Olympics-day 5

The Olympics never cease to amaze me. It can be so dramatic. Yesterday was so amazing, let's recap.
First, the USA team qualified for the final in the men's speed skating short track relay. It's interesting because people are switching in and out of the race so quickly. USA was racing South Korea and two other countries. There was a crash in the middle of the race so the other two countries fell behind. The thing I thought was funny was that the Korean tried to put some speed on in the end of the race. Apolo was content to let them win, save his energy, and finish in second. The finals are on February 26th.

Shani Davis took his second straight gold in men's 1,000 meter speedskating. He is like lightning on ice. It was also cool that he was able to put the South Korean in his place. Another American, Chad Hedrick got bronze. Shani was the first African American to win gold in the winter olympics in 2006. Now he's repeated his gold. Shani is so nice and chill, and was very gracious about winning gold.

One of the biggest stories of the Olympics was Lindsey Vonn. A downhill skiier, she didn't do so well at the Olympics in 2006 so she was back for redemption. But then she got some kind of shin-muscle injury that threated her being able to compete. The weather was bad so she got a few days to rest and recover. An interesting thing about Vonn is that she uses men's skis, they do better on the rough terrain. She's been able to win almost all the World Cup races. Julia Mancuso, another American skiier went earlier and got first with a really fast time but there were a lot of other fast skiiers left to go. Many of them had trouble with the course and crashed a lot. Lindsey started her race and was a little behind Julia's time. But with great skiing she was able to get faster and claim the gold. Lindsay was so excited to win gold, she was yelling and crying because she was so excited. I was really happy for her.

Lindsey Vonn

Lindsey Vonn

Julia Mancuso

Next up was Shaun White and the men's half pipe. I wanted USA to sweep the whole event, it didn't happen but we still did well. After the first round Shaun White was leading, and when he did his second run he already had gold. It was more like a victory lap. Shaun is such a good athlete and he pushes the limits of his sport. He gets more air than anyone else. On his last run Shaun busted out a double McTwist, a trick that no one else can do. He improved his score by like 3 points blowing away all the other competition. I learned that Shaun has a private half pipe that Red Bull built for him and flys him out to in a helicopter to practice tricks. There is a foam pit on the side that he can use to fall when he tries out new tricks. How cool is that? I will try to link a video of his win soon, because it is that awesome. Shaun White got a repeat gold in the half pipe. It made me proud to be an American. Another American, Scotty Lago, claimed bronze. He put up a superb run. I love the snowboard half pipe.

Get ready for day 6 because it was GREAT.