olympic lies

firstly, i dont know why i didnt write anything during the recent winter olympics. i watched more olympic action this year than in years past and really enjoyed all of it. thank you to canada for putting on a great games.

the one thing i wanted to comment on is directed at the post games analysis and commentary. heres the general theme - "the united states performed extremely well in the vancouver games hauling in the most medals with a total of 37. yeah, but, the united states has basically invented some olympic sports simply so they can win more medals."

so i had to look into the legitmacy of what will be named for the remainder of this posting as The Theory.

the three events that always seem to get mentioned during these statements are the snowboarding halfpipe, snowboard cross and skier cross.

snowboard halfpipe






ive listed the top 5 countries based on their average finish. however in regards to the number of competitors, on the mens side there were 6 countries that placed 4 snowboarders in the top 40 finishers. on the womens side the usa placed 4 snowboarders in the top 40 finishers but there were 5 other countries with 3 snowboarders in the top 40.

final tally, the rest of the world is equal to the usa for the number of competitive snowboarders and the usa placed 2nd (men) and 3rd (women) for average finish.

so for the halfpipe, The Theory is busted.

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snowboard cross







again the top 5 countries are listed based on the average finish of their athletes. for the men, 4 countries had 4 snowboarders finish in the top 40. for the women, 3 countries had 3+ snowboarders finish in the top 40.

final tally, again the rest of the world has an equal number of snowboarders competing in snowboard cross. the usa placed 3rd (men) and 6th (women) for average finish of their snowboarders.

so for snowboard cross, The Theory is busted.

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skier cross






on the mens side there were 4 countries with 4 skiers finishing in the top 40. on the womens side there were 3 countries with 4 skiers finishing in the top 40. notably, the usa had Zero top 40 finshers on the womens side and the top finisher for the usa men was 23rd.

final tally, the rest of the world exceeds the usa for the number of top 40 athletes. the usa finished 13th (men) and Did Not Qualify (women) in regards to average finish of their skiers.

so for skier cross, The Theory is busted.


lets do a quick comparison. curling always catches everyones eye when the winter olympics comes around every four years before dropping off the collective radar again. this year canada took the gold medal for both mens and womens curling with records of 9-0 and 8-1 respectively. so who is inventing sports for their countries benefit?

so dont perpetuate The Theory and tell those spouting it that they are just plain WRONG!