The World Competes

Whistler View by kholz87

Today was a quiet day for competition. The big event for the day was the ice dancing finals. The cross-country team sprints for men and women took place, as well as freestyle skiing aerials qualifications, ice hockey semifinals, and the ski jumping team large hill.

Ice dancing was great this evening. Meryl Davis and Charlie White skated an awesome performance to Phantom of the Opera. It was enough to win the silver medal. Canada’s Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir came in first, although I personally did not find it as engaging as the second place performance. Russia came in third, while USA’s Belbin and Agosto finished in fourth (but they skated great).  This placement marks the first time anybody from North America has won an ice dancing gold medal.  Sinead and John Kerr, British siblings, performed an interesting move where Sinead picked up her brother! Another performance that I enjoyed was Isabelle Delobel and Olivier Schoenfelder of France skating to “The Impossible Dream”.

In the cross country team sprint, Norway won gold for the men, while the Germans won for the ladies. German men took silver for the men, while Sweden won silver for the ladies. The Russian men and women both won bronze.

It was a good day for Germany and Norway in ski jumping as well. They took silver and bronze, respectively. Austria took the gold with a runaway win. The US team did not qualify for the finals, and Simon Amman did not compete today, as Switzerland did not have a team in the competition.

The aerials qualifiers were held in freestyle skiing today. The United States qualified two men, Ryan St. Onge and Jeret “Speedy” Peterson. Scotty Bahrke, Shannon Bahrke’s younger brother, did not qualify, along with Matt DePeters. It was an exciting event to watch.

The women’s ice hockey semifinals took place today.  The United States beat Sweden, while Canada beat Finland, to make it to the gold medal round, which will take place on Thursday.

Ladies figure skating begins tomorrow, as does men’s giant slalom and the debut of women’s ski cross. It should be a good day. Currently, the medal count stands at 25 medals for the US, 21 for Germany, and 14 for Norway.