Our favorite part - The air surfers

We thought the best part of the Ceremony - at least watching it live, were the air surfers. In this photo it is a little hard to see, but it was dramatic during the ceremony. Many of the displays are better on TV, because as a spectator you are part of the display.

The ceremony made us really excited for Vancouver, as they passed the Olympic Flag from Torino to Vancouver. Four years seems like a long time, but it will be here before you know it. This will be our last post as we leave tomorrow to return home. It has been fun. We hope you have enjoyed the blog! We hope to see you all at the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Spokane from January 21 to 28, 2007. For more info on the Championships visit www.spokane2007.com In the Olympic Spirit! Toby and Barb

Wearing all of our garb for the Closing Ceremony

We received a bag full of items for the Closing Ceremony. The white ponchos, flashlights, silver bags that became flash cards, a seat warmer and a mask. It was great to be there and experience it live.

Joey Cheek - Closing Ceremony Flag Bearer

Joey Cheek was excited when we met him. Last night he carried the U.S. Flag at the Closing Ceremony. He won Gold in the 500 meter speed skating, and Silver in the 1000 meters.

Day Eleven

Our traditional photo with the flame. This photo is from the day we went to Hockey - so the weather was not as nice. Today is beautiful. Sunny and clear. Hopefully it will remain warm this evening for the Closing Ceremony. As many times as we have been to the games, this will be our first Closing Ceremony, so we are excited to see all of the pagentry live at Stadio Olimpico. We ran into Joey Cheek here at the USA House. He is very nice, and we are excited to see him carry the U.S. flag at the Closing Ceremony. He said he'll try to do a good job. We're sure he will!

Derrick Parra says hi!

We met Derrick Parra at USA House at the Salt Lake Olympics. He had won a gold medal that day, and his whole family came with him to celebrate his win. There were probably 30 family members there. The most memorable part of the evening to us, was one of his brothers that was there. He was so excited. He introduced himself to everybody there, as "I'm Derrick Parra's brother!" It was fitting to see Derrick again at USA House. We told him we'll see him again in Vancouver in 2010.

Short Track - One word - Wow!

Short Track Speed Skating was unbelievable! It was over the top fun - edge of your seat excitement.

Apollo Anton Ohno pulled out a thriller - to make it to the finals in the 500 meter race. In the semi-finals he came from behind to pull out a squeaker at the finish, and then went on to easily win the Gold Medal leading the entire race.

They saved the best for last with the 5000 meter men's relay. As great as Apollo's win was, the Bronze medal in the relay felt more important. It's 45 laps and we couldn't breath until it was over. My heart was beating out of my chest. We were sitting with all of the families of the team, and we were all screaming the whole time. At first it was all fairly close between Korea, Canada and the U.S. but as the laps went by, Korea and Canada moved ahead, and were battling back and forth for Gold, and there was quite a distance between the U.S. and Italy. But Italy continued to gain ground, and moved into the lead. When Italy passed the U.S. the entire place went crazy. Every Italian was yelling and jumping up and down. With just two laps to go, Apollo literally sprinted the entire lap, and pulled the U.S. back into the lead. We barely won the bronze. Rusty Smith's mom and dad and all of the families were laughing and crying at the same time.

Hockey Venue - Palasport

This is what the hockey venue looked like. The Palasport is about the same size as the Spokane Arena, seating about 11,000 spectators. A perfect size venue.

Day 10 - Short Track Speed Skating

Tonight we have Short Track Speed Skating. We are excited to watch Apolo Anton Ohno, our own Washingtonian! It will be a thrill, especially since we are sitting with the skaters parent contingent. You may recall, we got our tickets from skater Rusty Smith's father, Peter.

Butch and Shawn Rojeski

We mentioned earlier in the blog about our U.S. Curling team, and the significance of the day for them.
It was really touching to meet Butch, and hear him talk about his wife Bonnie who had passed away exactly two years ago. It was raining like crazy, and he said it's Bonnie, crying tears of joy for Shawn and the team.

Look who we found - Our U.S. Curling Team

These guys were so nice, and so excited to have won the first Olympic Medal for the U.S. in Curling. We are standing in front of a giant photo of all of the athletes marching in during the Opening Ceremonies. The photo is of the back of Shawn Rojeski and Pete Fenton, pictured far right and center respectively.

The guy on the far left, is Scott Baird. At 54 years old, he is the oldest athlete on the entire US Olympic team here in Torino.

Day 9 - We missed a day!

We just realized we missed a day - well actually we did the figure skating recap on day eight, but after a while the days all start running together. Today we had tickets to the semifinals for mens hockey. We were concerned about Team USA making it from the get-go. They didn't start out very strong, so we figured if they weren't in it we would just cheer for Team Canada. Woops! Well, so we went to the game - Sweden against the Czech Republic in the men's hockey semifinal. Sweden won 7 to 3 over the Czechs! However we thought the Czechs were having more fun. There were three young guys not wearing their shirts from the Czech Republic just a few rows behind us. It seemed a little cold for that. The hockey venue rocks. There were cheerleaders in the isles, and great music. It was a lot of fun!

Yea! How about that U.S. Curling Team!

Check back to the Blog entitled: Here we are at Curling. The new title reads: Now we feel really guilty! We watched Curling today from the USA House, and Team USA beat Great Britain for the Bronze medal.

This is the first time in history that the U.S. has medaled in Curling. Boy am I glad I talked Toby into going to Curling. We had so much more of an appreciation and understanding of what was going on as a result of having been to see it.

It was another of those great Olympic stories. The vice skip for the U.S. Team Shawn Rojeski, lost his mom two years ago today to ovarian cancer. His dad "Butch" Rojeski was here to cheer on Shawn. They talked about how sure they were that Bonnie, Shawn's mom was looking over them today as he attempted to make history. Gives me goosebumps!

Fun with Melissa Gregory and Denis Petukhov - their memories from Spokane.

Melissa Gregory and I were acting like Medalists with our flowers. Notice how small my bouquet is. That would be larger than my figure skating talent. Melissa, on the other hand, is very talented. Although they finished 14th over-all, they are on their way up, and they have been working really hard. They promised they are going to put out a great performance next January for the State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

Melissa and Denis were in Spokane for Skate America, and they had a great time. The Davenport Hotel was the Presenting Sponsor and Headquarter Hotel, so all of the delegation stayed at the Davenport. They were telling us before we took this picture that they loved their bed so much they bought one. Another great testimonial for the Northwest Bedding Davenport Bed!

Official Time clocks

Omega is the World Wide Time Clock Sponsor for the Olympic Games. So at every event, and throughout the Olympic Village and Media Center you will see these Official time clocks.

The window displays around Torino

Virtually every window of every store-front has an Olympic theme. These were just a couple of examples of very small shops getting into the spirit. The second photo was a very small sewing shop.

The streets of Torino are beautiful

Every major street in Torino is decorated with lights hanging above. This is planets, but each street has it's own theme. Some are colors, but most white lights. They are all beautiful.

Figure Skating Wrap Up

With the end of the Ladies competition, all of the medals for Figure Skating have been awarded. The ladies, as has been a custom, was an extremely exciting competition.

The highlight was definitely the first gold medal for Japan. Shizuka Arakawa of Japan skated a flawless program, and earned Japan it's first Gold Medal in women's figure skating. We were standing next to a couple of fans from Japan during the awards ceremony, and they were so excited. It was a perfect Olympic moment.

The Australian fans at Aerials

Ignore the hat that says USA, this is the Australia Fan Club.

Great Sponsor support.

Here is a billboard with the Olympic Sponsors. They have had excellent support from their sponsors at these games.

Toby's reaction to the fog - A little better

It was a foggy foggy night at Aerials up at Sauze d' Oulx Jouvenceaux.

Ladies Figure Skating Final Preview

Here we are - at the Figure Skating office a block away from the Palavela, site of Figure Skating here in Torino. We are looking forward to tonight, the Ladies Figure Skating Final. Tickets for tonight have been sold out, and the hottest ticket of the Games. The price for each ticket for tonight were $375.00. Which makes the price of the All-Event Ticket Package for the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships at $495.00 (a minimum of 15 tickets - one to every ticketed event, plus a practice pass) seem like a real bargain. Great seats are still available at www.spokane2007.com, or by calling 866-USA-2007. (You know we have to give our plug.)

The U.S. Team all performed great Wednesday night. We are hoping for a medal tonight, perfect world, maybe two. Keep your fingers crossed!

It's a small small world

The most amazing thing happened today. You never think when you travel half the way around the world you will run into somebody from your back yard - but we did. Today we made it all the way up to the mountain, and right before we were going to go into the gates to Aerials there was a little bar. Since we were early we decided to go into the bar, rather than sit in the cold. The bar was really crowded, but Toby found a place to sit next to three guys that were obviously Americans. I walked in and asked them where they were from. One of them said Spokane, Washington. I thought Toby had already been talking to them, and that they were pulling my leg. I said "Get outta here!" And the guy looked really surprized. He said "What do you mean?" Turns out, sure enough he and one of the other guys were from Spokane. So tomorrow you'll see photos on the blog of Tim Durkin, Paul Kirkpatrick, and Jeff Baeth. Tim and Paul are both from Spokane, and Tim is almost our neighbor. Tim is married to a former figure skater, and a great golfer - Lissette Carter. Jeff is from the Bay area, and when he found out we work with Figure Skating he asked if we knew Ron Hershberger. (See photo of Ron a few entries below.) Jeff's ex-wife used to work with Ron at a law firm in the Bay area. We just laughed and laughed. It's may be no big deal when you're from L.A. or New York, but when you're from Spokane, and you run into people from your home town, it's pretty amazing!

Freestyle Aerials Review

Let me start with the most noticeable feature of the day - Fog. It was very foggy on Sauze. But what a fun event to watch. We were sure they were going to cancel Aerials today. It was so foggy several times that you couldn't see the giant video screen, leave alone the mountain. The grandstands were in perfect postition to see the whole run, so when the fog did finally clear up, you were able to see them from start to finish. The ladies go really really high!

It's a very up-tempo event. There is great music playing the whole time, and there were cheerleaders. The announcer was Italian, with a great grasp of English, but most everything ended with an -o- or an -a-. So every time the gals would start their run, he would say. . . Let's go back up to the top-a. It was the first time I have ever heard an announcer curse. When we were waiting for the fog to lift he said "Let's get this damn fog out-a-here."

Unfortunately we did not have anyone from Team USA who made it to the finals. We sat next to two young girls from Australia, so we adopted Australia for the Aerials. The best part, is we are already down from the mountain, and it is not even 11:30 p.m. yet, so the day is still young.

Day 7 - Back to the Mountains

We are headed back to the Mountains to see Freestyle Aerials today, at Sauze d Oulx Jouvenceaux. It is another warm day here in Torino, but its always cold in the mountains, plus the competition does not begin until evening. The trip requires a bus ride, a train ride, and then a shuttle bus ride. It is a minimum of an 1 1/2 hour trip from Torino to any of the mountain events. It is always an adventure!

A fun day at the Figure Skating Venue

The ladies short program always creates quite a buzz. The anticipation is obvious. We sat next to two young ladies from Japan, who were great fans. They cheered loudly for everybody, and when a skater from Japan was on the ice, I thought they both might faint! They had two Japan flags, and one of the girls had created this very elaborate sign made of cloth, sequins, and rhinestones. It was elaborate, and spelled out Fumie Suguri. She finished in 3rd place at the end of the short program.

Meet the other Toby - A bronze medalist

Meet Toby Dawson - Here with his Olympic Bronze Medal for Freestyle Moguls.

The Ladies Short Program

Tuesday night was the beginning of the biggest drama of the Games. The Ladies Figure Skating Competition has begun. It was great to see that Team USA had come prepared to skate! The entire team were on their game. It started early, the second skater of 29 skaters, was our own Kimmie Meissner. She looked great. She held the lead for a majority of the night. She was finally knocked out of the lead by Russias Irina Slutskaya, who ended up in second place. When Emily Hughes skated, she performed a Personal Best, and skated as well as we have ever seen her skate. The spin to end her program was dramatic! Then the final skater of the night was Sasha Cohen. She looked beautiful. She skated a flawless program, and just squeaked into the lead by 3/100 of a point. So that all sets the stage for a very exiting program Thursday night. We can hardly wait.

Meet Gold Medalist - Tenley Albright

The lovely lady between Toby and I is Tenley Albright. Fifty years ago, she won the Olympic Gold Medal for Figure Skating right here in Italy. In 1956 the games were held in Cortina d Ampezzo, Italy. The gentleman to Barbs right is the President of U.S. Figure Skating, Ron Hershberger and to Tobys right is his wife Gayle.

Hello from the International Broadcast Centre

This is just one of many entrances to the IBC. It is amazing to see the infrastructure they build that is only going to be used for less than a month.

Here's Brian Boitano

We ran into Brian Boitano, 1988 men's figure skating Olympic Gold Medalist at the Figure Skating Venue.

Day 6 Visiting the media center

The U.S. Olympic Committee gave us a day pass to the Media Center. It is located in the old Fiat Plant. As you walk in, you walk under this huge concrete structure that winds up about 6 stories. It was their test track, to test out new vehicles. The Media Center is huge, with all of the international and national media, every newspaper outlet you can imagine. It is a hub of activity. I am currently borrowimg one of the computers from a friend of ours that works for the USOC media department. Tonight we have tickets for the ladies short program, as they begin their medals quest. We also have ticket to the ladies Free Skate Final on Thursday night, where we hope to see another U.S. Medal!

Meet the FIRST Olympic Silver Medalists in US History!

Here they are - as promised, Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto, Olympic Silver Medalists for Team USA! It has finally started to sink in - the significance of what we witnessed last night. It was the first time in 30 years that the U.S. medaled in Dance, but 30 years ago it was a Bronze medal - never before has the U.S. achieved such success in Dance. It's surreal!

Yea! Tanith Belbin & Ben Agosto win the Silver Medal

We are here at USA House waiting for Tanith and Ben to arrive. After winning the first medal for the US Team in Dance in thirty years, they went to do the media interviews, and they will be here soon. Check back tomorrow for photos.

Day 5

We started the day at our corner restauant, then proceeded to walk through the University District, where they have lots of displays set up for the Games. We caught a bus to the Vancouver 2010 House. They were having a private function with the Canadian Hockey Team, so we'll stop back later. Barb wants to get something with their logo on it.

We then caught a bus down to U.S. Figure Skating's office. It is just a block from the Figure Skating Venue, and they set us up here with a computer to do our blog. It is almost 6:00 PM, and we will be taking off to go see the Free Dance tonight, so we all have our fingers crossed for a Medal.

A Great Water Feature

This is a great idea for Spokane. They have set this up just for the games. They have two huge fountains pumping a great big spray toward each other. They have two big projectors projecting these images - like you can see here the Olympic rings, and the images change constantly. We could do this over the Spokane River. - Note to self.

Here we are at Curling

This is the Curling venue - You can't see much of what is behind us, but there are four long skinny sheets of ice, all four fit inside of a hockey rink area. Eight teams, or rinks, as they are called, can play simulatiously.

We sat with a group from Great Britian. We were right in front of two very avid fans. John, who took this photo of us, and Bob, who's son is the skip for the Great Britian men's team. The skip is the guy who throws the stone, and is responsible for the strategy for the team - basically the most important member of the team. It was ironic, because the next night our US team beat Great Britian's team. For some reason, we felt a little guilty.

These guys weren't having any fun at all

We ran into the Italian fans at the Curling venue. Right outside the curling venue there is a concessions area, that is almost a little restaurant. In one corner, these wild young guys from Italy had set up shop. They were singing songs, and every time someone came in if they could tell where they were from, they chanted the country's name, so when we walked in it was U-S-A. - U-S-A. - U-S-A. The entire table was covered with beer. Toby looks a little wimpy with his cup of cappaccino, wouldn't you say!

Toby has gone to the dark side

This photo was taken the night that Slovakia was playing USA in men's Hockey. We ran into these guys in the street, on the way to the game. They assured us they were going to win, and sure enough they did. They are one of the favorites. We have tickets to the men's semi-final game, so we just hope that the US team is still in it at that point. If not, I guess we know who Toby will cheering for.

So you're never far from Home

Our apartment is a little out of the main part of town. It is a few blocks north of all of the action. We are probably the only Americans in the area. But at the corner of block is a great little restauant. Pastries, paninis, and Cappaccino has become our staples. In the corner of the restaurant is this display of Budweiser, which to me looks a little incongruous with everything else here, but it is very popular here.

Lindsey Jacobellis with her Olympic Silver Medal

This is Lindey Jacobellis with her Olympic Silver Medal. We ran into her at USA House in the merchandise area. She was picking up some souvenirs for friends and family.

Photo from Snowboard Cross

This is the photo from Snowboard Cross. From the grandstand you can not see the whole course, but you can watch it all on the big screen. There is this sky-cam that is on a cable over the course that shoots the whole run. You can see them once they get about 1/3 down the course, but the photo from above is much better on the big screen, because you can see how wild the twists and turns are in the course.

You can even try your skills at figure skating

This rink was created in a circle around one of the statues in downtown Torino. Anyone can get out on the ice, and give it a go.

Sights from around Torino

This is a photo of USA House and Bud World. USA House is the big yellow building. It is a rowing club that has been taken over by the USOC. It is where every USA athlete that medals goes to celebrate. Bud World is right next door. It is the huge red tent, that was orginally planned to be used for the Pope's visit. According to their info - It is a six story pyramid shaped nightclub, located on the Po River accross from Piazza Vittorio in the city center of Torino. The club includes a multi-level bar with observation deck, a massive dance floor, DJ tower.

Meet Jim Shea Sr. and Jr.

This is Jim Shea Sr. and Jim Shea Jr. - Jr. won the Gold Medal in the Salt Lake Olympics in a crazy sport called Skeleton. You go head first on a tiny sled. It was the first time it had been an Olympic sport back in 2002.

Day 4

Day 4 -

Great night in figure skating for the USA! The Palevala was rockin with two Italian Dance teams in the final pairings in Original Dance. Three of the final five Dance teams fell during their programs. Our team of Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto were superb, skating flawlessly, they moved up from 6th place into medal contention in 2nd position. The only other team to skate without falling in the final group were the Russians, and they were excellent. We are pumped up for tomorrow's Free Dance.

Dan Jansen still looks great!

Look who we found

Look who we found at Club Bud. OK, this is another name that for you new fans to figure skating you're going to want to know. This is Evan Lysacek. Barb says isn't he cute? And he is as nice as the day is long. He will be in Spokane next year for the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships. If you want to know more about the U.S. Championships in Spokane check out www.spokane2007.com. Evan finished 4th here at the 2006 Olympics. But watch out for him in Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics!

This is Rusty Smith's mom with Toby

Here's one quick photo

This is yesterday at Snowboard Cross. Toby was having a great time. The sun was shining. Tomorrow we'll try to get more time and post a few more photos.

Day 3

Wow, the day went fast. I'm sitting here with Jim Shea - Jr. , 2002 Olympic Gold Medalist. We were at the Medals Ceremony the night he won the Gold Medal in Salt Lake. It was unbelieveable, now we're both sitting working on computers side by side. The Jr. is important to know, because tomorrow you will see the photo of Jim Shea Sr. and Jr. His dad was two time Olympian and his Grandfather was a two time Olympic Gold Medalist. They are the only family that has three generations of medalists.

It's almost 1:00 AM and this is the first chance we've had to get close to a computer, and give you an update. We are back at USA House after going to Club Bud. Ran into all of the Olympic Champions. It was great. We did not start out today with a ticket to an event, so Barb talked Toby into going to see Curling. Barb thought it was great. Toby was not so sure. The USA women's team played Italy. Team USA won 11 to 3 over Italy. This was the first time we have ever seen Curling. The most interesting thing we learned about Curling is that you can quit if you want to. After we got to 11 points, Italy decided to call it quits. We sat with a group of people who were from Great Britain. The one guy's son is the Skip on the men's team. We learned a lot about Curling. There's a lot of strategy like chess.

But the highlight of the day was when we were on a tram going to Curling, we ran into Peter and Paula, Rusty Smith's parents. Rusty was the bronze medalist in 2002 for Short Track Speed Skating. The one ticket we did not get, that we really wanted to go see, was Short Track Speed Skating. So we're on the tram, and they mention that they have extra tickets to the night of the Short track relay. On February 25th it's the 500 meter Mens final and the 5000 meter Mens Relay. It's crazy to watch the relay. There are five teams on the ice at the same time. And it's on the size of a Hockey rink. So Peter sold us two tickets!

Here at USA House

What a night. Every night at the end of the day of competition the medalists come by USA House, many of them with their families. Tonight Lindsey Jacobellis came by with her family. We met her mom and cousin, and got a picture with Lindsey. (We're still on a day delay getting pictures posted - so you'll see it tomorrow.) She is as sweet as can be. We got to hold her silver medal. They are a lot cooler looking than they appear on TV. I thought it looked like a CD when I saw the first one on TV, but they are really heavy, and about a half inch thick. They are actually beautiful.

We spent quite a bit of time with Toby Dawson, the Freestyle Mogul Olympic Bronze medalist, and his girlfriend. She was telling us his story. He was born in Korea, and abandoned at three years old. He was adopted by a couple that were both ski instructors in Aspen. When he was thirteen, his brother was going to a soccer camp, and so his mom sent him to a freestyle skiing camp. He loved it, and the rest as they say, is history. Gave us goosebumps! And he is just soaking in the moment - having a ball, and just as nice as can be.
Toby has new fans - Toby and Barb.

Day two - On the mountain

Day Two - We took the train up to Bardonecchia this morning to watch the women compete in Snowboard Cross. This is the first time this sport has been in the Olympics, and just like when we were in Salt Lake and watched Short Track Speed skating for the first time - we were rivetted.
Snowboard Cross is one of those sports where it seems like there is a lot of luck involved. Four snowboarders take off simultaniously from the gates, and travel down a run filled with turns and jumps. It's wild to watch - things change quickly. One of the heats we were watching, the three girls in the lead all crashed, and the gal from Brazil who was in fourth place in the heat, missed the crash, and won the heat. It's a hoot to watch!

It was a beautiful day. It was snowing lightly when we arrived, but then the sun broke out and it was great! The only bummer was, as Toby explained it best, Lindsey Jacobellis snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory. (You will all remember Lindsey from the VISA ads where the coach says "Come on Lindsey, focus")

She had the whole thing won. She was in the final heat running for the gold, was wwwaaayyy ahead of the other three boarders, and on the last jump she did a hot dog move - fell as a result, and was lucky everyone was so far behind her, because she was able to get back on track, and win the silver. Opportunity missed. Probably a lot of lessons learned.

Meet Neve and Gliz

Meet the Olympic Mascots - Neve and Gliz. Here's what they say about them:

Neve: She is a gentle, kind elegant snowball; Gliz: He is a lively, playful ice cube. They are the two symbolic characters of the Torino Winter Games.

Alberto Tomba

OK so it's not a great photo, but it was fun to see him. (Barb speaking now) He is still very cute! Yesterday we were at the sponsor area. Samsung has a huge pavillion. It was packed with Italian fans. They introduced Alberto Tomba and the place went crazy. He had a lot to say, but it was all in Italian, so we didn't understand much except really really fast, which he said a couple of times.

Photo with Mr. Ueberroth

So this is Peter Ueberroth. Mr. Ueberroth has several connections to the Pacific Northwest. His message - keep cheering for Team USA.

Here's the photo of Bonnie Blair

Here's the photo we promised of Bonnie Blair. She looks great doesn't she. We wish we could say as much about the two yayhoos on either side of her.

OK we've got to call it quits today.

OK, it's 1:15 AM and we have got to call it a day. We just got our picture taken with Dan Jansen. Our goal for tomorrow is to get all of the great photos we took today uploaded. Still having some technical challenges. We go to Snowboarding tomorrow morning (actually today), so we won't be able to blog until tomorrow afternoon, and hopefully it will include pictures. With the time difference it will actually be in the middle of the day your time. See you then!

Day 1 Review

Wow, what a day! It is midnight and putting the finishing touching on a day that actually has spanned about 48 hours. Just completed our first competition, the men's figure skating final. Evan Lysacek came from 10th in the short program into medal contention only to finish just out of the medals. Johnny Weir, second coming into tonight missed several combinations to finish out of the medals. We are proud of their effort.

Meeting with Mr. Ueberroth

Just met with Mr. Peter Ueberroth, Chairman of the United States Olympic Committee. (The head honcho) We talked about our phenomenal ticket sales thus far for the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships. We also talked about Spokane's bid for the 2009 World Figure Skating Championships.

Just saw Bonnie Blair

We just ran into Bonnie Blair. We got our picture taken with her, so now my mission is to get it onto this post. I need some equipment, so check back later. She looks great. The last time we saw her was at a U.S. Olympic Committee Golf Tournament. She said she hasn't had much time to golf lately but now her kids are getting old enough to golf with her.

We made it!

Well here we are. We made it to Torino. It's a little foggy but a beautiful day. We found our apartment. It took the taxi driver, and two guys on the street, but we finally located it. It's much nicer than we expected. It's a young guy - Paolo's - apartment. He moved out and is staying with his mom during the games. It's very close to USA House, which is where we are now.

Made it to Frankfurt

We are sitting in the airport at Frankfurt trying to determine our technical situation. Does the Cell phone work. Do we need to add an international package to the phone. Should I sign up for a months service for T-Mobile Hotspots. I wonder if Starbucks have Hotspots here? I'm sure we'll know the answers to all of this soon enough. The flight over the pond was great - uneventful. Our first trip on a Boeing 777. Nice quiet plane. We're half way across the world sitting here in the Frankfurt Airport with a guy who got on the flight with us in Spokane. He works for Triumph making plane pieces for Boeing airplanes. Cody is a great guy - assisting with our technical issues and letting us use his phone. We will get this communication system worked out here or when we get to the USA House in Torino.

Two of those thousand little stories

We've made it as far as Chicago! We're in the airport waiting for our flight to Frankfurt, and then on to Torino. On our flight in, the flight attendant told us all about a guy that was on the Water Polo team that went to Athens. Her entire home town lived on their every move - the whole community fell in love with Water Polo. We were returning messages, and spoke to Kate in Sandpoint who is cheering for Nate Holland. Nate is from Sandpoint and competing in Snowboard Cross.

Meet John Baldwin and Rena Enoue

Here's two figure skaters you can add to your list - John Baldwin and Rena Inoue. They are Pairs skaters - not Ice Dancers.

This photo was taken in St. Louis at the U.S. Championships.

Even though they finished in seventh place, they made Olympic history by being the first to complete a throw triple Axel at the Olympics. They did it successfully in their short program.

Here we go.

OK, so this is where we begin in earnest to try to keep in communication with you.  This is our last night in Spokane.  We leave tomorrow at O'Dark. 

 

A little bit of background.  This is who we are, and why we are doing this.  Toby and I organize Olympic Sporting events.  We live here in Spokane, and are currently organizing the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships which will be in Spokane January 21-28, 2007. 

 

We leave tomorrow for Torino, and will be there through the Closing Ceremonies.  Part work, part fun.  We promised some of the media that we would keep a blog for them of our travels and adventures.  We have never blogged before, so please don't be too critical. 

 

Toby has been to seven Olympic Games:  Los Angeles, Seoul, Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney, Salt Lake, and now Torino.  Barb has been to five:  Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney, Salt Lake, and Torino.  There is nothing like the Olympics.  It is a thousand stories, tons of dreams and emotions, and always the new most unlikely hero. 

 

Our goal is to familiarize many of you with the athletes that will be here in Spokane in just eleven month.  Here's a quick quiz. Besides Michelle Kwan name me six figure skaters.  Tough huh?  Well hopefully by the time we return a few of you will pass that test. 

 

We will be out of communication for a full day as we travel.  We arrive in Torino at 10:30 am on Thursday.  We will try to give an update as soon as we can after we land. 

Ciao!

 

Fierce Competition. Incredible Artistry. Amazing Grace

The eyes of the world will be on Spokane ~ site of the 2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships!

Get your tickets now www.spokane2007.com or call toll free 866-USA-2007.

 

 

Difference between Pairs and Ice Dance

After watching the pairs finals last night I've had three different people ask me what the difference is between Ice Dancing and Pairs.  Not that I am in any way an expert, but here goes my explanation.  What you saw last night was Pairs.  There are more throws and theoretically it is more athletic, with more jumps, lifts etc.  Ice Dancing was derived from Ballroom dancing, so again theoretically it's supposed to look like Ballroom dancing on ice.  I think the confusion comes in because as everyone gets more athletic, it becomes harder for the novice spectator to tell the difference.  Hope that helps!

Barb Beddor

2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships

PO Box 30099

Spokane, WA 99201

 

Fierce Competition. Incredible Artistry. Amazing Grace

The eyes of the world will be on Spokane ~ site of the 2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships!

For event information, please visit www.spokane2007.com or call toll free 866-USA-2007.

 

 

The Opening Ceremony - Our favorite things

The pageantry of the Opening Ceremony is always spectacular.  Our favorite thing was the looks on the faces of the athletes as they came into the stadium.  There's nothing captures the moment better.

We both liked all of the elements that took a great big group of people to make a symbol.  The beating heart,  and all of the people in white hanging from the poles to form a white dove - very cool!

The thing we thought was really weird was the music they chose to march in the athletes.  Using all of the old American hit music from the 70s and 80s instead of Olympic Fanfare type music was odd, but the athletes seemed to like it.  There's something a little odd about seeing teams from half way across the globe marching in to Village People's YMCA!

 

Barb Beddor

2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships

PO Box 30099

Spokane, WA 99201

 

Fierce Competition. Incredible Artistry. Amazing Grace

The eyes of the world will be on Spokane ~ site of the 2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships!

For event information, please visit www.spokane2007.com or call toll free 866-USA-2007.

 

 

Just checking the weather for Torino

Just checked the weather for Torino. Wow, the high today is going to be around 50 degrees! It's really hard to figure out what to pack, when you are going to be there for almost two weeks. Last week our friends with the USOC media were telling us that it had snowed a lot, and that snow was melting fast - hip-waders came to mind.

Fierce Competition. Incredible Artistry. Amazing Grace

The eyes of the world will be on Spokane ~ site of the 2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships!

Get your ticket now - visit www.spokane2007.com or call toll free 866-USA-2007.

We're getting ready

Here we are sitting looking at the TV schedule. Friday night is the Opening Ceremony. It lasts from 8pm to midnight. We'll be watching - I hope we can make it til midnight. It's very exciting knowing we'll be there 4 days later. Saturday night we'll watch the Pairs Figure Skating. We'll be cheering for Rena Inoue & John Baldwin and Marcy Hinzmann and Aaron Parchem. We know the US is a long shot in pairs, but we gotta cheer for them!