FanNation - The Republic of Sport

The Games have begun... and the pageantry began in full force for the Opening Ceremonies even as the aerial cameras failed to adequately capture the moment for the world's viewing pleasure due to persistent particulates in the air. Whether it be dust or fog or pollution I cannot say -- I am not in Beijing. But, watching the footage of the torch lighting by former Chinese gold medalist Li Ning as he performed new acrobatic feats, wires lofting him gracefully around the Bird's Nest and down in artful arcs to the torch, I recognize that the Chinese are dedicated to putting on a good show, even as they denied many of their own citizens the pleasure of witnessing that show together. Parks were closed and locked to public use; the few big screens which were placed up seemed to be the exclusive playthings of the autocratic elite. Call this government Communist if you will, but Karl Marx or even Mao Zedong would be spinning in their graves to hear the ideology of communism being bastardized in such an appalingly class-centered manner. But people were bound to be pushed aside -- as was written in one of the essays in Evil Paradises: Dreamworlds of NeoLiberalism (New Press, 2007 -- edited by Mike Davis and Daniel Bertrand Monk [ISBN: 978-1595580764]), the very stadium where the opening ceremonies took place was built on land which was essentially confiscated without compensation from poor Beijing residents. So to see journalists' full researching potential abridged or citizens' right to use collective technology abrogated is no real surprise regardless of any promises made to the IOC... nor is it surprising to see those at the IOC capitulating with each and every restriction clamped on by the Chinese...

But the Games got underway regardless of who did or did not get to witness them, or the location from which they were witnessed. The Olympics are one of the truly global events that ties together disparate sports fans from all corners of the globe, transcends the myriad differences in culture and language and ideology to forge a common understanding of our interconnectedness and unites them in the ostensibly-peaceful auspices of athletic competition for several weeks. And today the first gold medals were handed out. The first gold medal went to Katerina Emmons of the Czech Republic in the women's 10-meter air rifle shooting competition. Emmons won gold ahead of Russian Lyubov Galkina and Snjezana Pejcic of Croatia. Soon thereafter, the Chinese were celebrating their first gold of the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, their home games, the games to usher in a new future. Expected to dominate weightlifting competitions in Beijing, the Chinese started off on the right path. Chen Xiexia, in the women's 48-kilogram (106-pound) class, set a new Olympic record with a combined weight total of 212 kilograms (468 pounds). She lifted 95 kilos in the snatch and 117 in the clean and jerk to set Olympic records in both the clean and jerk and the combined weight total. Taking silver was Sibel Ozkan of Turkey; Chen Wei-Ling of Chinese Taipei took the bronze medal, neither eclipsing the 200-kilogram mark in their combined score...

Now, at 12:39 AM Pacific time (Eugene, Oregon), the Chinese have struck gold again. This time it was Pang Wei in the men's 10-meter air rifle competition. Completing the Asian sweep of the event were two competitors from either side of the world's most infamous DMZ -- silver went to Jin Jongoh of South Korea, bronze to Kim Jong Su of North Korea. The two countries may never walk together in an opening ceremony, but they can proudly stand aside one another atop a medal podium... the Olympics work in mysterious ways...

They also work in sad ways. They bring out the best in humanity, the best out of the world's best athletes, but they can also bring out the worst side of both athletic competition and human nature. Tassos Gousis, a 29-year-old Greek sprinter, tested positive for methyltrienolone, a synthetic steroid, in pre-Olympic drug testing by the Greek National Olympic Committee. The Greek federation is analyzing the B-sample as I type, attempting to avert a disaster like the 2004 Olympics wrought even before the IOC issues a single test. This proactive nature, while sad when it discovers that someone was not trustworthy, is nonetheless refreshing to see. In cycling we have seen this recent turn of attitude in the internal testing programs being instituted by the sport's top teams, the CSCs and Columbias and Garmin-Chipotles and Astanas. Now national federations, too, are taking responsibility for cleaning their own houses and doing the dirty work before the IOC has to... let's hope, first, that this was a false negative for Gousis... but if the B-sample comes back positive, don't question the validity of the Games NOW... question the validity of them throughout history, before nations policed themselves and tests were advanced enough to detect the wide array of banned substances on IOC and WADA lists...

That's all the news from Beijing for now... stay tuned for updates from cycling's men's road race which is seventy kilometers from completion as of this printing... and enjoy all the diverse action from China these Olympics, whether as an ardent fan of a specific nation or sport or as a casual, neutral observer!