The Pan Pacific championships had only been held in the United States one other time since they started in 1985 (they were in Atlanta, GA in 1995). Swimming is one of my favorite Summer Olympic sports, so when I saw that the championships were going to be a few miles away (and practically on my way home from work), I had to go. I wanted to make sure I saw Ryan Lochte and Michael Phelps (my two favorite American swimmers). They both competed the first night and Michael Phelps was swimming the 200m fly – the stroke I most wanted to watch live. I used to swim a lot and though I was pretty good at butterfly, it’s definitely my least favorite. Butterfly is definitely the most impressive to watch on TV and live, though.

Not surprisingly, Phelps won the 200m fly. Though he won with the fastest time this year, he was clearly disappointed and ready to put this race behind him and concentrate on doing it better next time. In his post-win interview, he said he was far from the shape he wants to be in going into the Olympics in 2012. He may not have beaten his world record, but Phelps looked pretty good from where I was sitting. Ryan Lochte won the 200m free, which was also great to see live. Not surprisingly, he was much more pleased with his performance than Phelps. Lochte’s teammate Peter Vanderkaay came in third Aaron Peirsol, who was only in the A final of the 50m back because Lochte dropped out (he decided to only compete in one event per day) won the race. He thanked Lochte from dropping out of the race in his post-win interview.

Allison Schmitt won the women’s 200m freestyle, followed by Morgan Scroggy as the US women finished 1-2 in that event. Teresa Crippen and Kathleen Hersey finished 2-3 in the 200m fly, Christine Magnuson won bronze in the 50m butterfly, and Natalie Coughlin won bronze in the 100m backstroke. The United States definitely had a great start in the swimming championships.

The Australians also did very well, starting off the night with two swimmers (only one of whom was in the A finals heat) tying for the Pan Pacific Championship record in the 50m fly. Marieke Guehrer won gold alone, since her teammate Yolane Kukla who set the Pan Pacific Championship record in the first race of the night was in the consolation final.

Needless to say, NBC didn’t show the event live, but they were there tonight and will air highlights of the championships Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon (Pacific time). It’s really great that NBC will be televising the championships in HD, though. I look forward to seeing the races I watched (and the rest of the championships) from another angle.

I really enjoyed my first big swimming event. Until tonight, I don’t think I’d attended a swimming meet where I didn’t compete. It was very exciting to see world championship swimming so close to home. I never would have expected to see swimming championships in Orange County. Those of us in southern California are very lucky. We’ve had one of the mildest summers I can remember as the rest of the country has been facing record highs and we get to watch the Pan Pacific Swimming Championships live. What more could an Olympic-obsessed hockey fan trying to fill the time before the NHL season starts up again want? Training camps start in just a little under a month, so it won’t be long before the NHL is back. It was nice to have the swimming championships as a distraction until the NHL returns.

Watching the Olympics made me think some more about all the improvements technology has given sports. Clearly, there were the down sides of technology being used in sports (remember that horrible blue glowing puck that turned into a red streak if there was a slap shot?), but for the most part I appreciate what they’re able to do to make the viewer’s experience more enjoyable.

I’ve talked to people who don’t like the yellow line signifying the first down in football or the line indicating the line of scrimmage, but I think these are wonderful and make it so much easier to tell whether the player got the first down or not. The markers on the sidelines can’t be seen from many camera angles, but the lines are very clear and can be seen any time a player is near the line of scrimmage or first down. What’s not to like?

In the Olympics, there have been many advances. The flags in the pool and track & field lanes showed up in the last Summer Olympics (or perhaps in Sydney). It’s so nice to see at the start of each race which lanes are occupied by swimmers/runners/rowers of each country and to see which country is ahead every time they reach a turn in the pool. Of course, seeing the flags as each swimmer or boat end the race with the 1, 2, & 3 by them popping up as they finish is very nice. You immediately know who got the gold, silver, and bronze medals in the race without having to wait for the results to show up in the complete list.

This year’s addition of the world record time line in swimming was greatly appreciated. Each time Michael Phelps and the many others broke world records, you could see how much they were ahead of the line. It made the races more exciting, since it was often clear who was going to win. Not all of the races were as close as the 4×100 relay when Lezak had his amazing finish or the 400m butterfly race where it looked like Phelps might not get the 8 for 8 gold medals he aimed to attain. The ones that weren’t were made more interesting by seeing the world record pace line chasing the swimmers (or the swimmers chasing it).

I do wonder why a world record line could not be used for the track world records. I’d love to see that line going around the track as the races are going on. I realize that initially the lanes are staggered, but I’d think that they could do a diagonal line or just do a straight line that approximates where the world record would be (have it in line with the time for the middle lane, perhaps). Hopefully, this will be something they add in the London Summer Olympics of 2012.

They described Michael Phelps as the greatest American individual athlete of these games. Really? Is that all they want to call him? Michael Phelps is only 23 and has 14 gold medals – more than any other Olympic athlete of all time. He got 8 gold medals this Olympic games (again, more than any other Olympic athlete of all time, we all know Mark Spitz had won 7 gold medals). Seven of these gold medals were obtained with new world records, one with a new Olympic record.

Rowdy Gaines (Olympic swimmer, medalist, & commentator) agrees with me that the case is already closed about Phelps being the greatest Olympic athlete ever. I’m glad I’m not the only one. Considering what he’s already accomplished, how can anyone think otherwise? He’s only 23 and he’s already got 16 Olympic medals. The only person in the history of the Olympics who has more is Larissa Latynina of Russia, who has 18 medals. Phelps will almost definitely surpass that number in London. Then will people like Bob Costas think the case is closed? I hope so.

NBC has done a horrible job choosing what to show during the entire Olympics this time around. I can’t remember worse coverage. They did something similar to what they did last year with the gold medal women’s beach volleyball match. I can’t remember how much of the match they cut out last year, but I think it was the entire first set. That entire match was not available anywhere.

This year, they cut out the entire first set of the gold medal match of the men’s indoor volleyball. They also cut out more than half of the second set and clearly it was good, since the score was close when they decided to show us the rest. They also cut out half of the 3rd set! I can’t believe they did this to the gold medal match. I KNEW as soon as they started showing the entire 4th set that the US had won the gold medal and that they won the match 3-1. NBC was finally showing us a complete set, clearly it was the last one or they wouldn’t have bothered. On the bright side, it was great to see the US win gold! Everyone was clearly so thrilled to win the gold.

What bothers me about the coverage is not that they didn’t show the entire gold medal match in the prime time coverage. I don’t think that’s necessary. Highlights of the game are more than enough for most people watching the closing ceremonies, most likely. However, I think it’s horrible that someone like me who was recording on every channel (except the Olympics Basketball channel, I don’t like basketball) during the Olympics and loves volleyball could not watch the entire match. They should have aired the entire match live or sometime during the day or in the middle of the night for those of us who wanted to see it and then aired the edited version in prime time. I would have been totally fine with fast forwarding to the replay of the end (I would have watched that again) when I got to the prime time coverage, since I’d already seen the entire match. That would be perfectly acceptable. The fact that I could see the entire bronze medal match (and did – it was a great match) and not see the entire gold medal game (which was for the gold and had the US team taking part) makes no sense at all. It’s what NBC chose to do last year with beach volleyball, so clearly they think it’s a good idea. I hope they don’t do anything like that when the games are in London, but I’m sure they will. At least I’ll be at those games, so I’ll already know the scores before I watch the games I missed when I get home and I’m sure it won’t bother me as much.

Overall, I was very disappointed with the coverage of the 2008 Summer Olympics by NBC. I hope they realize some of what they did wrong and try to correct it for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver in 2010.

As unimpressed as I’ve been with the reporters at the events in general (swimming & gymnastics, especially), I have really enjoyed the interviews in the studio with the athletes. I definitely have to give NBC some credit for doing a lot of those this Olympics. I really think it’s cool that they interviewed Arron Piersol, Brendan Hansen, & Jason Lezak without Michael Phelps and giving them a bit of the attention they deserve. Don’t get me wrong, I think Michael Phelps is probably the most amazing Olympian of all time and probably always will be, since he’s still very young. However, the other guys on that relay (especially Lezak, who did an amazing job in the freestyle relay) did a lot and deserve some credit. Without them (and Phelps’ other relay teammates), Phelps couldn’t have broken the record of 7 gold medals in one Olympics.

I was glad to see that the Chinese women got the bronze medal as well as the silver in beach volleyball. Of course, the match happened before the gold medal match last night, but I didn’t find out until after I got home and was able to watch Very cool for them to get their first two medals in beach volleyball when the Olympics are at home. It was the first time since beach volleyball was introduced to the Olympics that Brazil didn’t get a medal – they must be pretty devastated.

Kerri Walsh & Misty May-Treanor were the only Americans I’d noticed who actually sang the National Anthem until the women’s soccer team later in the day. It was great to see them win the gold medal again (in an exciting game that went into extra time, since it was scoreless at the end of regulation).

I can’t believe Japan won gold in softball. I guess that’s what can happen when you go into a game with everyone wondering if the other team will even score, rather than fighting to win. The US women must be crushed… Most of the games the US women played started out with the commentators wondering if the other team would get a hit, not if the other team would win. I didn’t watch the game, since I don’t find it very interesting when a team dominates a sport so much. I stopped paying attention to the US softball team years ago.

As a big volleyball fan, I can’t wait to see the US women’s volleyball team playing for the gold (after sweeping the match against Cuba). They’ll play Brazil in the finals. Brazil hasn’t lost a single set so far in the 2008 Olympics. Hopefully, the US will break that streak.

Until Wang Chen of the US beat South Korea’s Kim Kyung-ah to advance to the quarterfinals, the US had never had an Olympian get that far. Wang, born in China, had a lot of friends at the match and dropped to her knees crying when she won. It was an amazing match and is the first time anyone from the US has made it to the quarterfinals and Gao Jun of the US was eliminated just barely, losing 4-3 to Wu Xue of the Dominican Republic.

I hate that they cut the beginning of the men’s quarterfinal match (22-21 USA when they started airing it). So sad! I love volleyball and clearly the game was good – a game can’t be that close without being pretty exciting. The commentator even mentioned it. They did win the first set 25-22. They turned around the second set (losing 16-13) to win 25-21. They dropped the third set 25-27 and the fourth set 22-25, but came back to win the 5th set 15-13. I can’t wait for the gold medal match! In the next quarterfinal match, the commentators were saying they think the US will be the team to beat in the gold medal match, no matter who moves on. I hope they’re right. No matter what, it should be a great match and it’s their first appearance in the finals since 1988.

I don’t remember ever seeing a jump-off for gold and bronze in the equestrian individual jumping event. Both the US competitors jumped part of the decoration and Beezie Madden successfully completed the course and beat the time set by the German rider who started the jump-off for bronze.

I thought they might cut out a lot of the gymnastics gala, since they only showed parts of it Wednesday night, but fortunately, they showed it on Oxygen in Thursday night’s coverage. As a former gymnast and lover of the sport, I like seeing the gymnasts just let go and have fun doing the sport they love at the end of the competition and I’m glad NBC didn’t decide to cut this as they did so much of the gymnastics throughout the Olympics. I’m sure they didn’t show us everything, since they’ve been cutting a lot all along, but they did show a lot of great performances at the gala.

The interviews with all the gymnasts were great, too. I think Shawn Johnson and Nastia Liukin are great, but my favorite gymnast on the women’s team was Alicia Sacramone. It’s sad that she still totally blames herself for the team getting silver instead of the gold. There was quite a bit of a difference in the scores. I really don’t think she should blame herself, though I’m sure as the leader of the team she feels responsible. A lot of the blame has to be placed on the judging. There’s no way around that. It’s so funny how a female gymnast at 21 is already getting old for the sport and thinking she probably won’t be able to compete in the next Olympics. Very sad, since Alicia is my favorite from the team, but it’s what I expected.

Go USA!

Last night’s Olympics coverage had some of the most shocking footage (to me) so far in the Olympics. Although perhaps they should have given Haley Ishimatsu (the 15-year-old diver who just missed qualifying for the platform diving, coming in 14th when the top 12 advanced) a bit more time before her interview, I understand wanting to talk to her before she left for the night. Surprisingly, the reporter asking Haley how it felt to be so close to qualifying and not make it seemed touched moved by Haley’s tears and tried to comfort her. I was shocked. It was nice to see a reporter for NBC seem to care about the feelings of one of the athletes at the Olympics. Normally, it seems like they’re cold-hearted and actually enjoy asking questions like “So, you just missed getting the gold by 1/1000 of a second – how do you feel?” and concentrating on the negative side, rather than saying something like “You just won the silver medal, beating out tons of other athletes – how do you feel?” I appreciate the fact that one of the reporters actually came across as caring about an athlete. I’m sure it won’t last, but it was a nice touch.

The men’s volleyball match against Italy yesterday was definitely exciting. I know that the USA wasn’t expected to win and it was a huge upset, but clearly I was rooting for the USA and was going nuts watching them. I’d be rooting for them anyway, but with UCI’s men’s volleyball coach (John Speraw) there as an assistant coach to the team, I really want them to do well! I’m excited that the men’s volleyball team moved on to the medal round and I hope to see them play for the gold. Go USA!

Of course, watching the women’s beach volleyball finals wasn’t too surprising. I figured Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor would win the gold and be the first team to win back-to-back gold medals in the Olympics (teams often aren’t even the same from Olympics to Olympics, it seems). I’m so happy that they were able to achieve their dream and move on with their lives now, though I’ll miss them in London if they’re too busy with their families to participate. They’re a lot of fun to watch on the AVP tour and in the Olympics. I did think that the Chinese team might win one of the sets against May-Treanor and Walsh. They are a very good team. It’s amazing to me that May-Treanor and Walsh were able to get through two entire Olympics without losing a single set. They did face set points against other teams, but they never actually lost a single set to another team in the Olympics. That’s amazing.

Usain Bolt broke the 200m world record Michael Johnson set in the Atlanta Summer Olympics in 1996. Many felt that Johnson’s record was untouchable, but Bolt proved them wrong. Even people who aren’t interested in track & field seem interested in world records being broken.

Those who were talking about all the excitement being over when Michael Phelps was done swimming and the gymnastics had ended are really missing out on the volleyball, beach volleyball, diving, track & field and many other sports that are still going on (it’d take too long to list them all). I can understand the people who are sick of hearing about the “Redeem Team” and not being interested in basketball (I feel the same), but there are tons of other sports to watch – even BMX racing, which can be kind of fun to watch. The gymnastics showcase pieces are enjoyable, too. It’s good to see the athletes relax after winning their medals and have fun out there. I realize I’m not biased, since I’m clearly addicted to the Olympics, but a lot of world records have been broken in Beijing and many are starting to argue what I believe (that Michael Phelps is the greatest Olympian of all time – he’s only 23 and he’s already surpassed the lifelong totals of everyone who’s ever participated in the Olympic games – imagine what he can do since he’s not done in the Olympics yet). How can one not be interested in the Olympics with so much happening?

Go USA!

The final night of gymnastics event finals was certainly exciting. It was great to see Shawn Johnson finally get a gold medal and having Shawn and Nastia finish 1-2 in the opposite order was nice. It’s actually what I expected on floor the night before and I was so happy to see the scores. When Cheng Fei’s score of 15.950 was displayed for balance beam when she had almost fallen off, I was very worried that the judges were determined to score another gymnastics event horribly and I would be disappointed by the end results. However, I ended up happy with the results for the first two spots. The fact that Cheng Fei got the bronze medal is horrible for Anna Pavlova of Russia. Pavlova came in 4th place with 15.900 and I don’t think I’m alone in believing that she deserved the bronze medal. Russia finished the 2008 Olympics without a single medal in gymnastics. I doubt anyone would have predicted that before the competition began.

Jonathan Horton’s performance on high bar was amazing and I was surprised that the crowd actually booed when his score of 16.175 (putting him in 2nd place) behind Zou Kai of China’s 16.2. It seems a lot of people there agreed with me and thought Horton should have gotten a higher score on execution. I think the execution score of 9.275 was a bit low, even though it was higher than Zou’s execution. What is it about high bar judging? The 2004 Summer Olympics’ high bar scores are what caused the uproar that led to the scoring system change. Remember when Alexei Nemov had to try to calm the crowd down after his horrible score before Paul Hamm competed? The great part of this year’s high bar competition is that Horton was clearly thrilled to get an individual medal and he knew that he did a great job on his routine and couldn’t have done much better. It’s always good to see Olympians truly enjoying the moment and last night was a great night for the US gymnastics team.

The China vs. China women’s beach volleyball match early yesterday morning was amazing. The one team goes on to play Misty May-Treanor & Kerri Walsh in the finals, the other plays for the bronze. I’d be surprised if the Chinese teams don’t get two of the three medals in beach volleyball. I’m guessing silver and bronze, since I can’t see May-Treanor & Walsh losing their first match in about a year in the gold medal match. Both medal matches should be very exciting.

The USA women’s volleyball team upset Italy in a great match yesterday to advance to the semifinals. They definitely seemed like they didn’t have what it takes to beat Italy for a while, but came back to win the last two sets decisively (25-18 & 15-6) and advance. Hopefully, they’ll have what it takes to make it to the gold medal finals. Clearly, I wish all the US teams well, but I’m particularly interested in the men’s volleyball team, since one of the assistant coaches (John Speraw) is UCI’s men’s volleyball head coach and I go to as many of UCI’s matches as I can. After the tragedy the USA men’s volleyball head coach had to endure, it would be really nice to see a bit of an up side for him and for the men’s team to win gold. They’ve been looking very good so far.

I don’t know of anyone who watched Lolo Jones in the 100m hurdles who didn’t want to cry when they watched her hit the 9th hurdle. She was pretty far ahead of the pack and doing so well. Then, all of a sudden, she clipped the 9th hurdle and dropped behind to finish next to last. The fact that she was still able to pull herself together enough to finish the race (and not even come in last) is amazing to me. My heart went out to her (and her family) as they cried when her dreams of a gold medal were destroyed. Lolo’s 26 years old, so perhaps she can try again in the London Olympics in 2012, but it’s so sad to see someone doing that well and being completely at the top of her game and then faltering.

I just bought a copy of last week’s Sports Illustrated with Michael Phelps on the cover swimming. I haven’t read it all yet, but I did flip through and it’s almost all Olympics coverage. If you love the Olympics you should definitely pick up a copy while they’re still available. The Sports Illustrated where Phelps recreated the Mark Spitz cover (for more information, click here, supposedly hit news stands today, but my local book store gets the new issues on Friday, so I can’t comment on that issue yet. I’m sure it’s mostly Olympics coverage, too.

Go USA!

The announcers and extra “junk” seem to get worse every year on NBC. Last year, that horrible blonde reporter was rude to Michael Phelps right after he had his first finish that was not a gold medal. They consistently asked questions to the gymnasts that were equally rude. This year, they asked about how difficult it was to compete after his teemates had totally messed up (I can’t remember her exact words) when the gymnasts in question were well within earshot and even on camera at the time. I see no need for this. How many gold medals (or Olympic medals of any kind) do these reporters have? Why can’t they concentrate on the positive side?

Everyone was nice to Michael Phelps this year, but not every athlete can get a gold in every event they do. Michael Phelps is the first Olympian in the history of the Olympics to win 8 golds in one Olympic year and is the most decorated Olympian at age 23. One can’t expect that of anyone else. It’s hard to say if this accomplishment will ever be matched. I think the reporters should be polite to all the Olympians. These athletes aren’t being paid for what they’re doing and many of the athletes are not professional athletes. If a reporter wants to be rude to a star of the NHL, NBA, MLB, NFL, etc. I still think it’s wrong. However, those guys are getting paid a lot of money and can put up with a little rudeness from reporters from time to time when they mess up. A lot of the Olympians are kids. Michael Phelps was only 19 last year. The reporters should have been kind to him.

Just another way that NBC has completely disappointed me in their coverage of the 2008 Summer Olympics. They seem to have more talking and less sports coverage per hour than they did in previous years. Even more upsetting, I found out from my best friend (who lives on the east coast) that the coverage there has not been going over the scheduled time as much as the coverage on the west coast. This probably means we are getting more commercials, since I can’t imagine them adding content.

I think it’s horrible that we don’t get the “prime time” (I use this term loosely, I do not consider coverage that ends at 1:30 a.m. prime time) coverage live, especially since many of the nights are scheduled to end at 12:30 or 1:00 a.m. and most nights have gone over this time slot by at least 20 minutes. At least one night went more than a half hour over the projected 1:00 a.m. end time. Since they’re time delaying the coverage on the west coast by 3 hours, they have plenty of time to cut out things like the gymnasts waiting (and waiting) for scores. While this coverage makes sense for the east coast, who is getting to see the sport live, it’s unnecessary when you’re getting a feed that is delayed by 3 hours and 3 hours is plenty of time to edit out enough to end the show on time on the west coast. Instead, NBC adds commercials and makes sure that those on the west coast are more sleep deprived than those on the east coast if they get caught up in the competition and can’t go to bed without knowing who won the gymnastics competition.

I would like to see an improvement in this area in future Olympic games.

NBC has made a big deal of talking about how the coverage of the Beijing Olympics is better than any other. They have over 3600 hours of coverage, but a lot of that coverage is online and since nothing is airing live in the west coast and I am recording more Olympics coverage than one can typically watch in a day, I have not been able to see if what I would like to see is online. I’ll check it out after I’ve finished watching the games, but a couple of my friends who have looked for what I would like to see haven’t been able to find it, so I don’t think NBC is providing the coverage I’d like.

I’m obsessed with the Olympics (to put it mildly). I record as much coverage as my one HD DVR will allow (and a lot of it has to be in standard definition due to the lack of space). Fortunatley, I’ll be back to DirecTV in time for the next Olympics in 2010 and will have two DVRs, enabling me to record more coverage. The Olympics will probably take me longer than 3 weeks to watch again that year – unless the coverage gets worse again.

This year’s coverage is the worst I can remember – even worse (in many respects) than the coverage CBS provided the one year they had the Olympics.

NBC has cameras recording everything at the Olympic games in Beijing, but I couldn’t even see all of the United States men compete in the qualifying competition for gymnastics. If the gymnast wasn’t from China, Japan, or the US, odds are we didn’t see them at all on the first night. In women’s gymnastics, the odd Romanian or German gymnast was shown, but basically the coverage the first night consisted of the American and Chinese women. Although I know they’re not the best, Australia has some really graceful women that I love watching on balance beam and other events. Why didn’t we see any of those?

I think any team making it to the team finals should have a couple gymnasts shown on every event. I think any gymnast making it to the all around competition should be shown on every event (including both vaults) and that every gymnnast not in that group making an event final should be shown competing on the apparatus they will be competing on event finals. I realize most of the US is not interested in all of this coverage, but many of my friends want to see it, so I don’t think it’s that unusual. I know that it doesn’t make sense to put this all on prime time, but why can’t it be available on a clean site (without results, so it’d be safe to look at even if one is a couple days behind, since they’re recording too much coverage) online, so I could watch it. Even if it takes a couple days to get everything online, I would like to see the rest of the competition.

Diving is another sport where they pick and choose what we are allowed to see. We often miss the first few dives and don’t see most competitors. I would like to see more diving available.

For swimming, running, etc. they can’t eliminate the countries that aren’t doing as well, since they compete against Americans and the best countries (if not America for that sport). Other events of track and field which just started are clearly going to be shown in much the same way as gymnastics and diving. We’ll be shown what NBC would like to show us and if we want to see a performer from another country, forget it.

There is a lot more beach volleyball, volleyball, handball, soccer, basketball, and many other team sports this year. NBC even has complete HD channels dedicated to soccer and basketball. Perhaps the answer is a channel dedicated to gymnastics & diving and another dedicated to track & field.