Beijing Blahs

I was happy to see American Nathan Chen (below) win the gold medal in men's figure skating at the Beijing Winter Olympics.  I think the Elton John medley he skated to helped him with the judges. 😃 Ditto for Chloe Kim in women's halfpipe snowboarding.  And I just have to give a shout-out to Lindsey Jacobellis, the Dan Jansen of snowboarding, who finally won a gold medal in the women's snowboard cross and followed it up in the mixed-team snowboard event with another gold medal.

But these Winter Games have mostly been a bummer.  Shaun White finished his Olympic career with a disappointing fourth-place showing in the men's halfpipe snowboarding competition. (Even Jackie Joyner-Kersee managed to finish her Olympic career with  a bronze medal.)  Mikaela Shiffrin could do no better than place ninth in the women's Super G ski race.  And reminders of China's repression and zero-COVID policy are everywhere - not just with the absence of fans in the stands but also with a face-covering mandate so strict that people have to mask up outside - and so we get pictures like this! 

That's Mikaela Shiffrin - you only know that because I just told you - checking her Apple tablet while looking like she's about to fly a jet fighter or audition for a role in a Star Wars movie.

Well, maybe she can still win a medal in the downhill. 

Even without COVID, these Winter Games don't feel right.  You sense that even by watching them on TV, the way NBC covers it.  Everything is rigidly controlled by the Chinese, and the vibe among the competitors mostly reflects that.  The good cheer is more fake than the the snow.  And the commentary is more pat than usual.  What would you rather do - listen to Dan Hicks or pull your own teeth? Me, I'd rather pull Dan Hicks' teeth.

The coverage got so pat that, on Friday night, I was watching the mixed-team snowboard cross race . . . and I actually fell asleep. 😮

Enough.  I want my classic Winter Olympics back.  I want the Winter Games held in a small ski town up in the mountains in a remote area.  Preferably in a country whose government doesn't monitor its citizens with their own smartphones. I want the atmosphere to be so cozy that you can imagine the athletes and the fans hanging out together and having cocoa in a homey ski lodge - and you feel like you're there with them.  I want a twelve-day Winter Olympiad, not a sixteen-day one - sixteen-day Winter Olympiads are just an excuse to make more money.  I want fewer athletes - except for the Jamaican bobsled team, no more athletes from tropical climates! I want Mike Tirico to host the Winter Games from a studio with a fireplace - a real fireplace, not a fake one like the one Stephen Colbert sat in while a "fire" was going!  And unless climate change is really bad, I want . . . real snow!

In 2026, when the pandemic should be over, the Winter Olympics will be held in Italy - the outdoor events in Cortina d'Ampezzo and the indoor skating events in  Milan.   There won't be any restrictions, but the grandiosity of holding the Winter Games in two separate places a hundred miles apart doesn't give me much hope.  It may be too late for 2026 to have a classic Winter Olympiad.  But then, there's always 2030 . . .