I have a soft spot for curling, myself...it was a sport my father-in-law loved to play, when it was too snowy for golf!
Alpine Skiing
Biathlon
Bobseld
Cross-Country Skiing
Curling
Freestyle skiing
Ice Hockey
Luge
Speed Skating
Skeleton
Ski Jumping
Snowboarding
And, ok ok, I'll include Figure Skating
Love 'em all, I'll be glued to the set
Winter sports? I can't think of anything more boring.
I have a soft spot for curling, myself...it was a sport my father-in-law loved to play, when it was too snowy for golf!
Hockey, no question. I might watch some of the skiing and other downhill related sports, but I'm not all that interested in them.
Figuring skating is, to me, about as boring as a sport can possibly get. There should be martial arts figure skating fights instead. That I'd watch.
Is not watching the Olympics a sport?
"I won't kill for money, and I won't marry for it. Other than that, I'm open to just about anything."
-Jim Rockford
I picked snowboarding, but it was hard to pick between that and speed-skating. I have fond memories of watching fellow Wisconsinite Dan Jansen at the '94 games.
As a member of the Canadian public, specifically a dweller in SuperNatural British Columbia, I am on the hook for these Games. I would have voted against them, but we weren't allowed to vote. The entire lower mainland is going to be a zoo for the duration. It's costing about 500 thousand bazillion dollars and they are closing schools and firing teachers, ambulance drivers have been on strike for months, there aren't enough nurses . . . you get the picture, I'm sure.
We lowly serfs whose money is paying for all this cannot afford to go to the games. My 85 year old mother would sell her right kidney for tickets to figure skating but after working like a slave all her life and paying taxes and being an upstanding citizen, she's not important enough to be given a chance.
The Canadian military announced this morning that, Yes, they can and will shoot down planes that violate the Olympic Air Space.
Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeezus H. A big fat waste of money so a few elite athletes can come and play their games at public expense and a few big corporations can put the Olympic Logo on their bottles of beer.
But I do like to watch the ski jumping, which both my late father-in-law and my husband used to do.
Sophmoric Existentialist
I did not vote as I do not look forward to the Olympics any more and have not for years. I guess the women's (or is that girl's) figure skating was my favorite once they let the Hockey Pros play. But I will probably not watch the Olympics. I could not vote for Most Boring though. Too many other things less interesting than the Winter Olympics to me and I have some fond memories of past ones.
Hockey for certain, as I'm a hockey junkie the rest of the time anyway. I also dig ski jumping, luge and bobsled and other controlled falling events. Snowboarding is cool, but since it's so focused on technical stuff for scoring purposes there tend to be many identical runs between riders which gets really boring after about 10 minutes.
I would love to try the luge myself, that looks pants shittingly exciting....except that the luge outfit would make it appear that a mylar balloon had stolen a sled and was attempting to abscond with it.
Hell, if I didn't do things just because they made me feel a bit ridiculous, I wouldn't have much of a social life. - Santo Rugger.
Ice hockey. I could give two shits about the NHL, but I find international hockey, like international soccer, pretty compelling...while it's actually happening.
"You laugh at me because I'm different; I laugh at you because I'm on nitrous."
find me at Goodreads
Ice Hockey, although I wish they'd go back to not letting pro's play. Go Red Wings
Silly, you can't spend a paragraph complaining about the high cost and disruption and then wax wise about how you can't afford the obviously very expensive tickets to an event with high costs and huge disruption. It'd be like saying my car is not running good after crashing it into a wall.
Hockey, definitely hockey.
Give me whiskey when I'm thirsty,Give me a cold beer when I'm dry, Give me root beer when I'm sickly, Give me a headstone when I die.
Women's figure skating and nothing else. Those are some incredibly beautiful ladies.
Political correctness will be the death of our country.
One of my old employees is vying for a position on the skeleton crew.
Back when I was on my country's national team, my sport, telemark skiing, was beaten out for a place in the Olympics by snowboarding. Good for the snowboarders, but still, crappity crappity crappity.
The odd thing is that as much as I love skiing, I'm not into watching ski racing, or watching any other sport for that matter. Getting out and ripping down a course is truly wonderful, but watching someone do the same thing just doesn't do a thing for me -- better than watching paint dry, but that's about it.
I think the Olympics is a terrific thing. It brings attention to sports that otherwise would remain in obscurity, and because of this, some people take up these sports for themselves, which is a very good thing. So here's to the Olympians!
If I were to be a spectator at an Olympic event, it would be ski jumping. I live in a chalet by an abandonded ski jumping venue, so I hike and ski about the old jumps, and never cease to be amazed that people willingly fly off these things. How they manage to keep in the air when their big brass balls must weigh about 100 pounds each is quite astounding. I very much hope the venue at my place opens again, for I'd love to see folks imitating flying squirrels as they soar off the 120.
I have a lot of respect for the athletic and mental ability of the participants in these sports, but I'm hard pressed to actually give a toss about watching them.
When the summer Olympics rolls around I make an effort to watch the Equestrian events and tear up during a good dressage routine. Maybe if they invent Snow Dressage I'll take to watching the winter ones.
Dressage on ice? Hmmm. . . now you have me wondering why Olympic television coverage never included compulsory figures? Maybe those horse faced USSR skaters were more horse than they claimed to be.
By the way, is that the official name ('crew')? Kind of cool.
I picked curling, because it's completely unhyped in the US, so you don't get a lot of boring coverage on the players; they just show the sport. It's such a strange but interesting sport to watch, too.
Although I will have to see Kim Yu-na. I never found figure skating that much of a draw, but I happened to catch one of her routines a while back. I was mesmerized. She's unbelievably graceful.
Last edited by parzival; 26 Jan 2010 at 11:43 PM. Reason: .->?
Well, it all starts on Saturday night. Anyone know how is Vancouver coping?
In the land of the blind, the one-arm man is king.
Well, according to NPR this morning, the organizers are freaking out over the lack of snow; the native nations are either smugly satisfied or bitter, depending on how well their particular culture is represented in the goings-on; and Vancouverites, as you might imagine, are apprehensive about the ecological and economic impact of the man-made El Nino that is the Olympics.
Last edited by OneCentStamp; 12 Feb 2010 at 10:00 AM.
"You laugh at me because I'm different; I laugh at you because I'm on nitrous."
find me at Goodreads
I voted figure skating because the rest of that shit is boring. (NB figure skating isn't that great either though.)
I just opened this thread all, "Haha, I'll suggest that I'd watch winter dressage. Nobody'd ever think of something that random."
But, yeah. I'm not so much into winter sports. I love sledding fast down a track and whipping around corners with a bunch of other people until we all go flying face first into the snow, but watching other people being all grim and determined in snow? Eh.
I'll watch hockey throughout the whole Olympics, but I'm having a curling party on Feb 27th!
The Ford World Championship Women's curling is on this week in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, Canada. It can be viewed online at http://www.tsn.ca/curling/
Sophmoric Existentialist
Sophmoric Existentialist