f**k you NBC!

[The Comrade]

is tampon changing an olympic level skill?

[Professor]

In all seriousness, I think it's highly likely that professional skiing is just as hard as professional motorsports. Or, to be exactly precise, professional downhill skiing (as a specific sporting event within the broader spectrum of "winter sports") is as hard as LMP-class sportscar racing (as a specific event within the broader spectrum of "motor sports").

After all, at any one world-championship event of either sport, there are 3 people who are on the podium, while the other 7.143 billion people on earth are also-rans (or never-rans).

[Dylan]

Competition is what makes things hard. It's dumb to compare what is "harder" when any measurement we have is just relative to others participating in the same activity.

Even dumber to get all pissy about a dumb argument

[jimmyz]

I know that a race car driver (even the ones going around left turns) experience high G force and muscle strain for hours on end and lose pounds of water weight during the race. Not to mention the mental stress of concentrating on not killing yourself or others in a crash while controlling thousands of pounds of race car going hundreds of miles an hour.

[Professor]

And, for almost every level of sports, when you aren't competing, you are practicing. When you aren't practicing, you're studying. When you aren't studying, you are preparing (exercising, eating right, etc.).

For instance, during the F1 off-season, scores of drivers eschew their multi-million F1 cars for ICC shifter karts and compete in competitions around the globe. Ayrton Senna, Lewis Hamilton, Michael Shumacher, Sebastian Vettel, Fernando Alonso - they all keep their skills up in the off season by driving karts. I've never personally raced against them (they are, literally, 4 levels of competition above me - the guy that won my heat, lost the next; the guy that won that one, lost the next; the guy that won that one, lost to Vettel), but I've been at the same event as them.

Same with almost every sport at that level.

[jimmyz]

[Professor]

[Spider]

[Mr.Bill]

I've been watching Olympic hockey all day long..LOL.. 1'-2' of snow coming today, what else is there to do?

Anyway the Olympic game is so much better to watch than the NHL game.. It's more wide open, less grabbing and tripping, less interference.. These guys got room to shake..

I use to really like NHL hockey, but over the years I became less interested in it because it's nothing but grabbing and holding.. It's like watching Jordan being held and grabbed everytime he got the ball..

But Olympic hockey? Very fast game, and a lot of fun to watch..

Canada and Norway on now..

[exploited]

Olympic hockey was even better when it was amateur IMO. But yes, the play is more about finesse and less about brute force. I like both aspects of the game but for most people, they enjoy watching the finesse aspect most.

The Netherlands and Norway are just killing it. I hope Canada has a good day and catches up. I also hope we can repeat the double Golds for hockey.