I always enjoy watching the Olympics; the summer games and the winter games. While watching the 2022 Winter Olympics from Beijing over the past two weeks I’ve made several observations.

Hockey is one of my favorite sports, so it stands to reason that I would enjoy watching the Olympic hockey tournament, featuring teams and players from so many countries that you don’t get to watch on a regular basis. For the second Winter Olympics in a row, the hockey competition is a bit different, since the NHL decided to not allow its players to participate. The league released the following statement on Dec. 22;

“The National Hockey League respects and admires the desire of NHL Players to represent their countries and participate in a ‘best on best’ tournament. Accordingly, we have waited as long as possible to make this decision while exploring every available option to enable our Players to participate in the 2022 Winter Olympic Games,” NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman was quoted in the release. “Unfortunately, given the profound disruption to the NHL’s regular-season schedule caused by recent COVID-related events — 50 games already have been postponed through Dec. 23 — Olympic participation is no longer feasible,” Bettman added.

The U.S. hockey team general manager and coaches then scrambled to put a team together of minor league, college and former NHL players. So far, in the first few games I’ve watched, the U.S. team is very good and had a 3-0 record going into the medal round. This team could very well win the gold.

Regarding the hockey uniforms, I really like the U.S. white uniforms with the blue band around the chest, however, the dark blue uniforms with black trim are horrible looking. Team Canada was wearing red uniforms with a black maple leaf on the chest, and the logo wasn’t even the same leaf shape as is on the Canadian flag. It looked more like a marijuana leaf than a maple leaf. Plus, there wasn’t any white in the trim. Canada’s traditional colors are simply red and white.

Skeleton, now there’s a sport that’s not for the faint of heart. Granted, all the ice track sports appear to be extremely dangerous; including, luge and bobsled. However, going 80 mph down an ice track, head first on a skeleton sled, with your chin three inches from the ice seems not only dangerous, but a bit crazy.

For as long as I can remember, there has been bobsledding in the Olympics; the two- and four-person varieties. This year, there is a brand new single-person event they’re calling monobob. That means, one person has to multitask while racing down a sheet of ice at 75 mph. That individual has to not only get a good running start while pushing the bobsled by himself, but then drive the thing be steering with a couple of wires, and brake at the bottom of the run. This has been very entertaining to watch.

Speaking of bobsleds, do you remember when former TU football player Todd Hays, was on the U.S. bobsled team? He competed from 1994 to 2006, including two Winter Olympics. Hays won the silver medal in the four-man event at Salt Lake City in 2002, breaking a 46-year medal drought for the US national bobsleigh team. He went on to become a coach with the U.S. team and later with the Jamaican bobsled team. Hays is also a former Mixed Marshall Arts fighter.

I’m still a big fan of curling. If you think it’s boring, well, you may not quite appreciate the skill and strategy involved in the sport. I attempted it once, and it was extremely difficult just trying to keep my balance when squatting down on one leg to release the rock, while sliding on a sheet of ice.

It was great to see how emotional Shaun White was after his last snowboarding run. Following the event, he expressed his gratitude to his family, his fans, and his first love; snowboarding. The 35-year-old is a five-time Olympian and a three-time Olympic gold medalist in half-pipe snowboarding. He made the sport an Olympic mainstay, when it began only as a demonstration sport, and he will be missed from future competitions.

Ski jumping still amazes me. It’s one of those sports like pole vaulting, that I don’t understand how you do it the first time. Flying through the air, four stories above a snowy slope, with the hopes of landing on two skis, is just a scarry proposition.

Speed skating is another favorite of mine. What degree of angle are those skaters when they go around those turns, anyway? That’s amazing, and they’re still able, for the most part, to keep their blade edges without slipping. The speed and skill it takes to do what they do is greatly appreciated. I can ice skate, but speed skating is a whole other thing.

Sorry, but I’m convinced I’m still not interested in figure skating. That’s all I’ll say about that.