the WOGs are the superior olympics and i'm TIRED of pretending they're not

[krow]

i'm sick of the lies; i'm sick of the gaslighting. i just watched a wonderful SOG in paris and sadly came away convinced it's all lost a bit of the overall magic.

meanwhile, a COVID olympics in china with fake snow was as exciting and diverting as ever, and what magic was lost will surely be back with international crowds and free movement. 

it's sad to say the SOG has become an over-exalted, bloated mess — a tedious mix of the outdated (pentathlon), never-ending multi-round team sports (volleyball, field hockey), and new arrivals that invite more ridicule than excitement (breaking, freestyle bmx). to say nothing of the sports like surfing or sailing that cannot be seamlessly hosted by landlocked cities and require — fittingly enough in the case of france — so many sporting colonies vast distances from the main cluster.

these days, a casual viewer cannot hope to watch all the summer sports without devoting their lives to the olympics, leaving most in a state of permanent disconnect with the event or else watching individual sports in isolated silos. 

complete chaos.

meanwhile, the WOG has grown but much more successfully, and it's hard to believe sports like curling and snowboarding haven't been with us since chamonix. maybe only the acrobatic events (aerial skiing; big air) seem overtly modern, but they stay sufficiently grounded in the common ice/snow theme to settle in perfectly like just another of layer ice in a skating rink, gradually freezing itself level by level to form a cohesive whole. 

the fact is both these things are true: the WOGs are a leisurely, frolicking snow day for rich cold-weather countries born out of a legacy of oppressive eurocentrism that is mostly fading in the face of a more globalized future AND it's the most perfectly designed and executed multi-sport event ever conceived (perhaps excepting the original, ancient olympic games, whose only real failing was a lack of international broadcast television coverage, a most american invention that was sadly beyond the greek imagination).

sure, winter sport lacks the democratizing, humanizing features of football and track&field. i'm aware that it takes a maddeningly specific combination of geography/infrastructure, money, and culture to succeed at the highest levels, which few a countries possess naturally (austria; norway), a few have succeeded in fostering (japan, USA/canada), and a few are spending big to blatantly force for geopolitical clout (china). most countries, i'm sure, find the WOGs completely baffling on a level so fundamental it's probably not even possible to correct — a drawback for sure but not a fatal one. 

YET, strictly from the standpoint of a disinterested viewer with no real cultural attachments to sport, the WOGs are the perfect distillation of a global multi-sport event in that it's very well attended/watched in the countries that send athletes, much smaller (and easier to absorb by viewers in pieces or as a whole), and thanks to the ice/snow limitation THEMATICALLY flawless (FIFA's single-sport world cup is similar in some ways, and also succeeds over the SOGs for these reasons).

somewhere along the line we lost the thread with the SOGs and the IOC is only interested in growing them ever larger in ways that don't matter at all (e.g., new venues, huge affairs like golf, pointless "youth" oriented sports), instead of the cheap and effective ways that do (e.g., dominica/st. lucia winning first-ever gold medals in paris).

the WOGs aren't quite at that level of over-bloat, though i sometimes fear they may be trending in the wrong direction. climate change and rising costs may still pull it back from the SOG abyss, and toward greater global participation, which should be the main growth-oriented goal, together with sustainability. 

finally, we must end this "both are good in their own way" nonsense!! we must come together to admit that we have failed the SOGs and that our superior iteration is now — and has been for a while — its smaller but cooler kid brother. 

i'll give you all some time to cycle between depression, anger, bargaining and denial before accepting this true reality and agreeing with me. apologies in advance for any hurt feelings this may cause.

[Bear]

i agree. winter olympics >>> summer olympics. this is why sports-wise, im more excited for SLC2034 than LA28.

[Sir Rols]

Yeah, I can buy into this convo.

First up, though, as an Aussie I have to state that the WOGs are a novelty event for elitist sports that we only do well in by fluke or by throwing money at obscure disciplines (freestyle aerials) nobody else is interested in and where we can recruit athletes to make the switch from other sports where they didn’t make the cut. The SOGs is where the real sport happens.

But I can get a kick out of watching the snow and ice fest and it sure is more bite-sized. And it actually happens during our summer, so I’m not rugged up in front of a heater to watch them. That said, despite the last two being in my time zone and having had the time to watch the bulk of them, I can’t actually recall much of PyeongChang or Beijing beyond memories of decommissioned water cooling towers.

@Faster and I were having the exact same convo in the back channels during Paris about how the SOGs were becoming too bloated and spreading themselves too thin. It could sure do with a bit of trimming. Personally, though, I like a lot of the new “urban” “youth” sports (though Breaking was bizarre, even without Raygun) and would look more to some of those things like golf, tennis, synchro swimming and rhythmic gymnastics etc.

I watched a huge swathe of what was on in Paris, and I’m still finding stuff that I forgot was actually on and didn’t catch at all.

Edited September 15, 2024 by Sir Rols

[Faster]

Anything with lots of Norwegians is alright by me. Stupid sexy Norwegians.

The OWG are a different beast. I think you have a point that the new additions to the Winters have been more seamlessly integrated and fit the theme a lot more. LA is going to be a bloated mess because of all the new team sports they've added. And the political minefield disaster that the Haundenosanee are going to cause with lacrosse. 

 

[FYI]

I see I'm not the only one that sees the (urban) youth oriented sports as "pointless".

[baron-pierreIV]

On 9/16/2024 at 4:05 PM, Faster said:

. . .  And the political minefield disaster that the Haundenosanee are going to cause with lacrosse. 

 

Maybe their team will be taken to the Cricket venue and the "Indian" cricket team will be driven to Lacrosse instead -- by clueless bus drivers??