on. We saw a feature about a sailor who practices on the Charles River, but haven't seen any sailing coverage otherwise.

Comments

[acw.livejournal.com]

I just tried to make my mouth do that, and I can't even get close. Maybe if I won a silver medal that would give me this strange ability. Or perhaps it comes with intensive gymnastics training.