After Atalanta

Last weekish I wrote about my astonishment that there isn't a 4-women bobsled event and how this speaks to the inequality that still remains in the Olympics in spite of visible and highly touted progress (i.e., the much-belated inclusion of women's ski jumping) because of the lack of equality in the events themselves. Even women's ski jumping has only one event while the men have two (two different sized hills). Want to see the inequality? Not in a pie graph or nifty infographic (though those are fun); but here in the medal ceremony for the team luge eve nt. This was a new event this year (I think--I had never seen it before) in which a team comprised of a female sledder, a male sledder, and a doubles team relay down the course. When one entity crosses the line, he/she hits a paddle which releases the gate at the top for the next entity. Each team has 1 woman and three men. Why? Because female lugers only have one event--the singles. Just like the female bobsledders only...

That's the message I am getting after the start of the men's single luge competition was moved farther down the track in an attempt to temper the high speeds that seemed to result in the death of Georgian luger, Nodar Kumaritashvili,* during a training run last Friday. This story is not breaking news of course, but I started to hear the grumbles about the start's move pretty much the day it started. Why? Well, one because it corroborates the party line that Kumaritashvili died because of luger error and not because of the course, which is on record as the fastest in the world. And one would think that given the pride those involved in the endeavor had over the speediness that they would have taken certain precautions. But I guess all that hubris gets in the way of covering steel beams with padding. But the second and more relevant (to me) reason for the disgruntledness is because the new start is the women's singles start. I am sorry--it was where the women were slated...

It's the day after American Thanksgiving and you know what that means... Time to talk luge. (What? Did you think I was really going to go the mall on Black Friday?) When I was in Canada a few weeks ago commercials for the Olympics were everywhere. Not so much here, but we should be getting excited at this point, especially if you are into luge. Because according to this piece , American women's luge could be an up-and-coming spoiler for all those veteran European teams like Germany where school children allegedly have easy access to the country's luge tracks. But to all my friends in their 30s who still harbor luge dreams, forget it. It's a youngsters' sport, at least here in the US. Apparently the average age of the US National Team is 21. Which makes sense; you have to have a certain teenage immortality attitude to shoot down a sloped ice track on your back, on a sled with sharp blades using only your feet to steer. More power to them! Hope they make a showing in...

1. Where international players will go in the WPS still remains up in the air though things are getting settled. Looks like Marta will head to LA to play for the Sol. No contract yet so don't count on it. But it appears that anywhere she goes, she will be the top-paid player--in the whole league. The WPS is planning to market the heck out of her. Interesting. First game of the season will be the Sol versus the Washington Freedom. So Marta versus Abby Wambach. Nothing like starting out with a bang! 2. Changing the conversation completely...the 2010 Olympics are only 13 months away! Writer Philip Hersh of the LA Times reminds us of that fact. Then he runs down what's happening in winter sports. Nice to see sports that are rarely covered (luge, speed skating) get some ink (or pixels I guess). Unfortunately he does not mention hockey, not that there is that much happening on the national front. Though it would have been nice for him to note that the US women's national team h...

Bryan Hollister of the Bleacher Report has a " humor" column this week in which he lists and explains the top 15 sports that are not sports. I'm not going to get super uptight about this list. But I do have some things to say about his choices. First, though, it should be noted that the definition of sport is always up for debate--and this is the way it should be. Because a sport does not always involve "blood, sweat, and tears shed through hours of workouts, practices, scrimmages, successes, and failures." Or at least not all those elements all the time. It's a pretty naive definition of a sport, but it's the only one that Hollister offers. I'm not going to comment on all 15 of Hollister's offerings. Check them out for yourself. Here are just some of my thoughts on some of his. Winter sports seem to be especially heavy hit, curling, bobsled, and luge. And if Hollister really thinks that no one has ever said about luge "that's what I wan...