Summer Olympics XXIX: Beijing 1

I LOVE THE OLYMPICS. Summer, winter, it doesn't matter. I love the Olympic games. All the events, the medal ceremonies, the pomp, the grandeur of it all. It is pretty much the epitome of sports, and in many ways the pinnacle of humanity. Sort of like World Cup Soccer, only better.



It doesn't hurt to be American either. Being a world sports powerhouse, it gives you plenty for which to cheer.



Yesterday I heard the story of Lin Hao and nearly cried. All hail the Chinese for brilliantly placing the 9-year-old life boy next to the 7-foot 6-inch basketball hero Yao Ming during the opening ceremoies (which I missed). Yao might be the biggest celebrity in China, but even he should be humbled by the hero of the Sichuan earthquake. (When asked why he went into the rubble of his collapsed school twice to pull out classmates (2/3 of whom died in the quake), Hao said, "I was the hall monitor, it was my job to look after my school mates..." Kid's got more courage in his little finger than most people have in their whole body. The contrast between sports celeb and life hero was staggering.



Then there's American swimmer Dara Torres, at 41 she's still winning Olympic medals and so concerned about the issue of a drug scandal she's volunteering for extra testing and requested that samples of her blood be frozen so future tests might be run as the technoogy becomes available. 41? Are you kidding me?!



Or how about the 33-year-old German female gymnast Oksana Chusovitina. I say German, she won a gold medal for the Unified team in, get this, 1992! Later she competed for Uzbekistan. When her son needed chemotherapy for Leukemia, she immigrated to Germany for better medical treatment. WAY TO GO MOM!!! A thirty-three-year-old gymnast?! She's old enough to be the mother of an olympic gymnast. AWESOME!!!



Of course, there's always the pool. I was literally screaming at my television today during the 4X100 freestyle. A member of the French team, Alain Bernard, shot his mouth off before the meet saying, "The Americans? We're going to smash them. That's what we came here for." Well, the American B-team set a world record in the prelims, and then the A-team got the job done in the final that saw five teams eclipse that record. M. Alain had a body length lead going into the final leg, then choked like a... Frenchman... and lost the race by .08 seconds. HA! (I told you it was great to be an American.)



Cullen Jones. Just another random athlete? No, he's an Olympic swimmer who very nearly drowned as a kid. They pumped a pint of water out of his lungs before he started breathing again. Oh yeah, and he's only the second black American to win gold in a swimming event (the above mentioned 4X100 freestyle.



With stories like these, how can anyone not love the Olympic Games?