During the Olympics in Beijing, many events transpired to keep me from enjoying the Games nearly as much as I'd wished.Excitement reigned throughout... but there were lessons learned which extended far beyond merely the action on the track and in the pool, on the beams and the rings and along the road. After a mostly-successful run at covering the Tour de France, I set the laudable if foolhardy goal of providing daily Olympic coverage. But, as Robert Burns' poem "To a Mouse" is often butchered from the original Scots, "The best-laid plans of mice and men/often go awry"...
The pageantry began in full force for the Opening Ceremonies even as the aerial cameras failed to adequately capture the moment for the world's viewing pleasure due to persistent particulates in the air. Whether it be dust or fog or pollution I cannot say - I was not in Beijing. But, watching the footage of the torch lighting by former Chinese gold medalist Li Ning as he performed new acrobatic feats, wires lofting him gracefully around the Bird's Nest and down in artful arcs to the torch, I recognized that the Chinese are dedicated to putting on a good show, even as they denied many of their own citizens the pleasure of witnessing that show together. Parks were closed and locked to public use; the few big screens which were placed up seemed to be the exclusive playthings of the autocratic elite. Call this government Communist if you will, but Karl Marx or even Mao Zedong would be spinning in their graves to hear the ideology of communism being bastardized in such an appalingly class-centered manner. But people were bound to be pushed aside - as was written in one of the essays in Evil Paradises: Dreamworlds of NeoLiberalism (New Press, 2007 - edited by Mike Davis and Daniel Bertrand Monk [ISBN: 978-1595580764]), the very stadium where the opening ceremonies took place was built on land which was essentially confiscated without compensation from poor Beijing residents. So to see journalists' full researching potential abridged or citizens' right to use collective technology abrogated is no real surprise regardless of any promises made to the IOC... nor is it surprising to see those at the IOC capitulating with each and every restriction clamped on by the Chinese...
But the Games got underway regardless of who did or did not get to witness them, or the location from which they were witnessed. The Olympics are one of the truly global events that ties together disparate sports fans from all corners of the globe, transcends the myriad differences in culture and language and ideology to forge a common understanding of our interconnectedness and unites them in the ostensibly-peaceful auspices of athletic competition for several weeks...
The first gold medal went to Katerina Emmons of the Czech Republic in the women's 10-meter air rifle shooting competition. Emmons won gold ahead of Russian Lyubov Galkina and Snjezana Pejcic of Croatia. Soon thereafter, the Chinese were celebrating their first gold of the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, their home games, the games to usher in a new future. Expected to dominate weightlifting competitions in Beijing, the Chinese started off on the right path. Chen Xiexia, in the women's 48-kilogram (106-pound) class, set a new Olympic record with a combined weight total of 212 kilograms (468 pounds). She lifted 95 kilos in the snatch and 117 in the clean and jerk to set Olympic records in both the clean and jerk and the combined weight total. Taking silver was Sibel Ozkan of Turkey; Chen Wei-Ling of Chinese Taipei took the bronze medal, neither eclipsing the 200-kilogram mark in their combined score...
They also work in sad ways. They bring out the best in humanity, the best out of the world's best athletes, but they can also bring out the worst side of both athletic competition and human nature. Tassos Gousis, a 29-year-old Greek sprinter, tested positive for methyltrienolone, a synthetic steroid, in pre-Olympic drug testing by the Greek National Olympic Committee. The Greek federation is analyzing the B-sample as I type, attempting to avert a disaster like the 2004 Olympics wrought even before the IOC issues a single test. This proactive nature, while sad when it discovers that someone was not trustworthy, is nonetheless refreshing to see. In cycling we have seen this recent turn of attitude in the internal testing programs being instituted by the sport's top teams, the CSCs and Columbias and Garmin-Chipotles and Astanas. Now national federations, too, are taking responsibility for cleaning their own houses and doing the dirty work before the IOC has to... let's hope, first, that this was a false negative for Gousis... but if the B-sample comes back positive, don't question the validity of the Games NOW... question the validity of them throughout history, before nations policed themselves and tests were advanced enough to detect the wide array of banned substances on IOC and WADA lists...
So I had every intention of keeping daily posts as the Olympics go on in Eugene. The problem with life is that oftentimes our greatest intentions can be derailed by any one of a myriad of factors. Sometimes our bodies do precisely what we don't want them to do, and in those moments there is not a single thing we can do to get back on track. Illness does not know what time of year it is or whether a quadrennial spectacle is underway. Illness cares not about one's spectating proclivities or loyalty, be it to a sport or an athlete or a team...
And all did not rest well in Olympic land. When Tang Yongming, a Chinese citizen, brandished his blade at the Drum Tower in Beijing, the Olympics went somber. Todd and Barbara Bachman, in-laws of U.S. volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon, sustained severe stabbing wounds from Yongming before the assailant lept to his death from the tower. Todd died; Barbara remains in critical condition. Yet it would appear to many that the greater tragedy was the fact that seven-year-old Yang Peiyi was considered too unattractive physically and too attractive vocally to be simply turned away from performing at the opening ceremonies. While Peiyi sang behind the scenes, nine-year-old Lin Miaoke - a veteran television-ad actor in China - pulled a Milli Vanilli and lip-synched over Peiyi's voice. Everyone decries the fact that Peiyi was cast backstage, but don't forget... Miaoke was essentially told that she can't sing worth a damn as much as Peiyi was told she was an eyesore. Each girl got her exposure... all the Bachmans got were knife wounds...
But there were moments which did strike to the better parts of the human spirit as well. We learned how amazinglyshort a span of time is really represented by one-hundredth of one second. For some, that hundredth signals a sigh of relief on the road to history; for others, those hundredths linger on the consciousness forever, haunting the afflicted with nightmares of what might have been. Yet others view those hundredths as an opportunity for celebration long after the battle has been won...
As life meanders on in its chaotic Nietzschian course, those hundredths of a second transmogrify themselves into works of art. For a man like Michael Phelps, the artistry takes the form of domination in a manner never before witnessed. Moments of panic merge with moments of exultation and relief to culminate in a masterpiece like last night's medley relay. Phelps, with humility and chlorinated water dripping from his LZR Racer, now stands as the undisputed Gilded King of the Olympiad. With his victory the previous evening over Milorad Cavic, the California-raised Serbian who had the best chance of any of felling the invincible Phelps, Phelps chopped his way level with Mark Spitz and came into last night's race with the unprecedented opportunity to take over the record. Teammate Brendan Hansen almost had it in to spoil the party in a way even Cavic couldn't...
Hansen, the breaststroke specialist who saw his opportunity to better his 200-meter bronze from Athens dashed by Eric Shanteau among others at the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials, nearly cost the Americans the race in his leg of the 400-meter medley relay. Still seeming shaken by both his missed opportunity in the 200 and the loss of his world record to Kosuke Kitajima of Japan, Hansen was subpar for such a champion these Olympics. Putting the Americans in the dubious position of third as he touched the wall to spring Phelps, it came onto Michael's shoulders to determine his own fate. And those shoulders, in their fluid butterfly stroke, made up all the time necessary as he allowed team anchor Jason Lezak to set off for the final freestyle leg first into the pool.
Just as he did for Phelps in the 400 free relay, Lezak again managed to hold off all comers to deliver gold to the man who, halfway through his schedule, already had more than any other Olympian has accrued in the twenty-nine runnings of the athletic festival. From the agony of defeat to the thrill of victory, Phelps now sits on eighth heaven. He luckily is the kind of man of character who can do justice to his new-found superstardom. From his eschewing the trappings of luxury to stay in the Olympic Village to his unflagging reverence of Mark Spitz, the artistry that is his pool prowess belies that humility which sets a positive example for the inevitable multitudes of children who will now set out to pools across the country. No greater endorsement, in my opinion, could come than the one offered by Spitz himself: "Somebody told me years ago you judge one's character by the company you keep, and I'm just happy to be in the company of Michael Phelps."
Other Olympians, suffering on the opposite side of the "hundredth" spectrum, would do well to remember this maxim. Each and every one, from Tyson Gay (who missed out on the dream showdown in the 100-meter dash by placing fifth in his semifinal heat) and Usain Bolt (who shaved hundredths from the world-record pace in that 100 despite dancing to the line) to Cavic and Dana Torres (one hundredth had the 41-year-old swimmer losing gold and stepping down to silver), can hold his or her head high. The company they keep is that of a long line of Olympians, of whom Phelps is now simply the most decorated. Regardless of the metal in the medal or whether there is even one hanging from one's neck, all these athletes can now say that they represented their nations with dignity and respect. For if one is judged by the company he or she keeps, then all the slaves to the hundredth can take solace in their gilded place in sporting history...
For all those fair-weather fans who watched Usain Bolt let up in the 100 meters and left track for dead until his return in the 200 meter races, there was some exciting action missed in the long-distance races. One particularly exciting piece of news hailed from the 10K race. At first glance, American fans will quickly pass over the standings, witnessing the fact that the first dozen slots in the rankings were filled by Ethiopians and Kenyans and Eritreans and Ugandans. But sitting there in thirteenth place, the top non-African finisher in the race, was none other than the University of Oregon's own Galen Rupp. His coach, Alberto Salazar, finally was getting to feel his heart race after missing out on the boycotted 1980 Olympics - Rupp was in the mix...
Rupp's race was definitely more Liu Xiang than Usain Bolt... the twenty-two year old Portland native, one of the first University of Oregon students to compete in the Olympics while still enrolled on the Eugene campus, quickly shook his nerves and got down to the business of racing. Alongside such luminaries of the discipline as eventual gold-medal winner Keninisa Bekele (who finished in an Olympic record 27:01.17) and Haile Gebreselassie, Rupp cut an unlikely figure. While he finished higher, eleventh, at the 2007 IAAF World Championships in Osaka, the Oregonian finished on the lead lap this time a mere thirty-five seconds behind Bekele. Showing improvement at every turn, Rupp did his nation and his coach proud as he fought through the final lap to remain apace with the far more seasoned runners. Despite falling behind in the final lap, Rupp acquitted himself honorably against a top-flight field. "That's why they're the best in the world," Rupp told Register-Guard reporter George Schroeder after the race. "I've got all the confidence that in a couple of years, I'll be there."
Salazar echoes that sentiment. "He's just got to gradually chip away at it. But he's closing the gap. No doubt in my mind, God willing, he's right on course to be competitive in four years." For someone as young as Rupp, these Olympics have served as the perfect seasoning for future aspirations. Finishing second at the U.S. Olympic Trials at Hayward Field was a sublime experience for this ascendant runner, certainly; finishing thirteenth, the top non-African finisher in a sport dominated by Africans for the past two decades, is an affirmation that we might have a new long-distance star on the horizon. From the land of Prefontaine, the future looks bright...
Rupp and Salazar are taking the right approach. Yes, thirteenth can be looked at as failure on his part to achieve medal status. However, the long view - the fact that he finished only a half-lap down rather than a full lap as in Osaka, the fact that he finished within four seconds of his personal-best time on such a stress-filled stage, and the fact that his experience will only better prepare him for London four years down the road - reveals quite the inverse. In a field as strong as this one was, completing the baker's dozen is no small achievement...
"You're trying to get ready for the Olympics, and you just get this huge bomb dropped on you." We often learn the most poignant lessons not when everything is clicking perfectly but when adversity is skirted to achieve some measure of success. Take the case of Eric Shanteau, the 24-year-old from Georgia who realized his Olympic dreams just one week after being diagnosed with testicular cancer. Postponing treatment, Shanteau headed to Omaha for the U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials with an outside shot in the 200-meter breaststroke. But with a second-place finish behind Scott Spann and ahead of race favorite Brendan Hansen, Shanteau needed only 2:10.36 to book his place in the Olympic Village.
Once in Beijing, the young breaststroker battled valiantly toward his gilded dream. In his preliminary heat, Shanteau took second place behind Mike Brown of Canada in a new personal-best time of 2:10.29. He bested that with a 2:10.10 in the semifinal heat. But his personal best proved thirteen-hundredths of a second too slow for a spot in the final. Despite reaching his ultimate goal, though, Shanteau embodied the Olympic spirit. He challenged his body to go faster than he'd previously thought possible and persisted against the odds to come as far as he did.
After his chance at the medal fell short, Shanteau told the press, "It's tough that I didn't get to be in the final and have a chance to medal. But my goal was to swim my best. Now I've got a much bigger battle to win, and I know I'm gonna win that one." His performance illustrated perfectly that, despite being overlooked coming into the trials, there is a reason that we run the races - and even if a favorite does not make the cut, those who do are more often than not worthy of their place in the limelight...
It is that spirit, the beauty of humanity which is illuminated through the microcosm of sport, which is exemplified by all the athletes at the Olympics.The wonder of sports is that anyone can have a shot; talent alone cannot lead an athlete to the promised land.This is the most important lesson we learned coming out of Beijing. We can revere athletes all we want, but we must temper that reverence with the realization that, at the end of the day, they are as human as each of us. Here's to hoping the next Olympiad provides us with yet more opportunities to see the best and worst of our world. For the thrills of victory and the agonies of defeat can all be witnessed, every fourth year, through the lens of athletic achievement and can serve to better allow us to recognize them in our daily lives...