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| 2:27 | 0:54 | 0:09 |
| Events | Ads | Fluff |
* At the Fortress of Solitude, kryptonite! Bob Costas is losing his battle with his eye infection, so Matt Lauer has taken over. Matt is a sports lightweight compared to Costas, but as long as he's only reading whatever the producers put on the teleprompter, he should do just fine.
* To the mountain for the women's ski slopestyle competition. It's basically the same as the snowboard slopestyle competition except on skis. You know what I don't like about all of these X-Game spinoff sports? Far too many of the athletes don't seem to take it very seriously. If they fall or miss a jump, they just head on down the hill and laugh it off. Shouldn't you be just a little upset if you blew your Olympic chances? Maybe I'm just old and crotchety. You darn kids! Get off my ski slope!
* Here comes Mary Carillo with her nightly dose of Russian culture. Russians are famous for their figure skating and also for their ballet. Mary shows us the connection between the two without giving us a lot of detail about either. It's amazing how little information you can convey in five-and-a-half minutes of fluff.
* That fluff of course was a natural lead in for the next event, the pairs figure skating short program. Americans Marissa Castelli and Simon Shnapir start off the evening skating to Santana's "Black Magic Woman." Ha! I was about to make a snarky comment, saying "wouldn't 'Smooth' be better for ice skating" and no sooner did I type that first sentence than "Smooth" started playing.
* To the halfpipe, where Shaun White will attempt to defend his title. But before we can even begin, there's an issue with the venue itself. The warm Sochi weather has melted the snow on the bottom of the halfpipe and the Russians are doing everything they can to get it to freeze over again. Much like White's fluff piece last night, this whole segment seems off. We've been watching this for about 10 minutes and we've seen two competitors, several minutes of Russian snow-creators, and a minute or so of reporting on Shaun White's confidence problems. Isn't this sport supposed to be fun? The whole thing is starting to feel like a eulogy.
* So, let's make it fun. It's time for fluff! Iouri Podladtchikov -- nickname: IPod -- is the son of mathematician parents and competed for Russia in 2006, then Switzerland in 2010 and 2014. They wanted him to be a mathematician, too, but let him compete in snowboarding provided he kept a B average. I don't know what that would have to do with snowboarding, but whatever. He kept it and now his parents are proud of him. Quick, Iouri, what is 60 seconds plus 60 seconds of fluff?
* Whoops! Unfortunately for Iouri, the line of his first run approached zero as he crashed at the top of the hill. His second run was better and he'll make the finals later tonight.
* Back to the ice rink for more pairs skating. The German couple of Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy is up first, and Aliona is wearing a pink outfit so bright that I think I'm getting retina damage. Hopefully Bob Costas and his squinty eyes are avoiding this part of the broadcast.
* Snowboarding! Can Shaun White threepeat? If he doesn't, the fault is obvious. Remember his long, flowing red hair from previous years? Now his hair is short. Danny Davis, fellow American, still has long hair. We'll see who does better then analyze the results.
* Aieeee! Danny crashes on his first run. Maybe my hair theory is bogus. Aaauugghh! Shaun crashes even harder on his first run. I don't know what that does to my theory. Hopefully both boarders can pull it together for their second runs.
* IPod and his long hair are in first place after the second run. Danny and Shaun are coming up. Danny is first. Nooo! Davis goes down again! So much for my hair hypothesis. Shaun had a little bobble on his run, but he did pretty good. Is it good enough to medal? Nooo! Fourth place. He is gracious in his post race interview, though. When asked if the conditions of the halfpipe negatively effected his run, he responded that it was the same for everyone.
* Back in the studio, Cris Collinsworth and Matt Lauer talk about the pressure that White had been under. Sympathy is fine, but this isn't adding anything. Fluff.
* Out to women's luge where we get a British announcer and a strange musical intro. Given that everything in NBC's primetime coverage has been very safe and predictable, this is the best thing I've seen so far. And the best part of all, there's still a US competitor in contention for a medal. Erin Hamlin is a big hit in her hometown and she's in third place after three runs. The other American left, Kate Hansen, warms up by dancing around the staging area. She's in 10th place after three.
* I'm loving the luge segment. Is it because of the foreign announcer? The dancing lugers? Or is it just because it's something other than ice skating and freestyle skiing? Yes to all!
* As Hamlin starts her final run, we learn that her grandmother died in a tragic car wreck in December, so Hamlin is racing for her. Well, she can't lose now, can she? And she doesn't! Hamlin reaches the bottom in first place with two racers left! The worst she can do is bronze, and even that is the first US medal in singles luge ever. Ultimately, the two remaining Germans beat her, but she still wins bronze. Yay, Erin!
It was great ending the night with the luge. The constant rotation between extreme skiing sports and ice skating is getting a little stale. There are a lot of sports in the Olympics, and while I appreciate that NBC is putting them on all of their other channels, I'd like to see updates on some of them during their primetime broadcasts, too. Hopefully there will be more of this in the coming days. See you tomorrow!
