The Olympics

[chemiclord]

His celebration will be coming in Olympic Village later. See, tons of people can claim they won the gold at the Olympics, but only one guy in the world can claim he lost because his dick was too big.

[El Axe]

Today's Olympics were a ton of fun, several GREAT competitions. You might want to watch the 6-7min videos before reading my summary.

Archery:

American Ellison started the day almost completing his career comeback. When younger, he was on a great trajectory, but he developed a hand injury and was told he may have to give up Archery. He was able to restart his career. He made the gold medal match and went up against the prohibitive favorite from South Korea, Kim Woojin, who is becoming legendary. They were tied after the normal rounds. They went to a 3 arrow shoot-off. They both bulls-eyed all 3. It went down to a final golden arrow, closest to center wins. Woojin's was closer by less than a millimeter. Absolutely stellar.

Cycling:

The next great event was the women's cycling road race. American Kristen Faulkner was a last-minute substitute. She is a pursuit racer who only decided to even try to qualify very late in the process. She wasn't initially in the race, but the original American qualifier withdrew (was entered into several events and didn't think she could do well) and Faulkner replaced her only under the condition that she could drop out as soon as she was out of medal contention so she wouldn't hurt her pursuit team's chances. She didn't drop out.

There was an early breakout with a pair of contenders. Kristen was back in the peleton and did most of the heavy lifting of getting herself and another favorite back up with the leading pair. When the four cyclists joined together, what usually happens is that they all work together until the end while resting for the sprint finish. What Kristin did instead might become legendary. At 5:40 in the video you can watch as she instead of joining the other four, just leaves them all in the dust with a final surge that she carries solo all the way to the finish. I'm a bit of a cycling fan and I'm telling you that this was epic. All the experienced announcers were just blown away by this almost unprecedented play.

Golf:

Scheffler started the day 5 shots off the lead, he birdied his first two holes and just kept rolling. He eventually shot a course-record 62 and needed every one of those strokes, winning the gold by one stroke as Fleetwood's last chip slid less than a foot by the hole.

Swimming:

The US Men's team has done poorly by their usual standards. They hadn't won an individual gold for the entire competition and it came down to the last individual men's event. Bobby Finke had lost the 800m earlier in the games and was not the favorite for the 1500m. His coach, Anthony Nesty, is also the US Team coach and is known for being stoic. His training partner is the all time great Katie Ledecky. Their reactions to his win are must-see viewing.

Track:

Noah Lyles is trying to become the first American to win the 100m in 20 years. This was probably the best, most competitive 100m final I've ever seen.

[chemiclord]

That 100m final was something else. You could have told me any one of three guys had won, and I would have believed you. Something like two hundredths of a second separated first from third, and four thousandths of a second separated gold from silver.

[froot loops]

The Faulkner story is quite amazing. She's only been riding a bike for 7 years.

The Lyles race was great. My younger daughter ran track and the one thing she did really good is the lean at the finish. A lot of sprinters half ass the lean. Attention to detail won him that race I couldn't believe he won the race. I thought for sure he missed it and was going to rue the fact that it wasn't a 101 meter race

[froot loops]

One other thing, that was a great race and it only cements my belief that Bolt's record is going to enjoy a Bob Beamon-like longevity. He was 9.58 and he let up at the end of that race. Nobody has even come close to that mark

[DanO]

One other thing, that was a great race and it only cements my belief that Bolt's record is going to enjoy a Bob Beamon-like longevity. He was 9.58 and he let up at the end of that race. Nobody has even come close to that mark

Ditto. That's a HUGE time.

[Mainevent]

One other thing, that was a great race and it only cements my belief that Bolt's record is going to enjoy a Bob Beamon-like longevity. He was 9.58 and he let up at the end of that race. Nobody has even come close to that mark

Agree that record is going to last a long time, but.Bolt didn’t let up that 9.58 race, he ran all the way through the tape, even leaned a bit when he didn’t have to. But none of these top guys are even breaking 9.7 right now, so nobody is even close.

Lyles may have a shot at Bolt’s 200M record, but even that is a huge task, and he hasn’t even broken 19.3 yet but I think he’ll be the 2nd guy to ever go into the 19.2s.

[Mainevent]

And hard to pick a favorite moment so far from the games, which have been tremendous, but I tuned in to that bike road race just a few minutes before Faulkner made her break away and it was awesome to watch.

[chemiclord]

I think if Lyles was like 21 rather than 27, he'd have a shot. Dude ran 9.78 after an absolutely atrocious start last night... and as you've said, he's been flirting with sub 19.3 in the 200 for a couple years. I just dunno how much stronger and faster he could get before Father Time catches him.

And hard to pick a favorite moment so far from the games, which have been tremendous, but I tuned in to that bike road race just a few minutes before Faulkner made her break away and it was awesome to watch.

Faulkner made a tactical "gold or nothing" decision there, and it absolutely froze the other three riders. I don't think any of them thought that after that punishing chase just to catch up that Faulkner would have the gas to go three more kms at that pace, and by the time they realized she wasn't fading it was simply too late.

[Mainevent]

Yeah, age is a big factor. Sprinters seem to maintain top speed into their late 20s and even early 30s these days, but they don’t get faster typically. Kishane Thompson - the silver medalist - is 23 and already has a PB that is better than Lyles. So you’d think if anybody from this current crop is going to go sub 9.7 any time soon, it’s him. The other Jamaican is also just 23 and not too far behind.

[DanO]

There are numerous athletes competing in all different sports in their 30's. Physically difficult events. I'm sure hoping like hell LeDecky and Biles, both 27, return for the LA Olympics. A home Olympics has to be hugely tantalizing.

[chemiclord]

Yeah, age is a big factor. Sprinters seem to maintain top speed into their late 20s and even early 30s these days, but they don’t get faster typically. Kishane Thompson - the silver medalist - is 23 and already has a PB that is better than Lyles. So you’d think if anybody from this current crop is going to go sub 9.7 any time soon, it’s him. The other Jamaican is also just 23 and not too far behind.

The thing with Kishane is that, I dunno, it feels like he's kinda already hit his ceiling? Maybe I'm just overthinking it, but it just feels like he's been at that high 9.7-ish for the last couple years and I just don't see where he improves much more than that. Like, for Lyles, I can point to his really, really slow starts (and his start last night was one of the worst starts I ever saw from him), but from my semi-informed vantage point, there's nothing I can point to with Thompson that says, "If he cleans that up, he can improve his times."

How much faster can Thompson get with just more leg strength? I'm not sure.

(Edit: Turns out I'm absolutely wrong about this; Thompson didn't crack 9.7 until this year, which suggests he definitely still has some growth to do.)

Fun fact, if Lyles (who had the worst reaction time out of the gate), had reacted as well as the best in the final, he runs about a 9.7 flat, which at least starts to get some people entertaining a Bolt challenger.

Another fun fact, while no one is seriously challenging Bolt any time soon, the level of competition is getting significantly better. If you had taken the runners in Paris and dropped them in Toyko just four years ago, the seventh best time in Paris would have won bronze in Tokyo.

[DanO]

The thing with Kishane is that, I dunno, it feels like he's kinda already hit his ceiling? Maybe I'm just overthinking it, but it just feels like he's been at that high 9.7-ish for the last couple years and I just don't see where he improves much more than that. Like, for Lyles, I can point to his really, really slow starts (and his start last night was one of the worst starts I ever saw from him), but from my semi-informed vantage point, there's nothing I can point to with Thompson that says, "If he cleans that up, he can improve his times."

How much faster can Thompson get with just more leg strength? I'm not sure.

(Edit: Turns out I'm absolutely wrong about this; Thompson didn't crack 9.7 until this year, which suggests he definitely still has some growth to do.)

Fun fact, if Lyles (who had the worst reaction time out of the gate), had reacted as well as the best in the final, he runs about a 9.7 flat, which at least starts to get some people entertaining a Bolt challenger.

Another fun fact, while no one is seriously challenging Bolt any time soon, the level of competition is getting significantly better. If you had taken the runners in Paris and dropped them in Toyko just four years ago, the seventh best time in Paris would have won bronze in Tokyo.

I heard 5th place would have won gold. Maybe it was 4th.

[Mainevent]

4 years ago Lyles was running in the mid 9.9s. It's certainly harder to improve when you are already running 9.77, as Thompson is. But assuming he's maxed out at 23 seems questionable. There are more ways to improve than just the start. (saw your edit after this post)

The real question is probably if any of the real youngsters have truly high upside, - Tebogo (Botswana - 21), Asinga (Suriname - 19) and US teen Christian Miller (18) have the top 3 under 20 times ever. Youth speed doesn't always translate to world records or gold medals though. But there's a good bench of young guys for sure.

[froot loops]

I had to go look back and Main is correct. Bolt let up at the 2008 Olympics in setting the world record at 9.69 when he famously looked to the side as he reached the finish. He also showboated when he set the 200m at 19.19 in 2009 World Championships, but he didn't when he set the 9.58 100m record.

If any of those runners were to go sub 9.7 in the future, it's probably Lyle's. He's the fastest runner with a shitty start, if he lucked into a good start he could shave a tenth.