Day 14 held one of the events that many people look forward to the most, that is, the ladies’ free program. Today was also the continuation of the second run for the women’s giant slalom, the women’s 4×5 km cross country skiing relay, curling semifinals, the men’s aerials final, women’s hockey finals, and the nordic combined long hill/10 km sprint.

In figure skating, Kim Yu-Na of South Korea blew the competition away, receiving the highest score since the new scoring rules were put into place. Mao Asada of Japan won the silver, while Joannie Rochette of Canada won the bronze. All three skated well, although Rochette had a couple tiny mistakes. The United States’ Mirai Nagasu gave a lovely performance for fourth place, while Rachael Flatt gave a solid performance for seventh place. This marks the first time since the 1964 Innsbruck games where a skater from the USA did not make the medals stand in ladies’ figure skating.

The ladies finished the second run of their giant slalom today. Julia Mancuso had the third fastest run of the day, but it was not enough to bring her back from yesterday’s disastrous rerun, after being stopped because of Lindsey Vonn’s crash. Germany’s Viktoria Rebensburg took the gold.

In the ladies 4×5 kilometer relay, Norway won gold, Germany was second, and Finland was third. As in yesterday’s men’s race, the gold medal anchor was well ahead (Marit Bjørgen), while the real race was for silver. While Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla made up a lot of time in the third leg, the lead was lost in the fourth leg, and they came in fifth. Kikkan Randall of the United States finished her leg in fourth place, but the US wasn’t able to keep up with the Nordic countries, and came in 12th.

In men’s curling, Canada will play Norway on Saturday for gold and silver medal determination. Sweden and Switzerland will play for the bronze medal. Tomorrow, the women’s Canadian team will play Sweden for the gold, while Switzerland will play China for the bronze.

In men’s aerials, Alexei Grishin won the gold for Belarus, while Jeret “Speedy” Peterson won the silver for the United States. Liu Zhongqing of China took the bronze.

The Canadians must be happy today. Their women’s hockey team beat the United States for the gold. The US took the silver, while Finland won the bronze.

The United States had a great day in Nordic Combined. Bill DeMong won the gold medal, and Johnny Spillane took the silver. The United States had never even won a medal in Nordic Combined prior to these Olympics, and this year, not only does the US get its first medal, it gets four medals, one of them being gold. In fact, the US received more Nordic combined medals than any other country this year.

The United States continues to lead the medal count with 32 medals. Germany is second with 26, while Norway has 19.

Kumaritashvili was sliding down the fastest part of the track, when he slid out of control, flew over a wall, and hit a steel beam. He was knocked unconscious, then died after he arrived at the hospital.

Georgia is considering dropping out of the Vancouver Olympics entirely, and are unsure of whether they will be participating in tonight’s opening ceremonies.

Some are calling for the cancellation of all sliding events after this tragedy. The Whistler track is dangerous; the athletes are achieving speeds that are faster than previous tracks. However, the Olympics only come once every four years. Not everybody will have the opportunity to compete in Sochi in 2014. Rather than cancelling the event, my take on it is that if anything is to be done, it would be better for everyone to either slow down the ice, move the starting gate further down the track, install safety measures, or move the event. If they can helicopter in mountains of snow, like they have been with Cypress Mountain, they can find a way to make the show go on.

Since the Winter Olympics began in 1924, Kumaritashvili has been the fourth Olympian to die in the winter games. The first two deaths occurred in 1964, after Australian skier Ross Milne struck a tree during a training run. During the same year, British luger Kazimierz Kay-Skrzypecki also died in a training run. Oddly enough, in 1964, the Olympics was also facing a lack of snow; the Austrian army trucked in ice from elsewhere. In 1992, Swiss skier Nicholas Bochatay died after crashing into a snow grooming machine.

While this event is a tragedy, the other athletes do have a choice over whether to compete or not. Engineers should do whatever they can to make the event as safe as possible, but it would be unfair to everyone else to cancel the event.

The Olympics are only three days away. Have you set your Tivos to record your favorite events yet? My husband wants to watch American Idol on some of the nights, but fortunately, NBC airs repeats of the primetime events in the middle of the night.

I mentioned a few days ago that the IOC had a problem with Australia’s boxing kangaroo. During their recent meeting, they decided that the Kangaroo could say. Good decision. Evidently, the Kangaroo is quite popular, and athletes are getting their picture standing with it.

The United States is used to getting skiing medals nowadays, but that wasn’t always the case. Prior to the 1964 Innsbruck Olympics, no American man had ever won a medal in an alpine event. American woman Penelope Pitou had won two silvers in 1960, Gretchen Fraser won gold in 1948, Andrea Mead Lawrence won gold in 1952, and Betsy Snite won a silver medal in 1960, but that was about it. All of that changed in 1964, when William Kidd took the silver medal in slalom and James Huega won silver (another American, Wallace “Bud” Werner, came in eighth). Huega died yesterday at age 66 of multiple sclerosis.

The Biggest Loser tonight features US Short Track Speedskaters tonight. It will come on during primetime in the US, which is either 7 or 8 PM, depending on what part of the country you live in. It is two hours long, but it does come on at the same time as American Idol.