Olympic Gold!

One of the last events at the Olympic Winter Games is the men's hockey finals. The year the teams contending for gold in Sochi, Russia were the Swedes and Canadians.

Both teams had gone undefeated in the round robin part of the tournament. They were both considered very strong; the Canadians having let in the fewest goals in their games (only three in six games) and the Swedes with their standout netminder Henrik Lundqvist.

The game started 7:00 a.m. Sunday (local time). Of course I wanted to watch, but as most of you probably know, I'm not a morning person. I thought I would try staying up all night so I wouldn't have to wake up. But, by 3:00 a.m., I fell asleep.

I did wake up in time hear on the radio we were up 2-0. By the time I actually got up I was able to watch the last half of the third period. We were up 3-0 at that point (which happened to be the final score).

The Canadians were relentless on the forecheck constantly harassing the Swedish players whenever they had the puck. We totally smothered them.

Shifts were as short as 30 seconds with players hustling from the time their skates hit the ice 'til the time they left it. Superstar NHL players left their egos at the door and bought into the team concept willingly accepting reduced rolls and reduced ice time. It worked to a T.

The game finished at about the same time I had to head down to church. I could hear cars honking their horns and people cheering on the street below as I got ready to go.

Unlike four years ago when the Olympics were held in Vancouver, there weren't any street celebrations at Yonge and Eglinton after the Canadian men's team beat the Americans for gold. The main reason probably was because that game was broadcast in the evening while this one finished at 10:30 a.m.

Normally when I take the TTC to church I take the subway down Yonge and up the University line to St. Patrick station and walk from there. But, this time I had to get off at Dundas because they were doing work between Union Station and St. Andrew.

When I got off there was a huge street celebration as I sort of expected there would be. Police closed the road off to all traffic for a short time so revellers could enjoy themselves. It was a sea of red and white. Beautiful.

I managed to snap a few pictures before I had to run off to church. I wished I had a bit more time. Perhaps in four years I'll get another chance.

Good Start, Canada!

Not my images.

The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia started recently. The opening ceremonies were held on Friday, February 7th.

But, before that, some events had already started. One, Snowboarding Men's Slopestyle, involved a number of highly touted Canadians - Mark McMorris, Maxence Parrot and Sebastien Toutant.

This event involves snowboarding down a course with various obstacles like rails and long barrels and doing tricks on/over them. As well there are three large jumps that the participants do flips and twists over.

Like in gymnastics or figure skating, competitors are then given marks on their technical proficiency and level of difficulty.

In the preliminary rounds Max Parrot and Sebastien Toutant advanced directly into the finals. Favorite Mark McMorris, who was nursing broken ribs, had to go through a secondary round because his scores weren't high enough.

I watched the second round live Friday night/Saturday morning (at around 3:00 a.m. Toronto time). It was pretty tense. McMorris scored well enough to squeak into the finals joining Parrot and Toutant.

The finals were held later that morning. I turned on the TV in time to watch Toutant and Parrot snowboard. Mark McMorris had already finished his run by that time though. He was holding on to second at the time with, perhaps, 7 or 8 competitors to go.

Sebastien Toutant was the next Canadian in line. His performance didn't quite make the cut unfortunately, eventually finishing in 9th.

Maxence Parrot was the last snowboarder down the course. I have to say I thought he pulled off quite a good run. The judges didn't quite see it that way and awarded him a 5th place ranking.

McMorris, by this time, had dropped down to the bronze medal spot having been knocked down by Norwegian, Staale Sandbech, who took silver. American, Sage Kotsenburg, won gold.

Considering his injury it was a great result for McMorris and a good start for Canada in our Olympic medal quest.

Later in the day it was the Dufour-Lapointe sisters, Maxime, Chloé and Justine, competing in the Women's Moguls.

I have to say I didn't get to see it on television. I only heard about the results afterwards. But, what incredible results they were. Little sis, Justine, 19, won gold; middle sister, Chloé, 22, took silver; and big sister, Maxime, 25, placed a respectable 12th. As well, Audrey Robichaud, came 10th to round out the standings for the Canadian contingent.

A great first day for our country if I don't say so myself. Go, Canada, go!

Icing on the Cake

The 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada just finished today. I have to say I throughly enjoyed the two week affair. There were highs such as Canada's record setting 14 gold medals (a Winter games record) and lows such as the tragic death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili.

There were also tales of unimaginable courage from Slovenian cross-country skier Petra Majdic who skied to a bronze medal in the women's sprint classic despite breaking five ribs and suffering a collapsed lung in a warm-up accident; and Canadian women's figure skater Joannie Rochette who went on to win a bronze medal after losing her mother to a heart attack just days before she was to compete. They embody the true strength and spirit of these world class athletes.

If you were a Canadian hockey fan the games ended truly on the highest of high notes. With the weight of a nation resting on it's rugged shoulders the men's hockey team took to the ice and won gold in a nail biter over the young, aggressive Americans, 3-2 in overtime. Led by the stellar net minding of goaltender Ryan Miller the U.S team almost pulled off the upset of decade. After going down 2-0 the Americans tied the game in the dying seconds of the third period. If not for the heroics of Sid, the Kid, Crosby, Canadians could have ended up crying in their beer instead of celebrating in the streets. It definitely was the icing on the cake to these amazing games that all Canadians had been yearning for.

A salute to all the athletes for a wonderful Winter Olympics. See you in Sochi, Russia in 2014!

To see a slideshow of all my photos on Flickr.com click here. Click on the photo for the captions.

Olympic Gold on Home Soil

Congratulations to Alexandre Bilodeau, the first Canadian to win gold at the Olympics on home soil for Canada! He just won the men's freestyle moguls a few minutes ago. After a drought of 34 years, after Canada hosted it's first Summer Olympics in Montreal in 1976, through 1988 when Calgary hosted Canada's first Winter Olympics, we're finally on the top of the podium at home. Embarrassingly, we were the only host country to never have done that before. What a proud moment for Canadians. And what a relief.

Photo by Adrian Dennis