Discussion: Vote for Olympic TV sport

A bit off from O', but since many Oers XC ski, I got a message from a XC ski groups about a"vote for your favorite winter Olympic sport" on ABC's website, http://www.wnbc.com/olympics2006/index.html=20/ind...
XC now has a slight lead in the voting, over Alpine, but Biathalon is a distant 3rd, so you might want to give it a boost.
Would be way I cool, in my opinion, if they showed more XC ski and biathalon.

Sorry, I had to vote for Curling :)

I didn't realize that XC skiing was so popular though. I'm impressed.

I think it is also interesting that xc is so popular because this is another sport that has undergone a lot of change in the last little while in order to become more spectator friendly ie many loops through the stadium even for longer courses, knockout sprints, classic/skate duathlon, etc.
Maybe it is working?

That could be the reason. The other reason could be that this poll has been posted on all the popular North American ski news websites and everybody that goes to these websites does their duty and votes for xc skiing ten times a day.

I remember reading an article about the 1994 Olympics in Norway and the US broadcaster gave the nordic coverage one day of live feeds with a helicopter and the whole nine yards of resources. The day they picked was the men's relay and it turned out to be one of the absolute classics of ski racing, Italy beating out Norway at the end.
If the Swedes can pull their weight, we should have another awesome race this year; Norway, Germany, Russia and as usual Italy I'm sure will "peak" just in time.

Acording to the CCC website, the Canadian World Cups in December will be on tv, more Jack Sasseville talking and keeping the seat warm for Beckie to replace him.

I think that it was the drama of this very race that helped to increase its popularity. At the following olympics they showed "the rematch" during primetime.

The rematch was almost as exciting, this time with the favoured Norwegians and Alsgaard outsprinting the Italians at the end. I enjoyed this one a little bit more ;)

I might be wrong, but I think "theshadow" is referring to the 2002 Salt Lake 4 X 10 k relay in which Norway edged Italy in an unbelievable sprint by Alsgaard in the last 50 meters. I think there was another relay that was shown later that again came down to Norway and Italy but was not as close.

It has been Norway vs Italy in the finish chute for the last 3 Olympics. Now that it is on Italy's home turf, it might just go there way again. Salt Lake recap.

I guess they don't update these recaps very often. Have a look at the links at the bottom of the page: "Muhlegg wins second gold", "Russians Gold and Silver in Women's Pursuit". We all know what happened there.

>We all know what happened there.
He 'peaked'?!?

Wow, I'm sure the execs at ABC are getting a chuckle out of that survey. Proof that web polls are bogus. Figure skating at 3%? When it comes time to actually tune in, skating will outdraw all other sports combined.

It would be nice to see a little more ski racing at the expense of one of the "up close and personal" features.

Well you see it isn't that skating will outdraw anything, it will be the only thing on. The quetion is what if you had a choice?

Canada's goal for this year's winter olympics: Top 3 overall in medals!

Canada's goal for the 2010 winter olympics: #1 in overall medals!

I suspect we'll see a lot of the ice sports this year on TV in Canada: hockey, speed skating, figure skating and curling.

OK - so I was at the gym, running at an easy pace (so I didn't think I was genuinely delusional.) I don't normally pay attention to the banal TVs but something got my attention. I hope I was imagining but I think I saw something like "Ice Wars: Battle of the Sexes." Surely, I was somehow mistaken? What could that be?

Don't know about the ice wars, but curling is now in the # 1 position on the nbc voting, with a 36-18 lead over XC skiing. Snowboarding is still without a single vote. Wonder which we'll see more of...

I saw the ice wars on NBC today. The gals team was awful cute! Not a suprise it got voted up. Minnesota dontchaknow. After watching for 30 mins and 2 rounds (I think) I still have no idea what the rules are.