Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics - Final Thoughts

The Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics are now over and the world can go back to normal. It's been a great 2 week run. I followed the Pairs and Women's Figure Skating. I watched as Apollo won medals, but none were gold. I saw a bunch of skiers succeed but more so for not finishing. The 50 Kilometer cross country skiing had killer finishes.

Asian countries seem to dominate the top spots of short track speed skating and figure skating these days. Asian Americans and Asian Canadians have also added to that mix.

I would have rather watched the figure skating gala than the closing ceremonies.

In all, I liked these games and wished it had gone on longer.

2010 Winter Olympics Ladies' Figure Skating

Kim Yu-Na does the expected and crushes the competition by over 20 points. Living up to the hype and the weight of a nation's expectation. It was an pretty impressive showing. Yu-Na has a sensuality to her performances that I am sure she'll build on back in Korea.

Mao Asada may have been considered the best 4 years ago, she's only second best these days. Mao has an quirkiness about her that does go against her in direct comparison to Yu-Na. I expect her to come back and get the gold in 4 years after Yu-Na retires.



Homegurl Mirai Nagasu (home in terms of from Los Angeles) puts on her best show to date and says, watch out for me when I am 20.

I've always enjoyed figure skating as its both athletic and graceful at the same. Like gymnastics on ice.

Due to the current state of figure skating, this year was the best I've seen. The girls are pushing the spins to amazing levels. When are the women going to start doing quads?

2010 Winter Olympics Ladies' Figure Skating - Started

Last night, the 2010 Winter Olympics Ladies' Figure Skating started.

After the short program, 4 Asians are in the top 6. The leader at the moment is Korean superstar Kim Yu-na. Followed by Mao Asada. Miki Ando and Mirai Nagasu hold spots 4 and 6 respectively.

The LA Times article, "Young Asian American skaters dream they can soar" came out this past Sunday. In the article, "Coach Victoria Stratton said those Asian girls who most often excel at the sport are short and slim, and lack hips." Interesting.

In any case. The Asian sistas are laying a beat down on the rest of the group.

After seeing Kim Yu-Na for the first time since the 2009 worlds here in LA, I can't imagine anyone beating her. She really is that good.

In any other year, Mao would be the champ. Especially if you compare it to the 2006 scores. I think the 2002 games were on the previous scoring system that caused a lot of flack for tampering.

Kudos to Shen-Zhao and Pang-Tong

Kudos to the pair of Chinese for Pairs in Figure Skating. Shen and Zhao captured Gold after a rough free skate. Pang and Tong jump 2 spots to earn the highest free skate score of the night for the Silver. This is the first Gold medal for any Chinese pair.

NBC really strung out the showing of the Pairs until almost midnight here in LA. I think they can show the snowboarding stuff after. In any case, they showed most of the pairs after the first US team skated. Which I thought was quite interesting.

Interesting enough, I think all 3 pairs that represented China at Vancouver will be retiring. I wonder how China's going to retool.

It was great fun watching this and I am waiting for Apollo to get his 6th medal and for the Japenese ladies in Women's Figure Skating. Lot's of Olympics left!

Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics - Upcoming

The Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics are mere days away. It is scheduled to run from February 12th to 28th. I've always been a big fan of the Winter Olympics since the 1992 games. The 1992 games featured many Asians in sports. Specifically, figure skating as Kristi Yamaguchi and Midori Ito finished first and second respectively. Chen Lu from China also placed in the top 10. From than, there were no shortage of Asians as part of women's figure skating. It was always nice to see some Asian faces in national television.

For the 2010 games, Asians will most likely dominate the ranks again. Japan and Korea have 5 gals that can all challenge for medals.

Recently, there was an NY Times article about the increase in women figure skaters of Asian decent. The article could have been an reaction to Mirai Nagasu's qualification for the US team.

Short track speed skating also features Apollo Ono and a host of Koreans.

I was inspired to post this when I saw the VISA commercial posted below about the Zhangs at the 2006 games.