Miller Time

Johnny Spillane became the first American to win a medal in the Nordic combined ski jumping and cross country event at the winter Olympics, earning the silver medal and just barely losing the gold to Jason Lamy Chappuis of France by four-tenths of a second. Meanwhile, a Canadian finally won an Olympic gold medal, winter or summer, at an Olympiad held in Canada by winning the gold medal in men's freestyle moguls - Alexandre Bilodeau, of Quebec, won that event yesterday.

But the big news is - Bode Miller finally won another Olympic medal!

Everyone's favorite sot from the 2006 Winter Games, who had won two silver medals in Salt Lake City in 2002 but got wasted in Torino and went home empty-handed, won the bronze medal in the men's downhill skiing race, missing out on a higher podium position by less than a second. (Didier Defago of Switzerland took the gold medal and Aksel Svindal of Norway took the silver. Mller's was just .09 seconds behind Defago and .02 seconds behind Svindal.) Miller credits his unlikely comeback - more incredulous due to the abysmal season he had last year - to a more serious attitude and a simple desire to race. The fact that he became a father two years ago might have also taught him some responsibility.

I don't know how many other races Miller is entered in, but it looks like he's on his way to fulfilling his Olympic promise of four years earlier. It's nicer to know that he's back, but, dude, what's that going to do to my Vancouver coverage? I'll have to look elsewhere for satire!

I've been going over my commentary on Torino from four years ago, by the way, and I think I peaked in terms of Winter Olympics ridicule. And apparently, Miller was a primary source for a good deal of that ridicule. :-O