Yes indeed!
I think I remember when someone in the US broke the 10 sec time for the 100 yard dash.

Now this... but in meters
Usain Bolt sets Olympic record, wins men's 100 gold medal in 9.63
.

ETA: Oooooops. I must have been having a Ronald Regan moment. :blush:
The 100 yard dash 10-second record was broken by J. Owen, Jr. in 1890 at 9.8

AWESOME! He set that record 4 years before the games began. That is the stuff of winners.

;):D

Sorry FT3, I didn't copy/paste enough from Wikipedia
... 1890 was a "world record" from 1870's, not the Olympics.

Hey, I'm more amused by the badminton.

In the last round of the pools, four teams in two games each wanted to lose to avoid playing their countrymen (or some formidable opponent) in the semi finals.

Tourney organisers decided if they wanted to avoid a certain game that much, fine, they can avoid all games from now on. :redcard: for throwing matches, bugger off. 8 players sent home.

Although it is poor sportsmanship on part of the players, it suggests poor design of the tournament structure that you can ever benefit by losing a game.

Shoot, I would've liked to have seen that, but I had to turn off the omnipresent beach volleyball.

I've been glued to the gymnastics and swimming, mainly.

Aren't your women gymnastics team a joy to watch? Thoroughly engaging bunch of girls.

I can't believe GB are riding third in the overall medals table at the moment. After such a slow start too. I expect we'll slip down a little by the end of play, but hopefully not by much. Given the size of our nation, even with the 'hometeam advantage' that's pretty impressive, I think.

Turning into such a slog between US and China for first place. Come on USA, you can do it!

In the gold medal tally, Australia is presently behind New Zealand.

There are questions being asked in parliament about this. The media are in lather. Angry mobs are forming.

Me, I am pleased with our team - heaps of silver and bronze, only one gold, is still pretty darn good at this level.

If they have many more athletes like Guo Jingjing we don't stand a chance! Her diving is just amazing.

Griff - I got to watch some of the Fencing. Fascinating, even though I was struggling to keep up and the screaming after every point, not point was very distracting.
I did read an article about one woman who lost a match because of some error with the timer? Article here
I'd like to read your take on it.

We were talking about this at the club the other night and I have yet to see a really good video but our coach made a couple interesting points that haven't been part of the conversation.

The director did almost everything correctly under the rules. There were two problems. The German appeared to jump the direction "Allez" on one of her touches. The timer, expecting a restart, did not allow the clock to run which left extra time on the clock. The Korean girl was fencing the clock more than the opponent. All double touches are little victories for the Korean because she only needed to burn time not score.

Where the director may have made a mistake is on not forcing the fencers to start at proper distance. The Korean girl was creeping forward from the back line because she wanted room to retreat during the attack. If both feet go over the line its a touch. The German was creeping forward to shorten the attack distance because she has almost no time to hit. They end up in extension distance which means they can hit without an advance and without the clock running down. They should start in a proper en garde, which would have no crossover of blades at full extension. That would have eaten up the time.

The funny thing is in many Stateside tournaments the director runs the clock so there isn't the lag time from the directors mouth to the timers ear through the brain and out to the thumb. A tech fix would be simple, voice controlled timing, but FIE is pretty dopey so we may end up with another Byzantine rule.

I'm sure that is completely clear ;) so ask a follow-up if I lost you.

Oh, and when they put a second back on, that was by rule the director had no choice, unfortunately that was a full second not whatever increment was left or whatever increment the machine could actually measure, which is something I don't know. I felt terrible for the girl. If she left the strip it would be a tacit acceptance of the outcome. Apparently her coach had to dig up like $80 American to challenge the ruling. Cluster Foxtrot all the way around.

Don't be sorry, my smartass opportunities have been few lately.

You Brits are getting a little greedy in the velodrome!:f205: woot!

How about these two finishing the Marathon...

Attachment 40001

The concern of one for the other was very touching.

It was clearly FAR more than a second which transpired though.
What a messed up situation. How the judges ruled against her is beyond me. She got totally screwed.

Oh, and thanks. I must admit with the sound turned low it was a lot of fun to watch.