None. Clearly the solution is for the Canadian Olympic Committee to lobby the IOC to have the rowing finals on the first day of competition.
 

She totally, um, "manned up" in that interview.

Trying to corkscrew the Hungarian was entertaining. It would make it a watchable sport if all the matches were more like Captain Blood or The Sea Hawk.
 

I've been at a few sport industry presentations by some prominent COC people (own the podium, etc.) and at one of them they basically came out and said (to paraphrase), "the apathy in Canada towards the summer Olympics (relative to the winter games) is tough to overcome... we've tried a bunch of different ways and we don't know how". It sounded like the kind of desperation where you know you're not going to win, but you really wish you could. (right, leafs nation?). To clarify, there's no shortage of apathy when it comes to complaining about our athletes shortcomings at the summer games... but no one cares enough when it matters: in the 4, 8, 12 (etc.) years leading into the summer games.

Anyway, I never really get too bent out of shape over Olympic performance, least of which the summer games. We're a country that is psychologically defined by our winter season, both by us and those outside our borders. If there was referendum that asked all Canadians to choose which Games we trained and sent athletes to, I think it would be a landslide for the "smaller" games... and that, to my mind, is why the summer games will always be a "disappointment" for Canada (except for the odd singular exceptions: e.g. tewksbury)
 

Well said Matt. People might as well wait until the actual medal contender flub before losing their heads.
 

We were discussing at work whether it's possible to be kicked in the nether region "repeatedly." At some point, a man's going to protect himself, no?

This strikes me as a more accurate quote:

"It’s like I imagine if I was a man, it’s like getting kicked in the nuts once or twice, and then in the hands repeatedly when I put them down there to deflect the remaining blows. That’s how bad it feels."
 

In spite of my despair and my reluctance to even look at a maple leaf for the next week, I'm not one of those guys who thinks that we should cancel public health care and pour the money into athletics instead.

But still. I've slammed my head into my desk so often this Olympic season there's a nice groove in it.

I wonder if we're not being strung along a bit by the CBC on just how high our medal hopes are. I mean, we hear 16 medals, but then we watch and it's "the gymnastics team is poised to break out! the baseball team should contend for a medal! our divers are among the favourites" and it's just a storm of things we should be good at and then it turns out we're really not.
 

I will argue that we have had no less than 4 medal contenders already lose out.
1) Shewfelt not making the floor final (an event that hasn't happened yet, but that he must be considered a medal threat in).
2)Hayden not making the final in the 100m free. Again, another even that's final had not taken place as of the writing of this post.
3)The 4x200m, who, with better swims from Johns and Hurd, would have medaled.
4)Despatie and Miranda. The fact that Despatie is such an amazing diver makes him a threat in every event he is in. The fact that his partner always sucks (and his penchant for underperforming at the Olympics) means he usually isn't going to win.

Maybe SI didn't predict medals for the 4x200 or Despatie/Miranda, but I assume they did for Shewfelt and Hayden, and both of them didn't even qualify for their event finals, which skews your question a little bit.
 

Maybe SI didn't predict medals for the 4x200 or Despatie/Miranda, but I assume they did for Shewfelt and Hayden, and both of them didn't even qualify for their event finals, which skews your question a little bit.

Indeed, why just click on the link when you can assume. As it happens, they did not predict medals for Hayden or Shewfelt. Make of that whatever you want, but they didn't apply a Canadian Choke Factor. They figured that there were 3 (or more) other guys more likely to win the event.

I totally take the point that if you add up all the 10, 25, 40% chances we've had for medals so far, you'd think something would have come through. But it hasn't. And that hardly means that the Olympian who had a 40% chance to win a medal failed by not doing so.
 

I don't think its too much to expect that a country of 33 million, and I don't know how many swimming pools, can win a couple of medals in the swimming events. How many medal events are there in swimming by the way, 100? I think with Baumann back, they're working the problem: good. Do they need more funding? yeah they could probably use some more, I'm open to more lottery money flowing that way. What concerns me more than the results is the way that Canadian Olympians appear to train and compete largely in obscurity and when thrust on the big stage once every 4 years, seem to have trouble delivering their best performances. I don't know if thats just my bias (as one of the guys that keep them in obscurity) or a real effect.
 

I totally take the point that if you add up all the 10, 25, 40% chances we've had for medals so far, you'd think something would have come through. But it hasn't. And that hardly means that the Olympian who had a 40% chance to win a medal failed by not doing so.

And I'm saying that Hayden (a defending World Champion from a year ago) should be a medal contender, regardless of what Sports Illustrated said (I will admit earlier laziness in not checking the article).

The same goes for a still fairly young defending Olympic champ in Shewfelt (although injuries could be used to convince me otherwise).

Either way, I think, there are four big-time Canadians here: Van Koerverden, Hayden, Shewfelt and Despatie (I'd include Muenzer but she's 42), and we saw three of them falter in the past couple of days (though it's unfair to blame Despatie for the diving last night; he was regularly at least a full point higher in execution than Miranda), and it's hard to see the guys who are supposed to be carrying the team do that; where will the medals come from if not the big names?

I think Hayden's loss hits hardest because if he had swam like he did in the heats he would have qualified fourth and because he rebounded from his bad race with such a spectacular leg in the 4x200 relay.

The problem of going too fast too soon showed up in today's breaststroke too; if Brown swims what he did in the semis, he wins silver. These swimmers should be having their best performances in the finals, and in some cases, that's just not happening, and that adds to the frustration.

The problem only gets worse every day without a medal, as every day we see people we are told are good chances to win something come up empty, so we start disbelieving that the others we are told have good chances will actually follow through on their potential. it's all well and good to say "Wait for rowing," but the fact is that the rowers choked in Athens, so even that isn't as sure of a thing as everyone wants to make it out to be.

I also think it's tough to hear that we have a World Champ in Hayden and then see the guy not be able to go out and swim in five finals, especially when Phelps is going for 8, Katie Hoff 6, Eamon Sullivan 6, Lazslo Cseh 872, etc. If Hayden is supposed to be at the same level as these guys and supposed to carry this team, then why isn't he able to handle the same work load (the answer is a clear: he's not at that level, but it's hard for the Canadian public to realize that; they hear "2007 gold medallist at the Worlds" and it arouses their medal-boner.
 

I tend to blame the CBC for this - I think that they tell us that people who have no real hope at a medal have a shot at a medal.

As for Shewfelt, the guy broke two knees and was in a wheelchair eleven months ago. You're talking about the elite here and I'd think that something like two broken knees would be enough to let some people slide by him.

(though it's unfair to blame Despatie for the diving last night; he was regularly at least a full point higher in execution than Miranda)

This guy knows too much about diving.

As far as being competitive in the longer term goes, I don't know what to say. Is it possible that we just have too many of our elite athletes slugging it out in the AHL, ECHL and CIS to actually have a hope of doing anything in these events? It'd be interesting to see what proportion of Canada's elite athletes (have fun defining that) are dedicated to being something less than elite in hockey, possibly missing chances at eliteness elsewhere.
 

It'd be interesting to see what proportion of Canada's elite athletes (have fun defining that) are dedicated to being something less than elite in hockey, possibly missing chances at eliteness elsewhere

Can you blame them? A steady paycheque vs living in a van while you scramble for government funds to prepare for a sport no one cares about?
 

Just anecdotal evidence of that: two older brothers (http://www.badminton.ca/page.aspx?id=1907) have made far less $ than their younger bro, who was also a 2-time national jr champion in badminton. No idea who would have been the 'best' had they all played the same sport - but I imagine that Duncan's exposure to the lack of rewards/prestige gained from winning jr nats may have influenced his decision to quit the sport and focus on hockey.
 

The media is to blame for overhyping a lot of athletes. The fact that someone once medalled in a meet does not make them a medal contender. They build up the expectations and then blow the failures out of proportion.

In reality there are always disappointments and always big surprises. So far Hayden not making the final was a big failure and I would say the divers as well as this fencer losing in the first round would be ranked as minor ones. Nestor was playing with a partner who is injured. No way Shewfelt was going to be a medallist - its amazing that he even was able to compete. The truth is also that the heart of the order hasn't come up yet when it comes to the Canadian team.

The swim team's overall performance has actually been quite good. Remember our ski team? A number of years back they were in the same boat as the swimmers. A once proud program that had bottomed out. It takes time and the likes of Wilkinson will likely be on the podium in four years. It takes time.

And it takes money. There is a reason we have become a power in winter sports - we invest in the athletes. If there is funding for swimming and rowing and gymnastics and track and boxing (remember when we used to win multiple medals in boxing?) then we will win medals. If not we will muddle along except for successes for the truly special athletes.

No medals makes me crazy too but they will start coming, there will be a couple from people who we never expected to win as well as the usual suspects. It will be ok. And we will hear all the same shit in four years.
 

I don't see why Shewfelt's knee injuries (which took place a year ago) are giving him such a good excuse. I'm no doctor, but it seems to me that elite athletes recover from these sorts of injuries in this sort of time quite regularly. If Hemsky broke both his kneecaps and wasn't ready for the next season, we'd all be a little suspicious, but Shewfelt gets a free pass? He was sticking (or close to sticking) his landings and finishing all his tricks with plenty of height (not under-rotating or anything), so that indicates to me that his knees weren't an issue.
 

Right, okay your man broke his legs. Both of them.

Broke his legs.

Nobody expected him to even make the Olympics after that. Considering that he just spent a year rehabbing his broken legs when he normally might have been, you know, working on his routine, his technique, regular conditioning, I'm not really sure where you are coming from p-ow?

Four years after his gold medal, a year after he broke both of his legs, nobody predicting a medal for him except pie in the sky CBC guys trying to boost ratings.

Shewfelt is the last guy anybody should be hacking on.
 

My point is that athletes break legs all the time, and they don't take a full year to heal, and that Shewfelt clearly wasn't still suffering from his injury during the Olympics. His first vault proved that. He messed up on his second vault, which is why he didn't make the event final in that one, and his floor routine was just a touch short of what he's capable of and was scored a little poorly (both Shewfelt and his coach are on record as being disappointed in the way it was judged). It's absolutely disappointing that he didn't make the event final in either of those apparati, and I think that it's a cop out to use his legs as an excuse when he wasn't faltering on landings or pulling less difficult tumbling passes or anything. If his legs were affecting him, his difficulty would have been down, and it wasn't.
 

I don't have any idea why I'm feeding the troll that p-ow clearly is, but...

Nobody said Shewfelt hadn't recovered from the broken legs. Point is, competing at an elite level is not something you just roll out of the bed to do. It takes practice. As in loooooooots of it. Particularly for Olympic level gymnastics. Is there anything they do that doesn't involve their legs? Instead of training, Shewfelt was in a wheelchair for quite a while. If you don't think that'll have a negative impact, you have lost complete grasp of reality.

Shewfelt competing at the elite level less than a year after breaking both legs is amazing. There's no chance he was a medal favourite this time around, defending champ or not. To top it off, the Canadian coaches were upset at the judging that kept Shewfelt on the sidelines for the finals. In other words, he performed very well, and likely exceeded expectations. Somehow though, that's not good enough for p-ow. BTW, if that's your idea of supporting Canadian athletes p-ow, I pity your significant other.

Wake up p-ow. As BDHS already pointed out, Shewfelt is the last person anyone should be hacking on. By stubbornly continuing to do so, you've undermined and invalidated everything else you've said. Are you trying to break the medal goose-egg by scoring one in the "Foot-in-mouth" event of the Troll Summer Games? Can't imagine anyone coming close, so you should have a lock on gold (though we haven't heard from f4f in a while). You should be proud. Making f4f look smart is no small accomplishment.
 

How does disagreeing make me a troll?

my points are:

1)Shewfelt is one of the few big name Canadians competing and that his not making an event final (not not medalling, but not even making an event final) is worth being disappointed over. I'm not saying I expected him to medal, just that it's not unreasonable for the Canadian public to do so.

2)His injury shouldn't be used to defend that because it clearly didn't affect him. He stuck his landings and had his typical difficulty and height, the three elements you would imagine would be hampered most by leg injuries (or less training as caused by the injuries). He missed the finals because he did a poor job on his second vault and because he was a little bit sloppy on his floor routine. This isn't a case where the rest of the world surpassed him in his year off; this is a case where he came back, seemed 100 per cent healthy, and just didn't perform his best. He had an off meet, and that is why he's a disappointment. It's great that he came back from such a serious injury and had a couple of good moments (and one great one on his first vault), but it should also be okay to be disappointed that that is the best he could muster.

Anyways, I really didn't want to harp on Shewfelt too much, I just don't think his injuries should be as big of an excuse as some people want to make it, and will continue to believe so until someone shows me proof that they were affecting him. I'm much more disappointed in Hayden's performance in the 100m.
 

Huh? Where did I say disagreeing made you a troll?

Fact is, multiple posters have pointed out the utter lunacy of the notion that Shewfelt wasn't affected by his broken legs...and yet you continue to espouse the theory...without addressing the points raised.

Ergo, troll.

That's how it reads to me at any rate. If you don't want that label, stop acting like one.
 

The argument for the injuries affecting him:

"He broke both his legs a year ago and missed significant training time, of course it affected him!"

The argument against:

"He stuck his landings in the qualifications (including rings), and didn't lose any difficulty on his tricks, so how did it affect him?"

In both cases it's speculation; in my case, at least I have the guy's actual performance to back me up instead of the assumption that an injury that he healed from (the best I can tell from skimming his blog) in March (March 22 he did his first vault) killed his chances. So like I said, I don't believe his knees are the reason he didn't make the final, and it's not like anyone has offered any reason to the contrary other than the fact that it should have because gymnasts need their legs.
 

The fact that someone once medalled in a meet does not make them a medal contender.

A very good point. I mean, even Tampa Bay and Los Angeles won some games last year.

Instead of training, Shewfelt was in a wheelchair for quite a while. If you don't think that'll have a negative impact, you have lost complete grasp of reality.

Exactly. I have a teammate on my coed rec soccer team (as an aside, I got my first win as a keeper tonight, 2-1 -- I let in a Toskala Special, but otherwise it was great) who is training for the 2014 Paralympics. Not 2010, 2014. You need to get in the right shape, learn the technique, improve, compete, lose, learn to deal, improve some more, win some, lose some more, improve some more, suffer a setback, recover again, win some more, lose some more, then you might make it as far as the qualifiers. This shit takes years. And this one lady is far from the only one I know who's trained and competed for this sort of thing. The schedules are insane, and the process of not only healing, but rehabbing and getting back to elite status can take a damned long time. Hell, look at Horcoff: he went out in February even considering he's on an off-season, he's only gotten back to hard training in the last few weeks. And he doesn't use his shoulder the way Shewfelt uses his knees. Plus, there's the mental aspect, which is a whole other kettle of fish, especially with such a devastating injury. Getting back into full mental health is just an arduous process as full physical health: anyone who's ever suffered an injury is going to be a bit hesitant the first time they're asked to do the thing they hurt themselves doing, which can also affect training.

In both cases it's speculation; in my case, at least I have the guy's actual performance to back me up instead of the assumption that an injury that he healed from (the best I can tell from skimming his blog) in March (March 22 he did his first vault) killed his chances.

And yet you said yourself his second one was a disappointment. It cuts both ways. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying it's more complicated than this current argument, and really not worth anyone's time, since none of us has all the facts. (We still have to consider the possibility of poor/corrupt judging, after all.)
 

Dougie, I agree with most of what you say, except for two things:

1) While it does take time, Shewfelt has already taken this. It's not like he had to start from scratch after his injury—this didn't wipe out all the work he'd done over the Quadrennial (or on trips to his first two Olympics). I agree about the mental issues and confidence (and he was quite nervous posting on his blog leading up to it), but physically, he was fine, and declared himself so after the Canadian trials when he won his spot on the team. He then went to upping his difficulty on floor and adding a 6th tumbling pass.

2)The second vault he flubbed he over-rotated on, stepping forward, again not really indicative of a lack of power in the legs. I do agree that to an extent it cuts both ways, but watching him, Shewfelt didn't seem to have any physical problems competing; most of it was mental, and I don't think it's right to chalk all of that up to an injury when it could just as easily been a bad day.
 

Shewfelt didn't seem to have any physical problems competing; most of it was mental, and I don't think it's right to chalk all of that up to an injury when it could just as easily been a bad day.

That's reasonable. Again, I'm not sure we can say from out here what of that was the injury and what of that was the friggin' Olympics -- one of the sports psychologists with Team Canada is also one of my profs, but I doubt he's talking -- but I see what you're saying now.
 

Wow. That's real evidence there p-ow. Shewfelt stuck a landing therefore he's OK.[rolleyes]

Also, you do realize Shewfelt did not compete at the Canadian Trials, right. The Olympics were his first real competition since the injury.

To go back to your Hemsky theory, let's say an injury to both knees kept him out all season, until say game 82 of the season. The Oilers need a win to qualify for the post-season, so obviously their best player is on the roster. In the game Hemsky makes a great play here and there, but in general is not the same.

Do the good plays means he's 100%? Of course not. Do the good plays mean he's completely unaffected by the injury? Of course not.

Remember, this wasn't just broken bones (which according to you are so easy to recover from). There was also ligament damage.

When that happens to a hockey player--to just one knee--they aren't the same upon returning. It takes over a year to get back to where they were.

As for over rotating proving his power was fine. So what? Nobody said he wasn't recovered enough to compete (thanks to all the rehab he went through). About all an over rotation proves is that his timing was off. It's about practice. Practice. Practice. Shewfelt lost a lot of practice to injury rehab. Get it through your head that that affects an elite athlete's prep. Which in turn affects timing and consistency.

I still find it ludicrous to assume that Shewfelt was unaffected simply because he stuck one landing. Shewfelt had less than a year to get used to how his legs would respond. And each week his legs probably improved (probably still happening)...so his timing changed every week. Good luck being consistent (which is what's required for an event final...).

If you're to be disappointed in anything, try these:
- unrealistic expectations you had for Shewfelt (i.e. ignoring the injury, especially the impact on his preparation)

or

- the judges that kept Shewfelt out

Finally, how about this:

>>Canada is sending a full men's gymnastics team — six athletes — to Beijing. Shewfelt is leading the charge. He would have been considered the man to beat if he had not been injured. As it stands, he is considered a long shot to win another gold.<<

Long shots don't automatically qualify for the finals.

There's no reason to be disappointed in Shewfelt's performance. Zip. Zilch. Zero.
 

I have even more respect for Kyle Shewfelt today than I had in 2004. The man made a Herculean attempt.
 

Rod, Shewfelt competed at a bunch of trial meets (not the Canadian Championships that he pulled out of) after Nationals and his performance there allowed him to keep his spot on the national team. These were what I was referring too, not the Nationals.

Your point on his timing changing is well taken, and I'm not going to argue with it other than to point out that it is as much speculation as my side of the argument and that Shewfelt had basically two months from when he declared himself "back" to get his timing down, which is not an unreasonable request.

I'm not basing this on one stuck landing, I'm also basing it on his height and difficulty; if his timing wasn't where it needed to be, then why did he do his hardest vault first? Why did he use his 6th tumbling pass on floor? And let's not forget that he was solid on his floor landings as well, with just a couple of steps, and better than that on high bar and rings.

My expectations were for Shewfelt to make an event final, not necessarily to medal. I just don't feel it unreasonable for the Canadian public to expect one of the few big-name Canadians to medal, nor is it unreasonable to be disappointed when he didn't. Feel-good stories are great, but I'm sure everyone would feel better if he had made the event finals.
 

Ditto on that Bruce. Herculean effort indeed.

As for p-ow, well, of course we'd feel even better had Shewfelt qualified for the final. By that "logic", you'd be "disappointed" to find gas at 75 cents a litre (because gas at 50 cents would "feel even better"). Meanwhile, in the land of reality, I'd be quite happy with 75 cents.

It goes without saying that something better is, uh, better. The delta does not necessarily equate to disappointment. Especially when Herculean efforts are involved.

Disappointment comes in when expectations aren't realized. Which is why I think it's lunacy to be disappointed in Shewfelt's performance. The only way disappointment applies to Shewfelt is if you had completely unrealistic expectations to begin with. That's not his fault. Check the mirror on that one.
 

Can't believe that the first post on this blog I'm driven to comment on is about gymnastics, but anyway...

Another thing about Shewfelt's injury, aside from the stuff rod and doogie have already brought up, (timing and all that) is that he missed a whole year of learning new skills. His first vault, for example, is called the 'Shewfelt.' He was the first guy to ever compete it, so obviously he's elite at pushing the envelope in getting new skills. At this point, though, the Shewfelt isn't near the highest difficulty vault. It's worth 6.6-- guys in the finals will be doing vaults worth 7.2. If Shewfelt hadn't broke both of his damn knees, he might be doing vaults worth that much too.

Same holds true for floor: his routine was relatively difficult before he got hurt, but guys have advanced and he hasn't, so now he is doing a routine that is less difficult relative to the field. And, with the new code of points, that really matters.

So it's not just that he missed lots of practice, like a hockey player who gets hurt. The game actually changed while he was out.

Plus, holy shit, speaking from experience, knee injuries and gymnastics are a pretty shitty combination. The guy is just plain awesome.

Love the blog, by the way: and I'm a Habs fan, so that's saying something.
 

Excellent points Matt D. Thanks for the insight. Not bad for a Habs fan. :-)