London 2012 Olympics

[Aldentron]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

that's because the powers-that-be in China tell the athletes, "if you don't win gold, don't come home"

[j-rodd123]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

lololol

[kommisar]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

hahah so true


I watched clayton's boxing match against great britain.

rigged as ****. judges gave a generous amount of points to the hometown boy. anywhere else canada would've won.

[bmah]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

The Games have been extremely disappointing for Canada recently. Whether it's the referee not deducting two points for GB in boxing, the referee making an almost unheard of call against Canada in women's soccer, or just plain shitty performance from the players themselves (Simon Whitfield's bike crash, Alexander Despatie's belly flop, etc.), there really hasn't been much in it for this country.

You can bet there was obvious and wrongful bias (boxing) or denial that referees do anything wrong (FIFA investigating AGAINST Sinclaire instead of investigating the referee).

[Trogdor!!!!]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

Just wait for the Winter Olympics and watch Canada take every gold medal. o:

[Cavernio]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

God that bike crash was terrible. Really sucks to be the guy behind the derp olympian who randomly loses balance and causes you to crash too.
Ah who am I kidding, I feel really badly for the poor guy canadian cyclist, he couldn't even look at the camera in the interview afterwards he was so devastated.
Really funny to watch the triathalon anyways. The only olympic sport that times dressing and undressing!

What do you think of this guy? http://www.mensfitness.com/leisure/s...e-blade-runner

He's got prosthetic legs. If I had to make the decision I don't think I'd allow him in the regular olympics. Just more support for Bionic Olympics I say. Lets see some cool implants!

I'm pretty sure Canada gets about the same amount of medals in winter or summer olympics. And I dunno if we'd get any if you counted Quebec as a separate country.

[Choofers]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

He's got prosthetic legs. If I had to make the decision I don't think I'd allow him in the regular olympics.

Why not? That's a bit discriminate.

[awein999]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

His prosthetic legs could give him a physical advantage over regular people with normal legs. This guy is participating because enough people thought it was "unfair" if he wasn't allowed. Just imagine if he wins though. He's not supposed to win. Imagine also what it would be like for the guy who doesn't qualify for the next round because he loses to a guy with prosthetic legs. I thought the formula for being allowed to play in the olympics was no biological altering from birth. Seeing as he has prosthetic legs I don't see how he can be allowed to participate any differently than people doping. Pity points are the only difference. And I'm also sorry he doesn't have his legs but that doesn't mean he should be allowed in the normal events.

Edit: Support for Bionic olympics as Cavernio said.

[bballa48]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

Man, I hope you guys were watching (or watch tonight) that 800 meter final.
That quite possibly may be the greatest athletics performance of all time outside of Usain Bolt's 9.58.

Wow.

[PrawnSkunk]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

Man, I hope you guys were watching (or watch tonight) that 800 meter final.
That quite possibly may be the greatest athletics performance of all time outside of Usain Bolt's 9.58.

Wow.

I literally shit everywhere. That blew me away. 49 second lap to a 51 second final lap.
1:40 is slightly better than my mediocre 2:08

On another note, the 200m final is in 5 mins at 12:50 PST (well, is supposed to be. with track delays most likely 1:10 PST)

[awein999]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

dude i was freaking out that was spectacular. so pumped for 200m mens final holy shit.

[VisD]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

there we go

More Olympic history made

[bballa48]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

Bolt still unbeatable. Good stuff.

[bob bob]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

bolt is da man

props to blake though for coming back in the last 75m

[Cavernio]

Re: London 2012 Olympics

Why not? That's a bit discriminate.

Sure it's not intentional, he didn't choose to be like 'Yeah, no legs!', and yeah he rocks, and yeah I rather like that it's brought so much attention to the disability thing but not only is it body modification that could easily be an enhancement, it could be construed as not even the same event seeing as there's an entire muscle group missing.

What if we found out that ALL people can potentially (potentially because we'd all be slower at first if we got our legs chopped off and jammed a stick under there instead) run faster simply using carbon fibre legs like his? Would you still think it's fair then?

We have 3 possibilities. Prosthetic legs like his make potential running speed 1) slower 2) faster or 3) the same/irrelevant for running speed. If #1 he's superman. If #2 we still think he's awesome. #3 actually doesn't seem like a possibility at all when considering just how precise measurements of speed and how close these top-notch races are. Like, it seems that on a regular basis, to an average person, #3 would likely fit, but when it boils down to it, equivalency seems far fetched. (Unless, for instance, he used a leg specifically made worse or better to match the ability of the standard human leg.)

Does the fact that we don't know mean we should pretend that his artificial legs aren't a factor or not consider that factor as important? According to the wikipedia article he did get this very thing looked at, and although he was told that he has an advantage, but he vetoed that the testing was imperfect and incomplete (which I think it was), but that, to me, doesn't suddenly make the issue resolved, nor does it seem like it invalidated what was already determined as beneficial.

And here's completely another way of looking at it:
There's plenty of people who can't compete in olympics regularly for all kinds of physical traits, the vast majority of them very regular and usual. For instance, I'm naturally far too short to ever be a contender for something like sprinting. If I strapped on mini carbon fiber feet under my own feet to put my height up to 6 feet, hell even just 5'10", trained my ass off and then rallied to take part in the olympics while using my extra feet, would you think it's fair? The point of that example, just to reinforce, isn't that the carbon feet are necessarily better for speed, but rather that I am at a pretty bad disadvantage by being only 5'1" and I would simply have a way of overcoming that. I'm pretty sure we'd all say 'No, that's not fair'
The difference between being short and having no legs below the knee is that he's at a much, much worse disadvantage than me. How does being much worse off make it acceptable to artificially compensate for the disability during a competition? Why, in our minds/in society, are there 2 separate categories of people here, the disabled and then non-disabled, such that different rules might apply for something like the regular olympics?


tl;dr What awe said