Have you been watching the London 2012 Olympics?
While I don’t usually follow sports these days, the Olympics always gets my attention.
A lot of times, I’m on the edge of my seat, slanting on an angle towards the TV as though I’m ‘skiing’, especially when the races are close.
Among my favourite summer events are gymnastics and swimming!
Last night (when I was preparing this blog post), I was watching the men’s 400m freestyle swimming competition.
Although I’m Canadian, it was really exciting to watch Ryan Lochte (an American) win the gold. And it’s too bad that Michael Phelps didn’t get any medals.
(Image Credit: London 2012)
As I’m preparing this post (on Saturday night), here are the top 3 countries in the medal count:
- People’s Republic of China: 4 Gold, 0 Silver & 2 Bronze
- Italy: 2 Gold, 2 Silver & 1 Bronze
- United States: 1 Gold, 2 Silver & 2 Bronze
Canada sadly isn’t even on the list yet. But that’s because we’re usually way better in the Winter Olympics anyway.
Here are some facts I read about the Olympics on Wikipedia (from here and here) that I wanted to share:
- Tug of war was an official summer Olympic event from 1900 to 1920
- The Olympic tradition began in 1904
- The 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin were the first Games to be broadcast on television, but only to local audiences
- Over the past 50 years, the most expensive Olympic Games have been London 2012 ($14.8 billion USD), Barcelona 1992 ($11.4 billion USD) & Montreal 1976 ($6 billion USD)
Here’s a link to the CTV London 2012 Olympics site where you can stay up-to-date on the latest news.
I hope that your Sunday is going well so far and that you’ve been having a relaxing weekend! 🙂
What’s your favourite Olympic event to watch? Have you ever attended any of the live Olympic competitions in the past?
Hi Mary,
I love the gymnastics too and I read/hear that a lot and yet I always find the TV coverage of gymnastics is hard to find and if you do see it it’s just for a couple of minutes and then back to the ‘more’ important sports. Well that’s how it is on Aussie TV – I’m sure there would be more coverage on cable but I don’t subscribe. It’s so weird but I generally hate sport of all kinds and yet I love the olympics – I love the variety of sports you just don’t get to see normally. I like the dressage, skeet shooting and athletics as well..
Hey Lauren!
Yes, the costumes are interesting to see, too. And then there’s the excitement about who will claim a new world record! I think that’s also why I always get excited about the Olympics – you get to see the best of the best compete all at the same time.
I love watching gymnastics and swimming as well :). It really amazes me what these athletes can do–I could never do any of it myself, not in a million years! I like to watch the “random” sports that you would never really see on TV otherwise, like badminton and fencing. I would love to watch all the equestrian events, but most of them will be broadcast pretty early in the morning here in the US. Did you watch the opening ceremony? I thought it was pretty cool :D.
Hey Jessica!
Yes, I watched some of the opening ceremony, but I unfortunately missed a lot of it! Hopefully I’ll be able to catch the closing ceremony!
Happy Sunday Mary,
I have not watched any of the Olympics yet. I like the gymnastics also. My fave is the diving. I don’t like hights and don’t dive but I love watching them dive. Hope you are having a great weekend. Keep up the awesome job and have a great week. :~)
Hey Melissa!
Diving always seems so scary to me because they’re heads are so close to the diving board, and I’m worried that they’ll accidentally hit their head! I know they’re pros, but I still worry!
I only started watching the Olympics this year. I liked the opening ceremonies, it was pretty cool. I’ve watched the gymnastics and swimming and I still amazed with what they can do cause I can’t even do a cartwheel. I’m actually looking forward to taekwondo.
Hey maddy!
Yeah, the opening ceremony was cool, but I missed a lot of it! Hopefully I can catch the closing ceremony.
Oh, I didn’t know you were into taekwondo! Cool!
I was just talking about this with my husband and I picked track and field as my favourite to watch. I was also never a fan of weightlifting but I saw it yesterday and it’s so intense. One competitor lifted 3x his body weight. That’s insane!
Margo recently posted: IT Cosmetics haul
Hey Margo!
Cool – did you ever participate in track and field in school?
When Usain Bolt competed and came in first place, I remember what a moment that was, especially since he was so damn fast that he even had time to gloat as he was racing toward the finish line! AWESOME…haha! Kind of a jerk move, but, hey, if you’re THAT good, well, you can sometimes get away with it.
Yeah, weightlifting is insane. Sometimes I picture that those athletes were ants in their previous life…y’know how ants can lift much more than their weight…hehe!