PyeongChang 2018 Day 1 Review
The first day of competition is complete for the 2018 PyeongChang games and what a day we have had! If you're Australian it's been filled with endless coverage and replays of the moguls, if you're Canadian you're actually getting to see the games! There has also been some excitement for New Zealand with it soon set to be a national holiday in recognition of the great Carlos Garcia Knight. There has also been some late nights for Jarrod & Ben with the epic ski jumping being exciting when it really shouldn't be. We also get excited over pink guns with ponies on it, that great TV show 'Games of Throne' as well as trying to work out why the Koreans aren't going to the events, decoding why Channel 7 really sucks at covering the Olympics and working out if the Moguls are more important than 'My Kitchen Rules'. It's all in another days work for us here on Off The Podium!
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Please note this is an automated transcript that may contain errors.
BEN WATERWORTH: Hello and good morning everybody on Off The Podium, as we come to you once again during our coverage here of the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics. Day one is done and dusted. And if you're Dutch or German, you want the Olympics to end right now because you've had a very good day. If you're the Norwegians, well, you don't want it to end because you haven't won a gold yet. And if you're Canadian or Australian, you haven't even realised the games have started because nothing has come your way as of just yet. It's been an exciting day. One so exciting that two of us have gone to bed only two hours ago because the bloody ski jumpers don't know how to jump very well. My name is Ben, otherwise known as the Mustached Ski Jumper who wins bronze. We're going to get to him throughout this coverage. Joining me, I only have two people today. One person is still in bed, the lucky duck. The other, well, I don't know, there was not another person that joined us apparently. First, let's start with Jarrod Loobeek. He's from Emu Plains, and he's also up early at 5.12am to record this episode. Jarrod, hello. Welcome back to Off The Podium.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Thanks for having me back. Yeah, today it will be low bake in honour of the Dutch success.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, yes, exactly. Oh, that's a good point. I'm joining us also from Canada, one man who's not complaining about the time, because it's like lunchtime for him, and probably a good time, because I don't even hear a baby crying as well. So don't get used to recording at this time, Colin. It is Colin Hilding from Winnipeg in Canada. Hello, Colin.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, I've locked myself in a room right now to get away from the screaming baby. But I still consider myself the lucky one, because it's a decent hour here.
BEN WATERWORTH: It is, it is. But it's the Olympics, so I wouldn't be getting up at this time in the morning to cover any of our other podcasts, particularly things like the qualifying lap and things like that. Don't get me started. But we've had an enjoyable first day. Five gold medals were decided, five silver medals were decided, five bronze medals were decided. I'll start off with Jarrod first of all. Before we get into some news on our own countries here and also the events that we talked about. But you're enjoying these Olympics so far, Jarrod? I mean, does it make you want to grow a moustache at all or take up ski jumping?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, the events that I'm seeing, I'm enjoying, but I'm sure we'll talk about that more later. But yeah, no, it's been great. It's nice to finally get to some finals and see the sound of a competition kind of just shoot through the roof.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, yes. I believe that there's some Olympics going on, we should mention. I mean, between... I think the only events actually that are happening from an Australian perspective are the moguls qualifying, the moguls qualifying. I think the moguls qualifying is happening, followed by the moguls qualifying. Chubby Pullman was interviewed, then the moguls qualifying was on. The moguls qualifying, I think, was on then, Jarrod. Maybe a bit of snowboarding, then the moguls qualifying, and then I think they might have crammed in all the events into about five minutes towards the end of the Channel 7 coverage. But they want you to download the app, though.
JARROD LOOBEEK: And don't forget about the highlights of the opening ceremony, which consisted of a repeat of the entire thing except for the Korean guy's speech, which they cut out, but the rest of it was all highlights.
BEN WATERWORTH: Not Thomas Bach's speech. It was the entertaining guy's speech they cut out. They kept Thomas Bach's in. And all five hours of children growing up. Colin, you have something going on for us there?
COLIN HILDING: Well, first I just want to ask, in all that coverage, did they at any point mention the lack of belly rubbing going on in the speed skating that obviously had an effect on some results?
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, yes, I'm glad you brought that up. But in defence of Andy, I think maybe he didn't really have time at the start. I mean, if you actually notice, when they get called to the start line, they've got about two seconds before they've got to get into the event. I'm assuming he maybe meant if he makes the final, because then they've got about ten minutes once they get introduced in that final. So I forgive Andy for not going through with his words.
COLIN HILDING: No, I'm going with, if you make a promise on Off The Podium to rub your belly and you don't do it, you lose, okay? That's what happened.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, look, let's be honest. So far, three out of the four that we've had on this show that have competed so far have made the final. And the one who has competed in a final didn't win a medal. So we are officially the Campbell Sisters podcast of Olympic podcasting. Colin, how did you enjoy day one? You know, a little bit more successful for Canada. I mean, you know, you did all right in at least one event.
COLIN HILDING: I mean, well, the slope style is looking really good for Canada right now. I mean, we qualified in the top two spots for men's, and there are two more that made the finals as well. Speed skating is what I spent the majority of the day watching. And I have to say, I don't think I've ever been this uptight watching speed skating. I mean, there's a lot of, you know, ooh, this guy's finger touched this guy's thigh. I think that we may have a judgment call, and he's going to advance it. A lot of people seem to be advancing just based on, like, minor contact and stuff like that. But, I mean, it made it very entertaining to watch. The funniest thing was just on Canadian TV. You know, obviously Charles Hamlin, he made the finals, and there was so much hype about, you know, this being his final Olympics that he's only one medal away from tying the all-time record for most career medals won, only two away from breaking Cindy Claussen's all-time record. And there was a lot of talk even just through all of the heats and the semifinals and everything. And then it got to the finals, and it was just Charles Hamlin, Charles Hamlin, Charles Hamlin. And then as soon as he started dropping off, and all of a sudden he's at the back, they just stopped mentioning his name, and then the whole race is over. And I swear, they're not even acknowledging he's in there. It's like he is dead to us now that he did not win a medal in this.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just like he used to off the podium, you know. Our guests who choke in these finals. God damn it, Brit Cox and Andy Norty, no pressure on you tonight. Um, it's fascinating because, you know, when we get to our sort of a bit here when we usually talk about, you know, what we watched, I really think it's a case of I think I watched everything today, well, yesterday. We should establish that. This is where it gets tricky sometimes when we say today and yesterday, because at the time of recording this, day two is only what about four hours from starting, but we're covering day one and then therefore we're going to be probably coming to you later on today to cover day two. So you're almost going to get two episodes from us today just because of the way we're going to be trying to cover the moguls a little bit later on. But yeah, I love short track speed skating, but I didn't realise it could get so bloody technical. And the fact that you've got to spend 10 minutes like today is literally a waiting day as much as I enjoy the sports. From waiting from the ski jumpers to wait for a bit of wind to die down, from waiting to the short track speed skaters to have every single thing looked at when it comes to the judges, to waiting for Channel 7 to stop showing the moguls qualifying. Yeah, it was one of those days. But we should look at some results here of our respective nations. Similar to Rio, one won't take that long. One will take a little bit longer than the other. This time around, it's Australia, which won't take that long. Jarrod, we had three athletes, four athletes in competition today when it comes to cross-country skiing, luge and short track. We'll start off with our man Andy Jung. Spoke to him only a couple of weeks ago, the belly rubber himself, and didn't quite live up to that. But he made it into the semi-finals. Luckily, I should say, I didn't say luckily. Let's be honest. The Italian short track speed skater, I don't know his name. He's Italian. He wanted to dive at some point. But he was blocking Andy the entire time. He got his just desserts when he eventually crashed out. And then he got penalized. And Andy, rightfully so, got put into the semi-final to where he completely got waltzed all over. Sadly, couldn't make it through to the A-final or the B-final. He does have his pet event, the 500m to come. And I want to correct myself. Yesterday, I said it was the, I think the 3,000m, I went the other direction. I do listen to people when they talk to me on interviews. But just quickly on Andy, I just wanted to say, Jarrod, I mean, what were your thoughts on Andy? I mean, I was impressed by him for an event that this isn't his strong suit. He's a sprinter. He enjoys the 500m more. He interviewed very well afterwards, I think, in his honest assessment of what happened in it. But yeah, I was impressed with Andy's performance in that event.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I thought he did really well. I was so excited for him to get out of that heat after what happened, and especially the time that they took to review the footage, and then you hear the commentator saying, I think it was actually the Australian. I'm like, don't you even dare. Don't you dare disqualify him. I was like, he got cut off here in the inside lane. Don't you dare. But then yeah, the semi-final was, it was a bit of the Bradbury strategy that didn't really pay out this time around.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, he definitely did take that Bradbury position and just hover around the back. The Italian was Yuri Konfotola. Of course it's Yuri. He's renowned for his cheating ways. Rightfully so, he was penalized. But yeah, I like that with the commentators too. I'm pretty sure, like they sound too unenthusiastic to be American, but the thing is they sound like nice enough to be Canadian, but then they don't seem to get excited enough for the Canadian skaters. So I don't know, maybe it's like a Canadian who defected to Britain or something like that. But like I don't know why Bradbury's not there commentating. Like I don't know why we have expert commentators in the luge, but we don't have a commentator in the short track, an event we've won medals in before. We'll get to that when we get to our Channel 7 coverage maybe a little bit later on. Our other athletes, speaking of the luge, Alex Filazzo, I wanna say. I do listen to how they pronounce their names. I think he's gonna become a cult figure here in Australia, Jarrod, because this guy is awesome. He was 16th after his first run, a 48.073, dropped to 27th, a 48.587, and I believe he's gonna be in the top 20 to get a fourth run on his third run this evening, or tomorrow, day two, whatever you wanna look at it. He's got the hair, he's got the personality. You know, if he gets his results, Jarrod, I can't see Luge not becoming at least the top five sport in this country.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, if he gets that fourth run, yeah, parties in Australia, parties with his Latvian buddies. Yes. Yeah, it's gonna be great for the two countries.
BEN WATERWORTH: Even his Latvians, he's going off. He trains with the Latvian National Luge Team, a goal that all Australians aspired to growing up, I don't doubt. And our other two Aussies in action. No, it wasn't Britt Cox and everyone else. They competed the day before, but Channel 7 wouldn't let you believe that. And the cross-country skiathlon. Speaking of events that can take off in Australia. Wow, this had everything. There was seven and a half kilometres of skiing, they had a pit stop, and they had another seven and a half kilometres of skiing. I was absolutely hooked to my television. Sadly, Barbara Jezusek wasn't. She was only 39th, 44 minutes, 39 seconds,. 3. And Jessica Yeaton, the rivalry between these two, it was Barbara who came out on top, but Jessica got a 45, 44.8. She was in 50th position, top 50 for Jessica. No mean feat. Did you pay much attention to the Aussies in the skiathlon there, Jarrod?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Well, I kind of tried to, but it was a bit difficult when they were about to cross the line, and then we had a channel change, and we didn't bother to show them finishing in typical Channel 7 fashion. But no, the skiathlon was great. The favourite part for me was just how the person who won, Charlotte, she was just with the rest of the pack, and I swear I looked down for two seconds, and all of a sudden they're like, she's 20 metres ahead now. Look at that burst of speed. And I was like, where did that come from? That just takes some skill to be there one second and not the next, so I think there should probably be an inquiry into some of her gear, just to check out that she didn't have Rockets on this case.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, yeah, I agree. And soon to be in 2022 Olympic athletes from Sweden or something like that competing. All right, we're done. Colin, next 20 minutes, talk about all the Canadians that competed, because I think you had a few more.
COLIN HILDING: I was hoping you had some results of Canadians because the Olympic.ca website decided to stop responding completely. I can go off the top of my head though, I'm sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: Go for it, you know, and I'll help you out.
COLIN HILDING: Well, I mean, the big one, obviously, the 1500 speed skating finals. There was a bit of a surprise there, I guess, as Samuel Gerard made the finals on, one of the many technicalities, and Charles Hamlin, the favourite, ended up being disqualified, which to me just was weird. I mean, you guys watched that, right?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, yeah.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, the 1500 metre final, they showed replay after replay of that, and I couldn't find one moment where he touched another skater. And meanwhile, we're going through all these other ones where guys are like side-kicking each other with their blades, and they're getting through. And it's just, I just wish we had one clip to show how he got disqualified there. But Samuel Gerard almost by default makes fourth place, could have almost by default won a medal, but sadly he didn't. He gets to be the hero over Charles Hamlin. The slope style, as I said, we qualified number one, number two, Max Perot was number one, and then Mark McMorris, who is one of the Canadian heroes from Sochi, just because he won bronze in slope style while his ribs were broken. So they're the top two qualifiers. And then we had two others. I don't have their names in front of me because Olympic dossier website sucks, but they qualified, I think it was in eighth and ninth. Ben can probably confirm that. And there was somebody in the ski jumping. Who kind of felt like Eddie the Eagle to me because they're building it up. Like, you know, if he makes this, he will break the all-time Canadian record. And then he was like, you know, 22nd place or something like that. And that's all I know. Oh, other than of course mixed doubles curling as we talked about on the opening ceremony, it's, you know, amazing how quickly things change. Laws and Morris who lost their first match against Norway have now won five straight after that. So they're five and one and they just beat the Olympic athletes of Russia eight to two. So that's the big one for Canada.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I'll go through the other Canadian ones and just in general, all the results here now while I've got everything open. Can I just say, I saw a bit of the curling and Caitlin Laws, I'm a fan. She is-
COLIN HILDING: I figured you would be.
BEN WATERWORTH: She seems like a very nice lady. I'm sure she's fun to hang out with.
COLIN HILDING: She's a local lady too. She's from Winnipeg and basically makes appearances here all the time and curls out at Winnipeg. I've never had the chance to run into her though. You can come back to Winnipeg and I'm sure we could, sure we could set up a meet and greet.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm back in Winnipeg. Those who are wondering, plenty of curling that happened on day one. So China defeated the US, this is the mixed doubles. China defeated the USA 6-4, Norway defeated Finland 7-6 in that epic match. Oh, that's a match of the ages, 7-6 there. It came down to the final, what do you say, end, round? What do you call those things? End, thank you, 7-6. Canada defeated Switzerland 7-2, the Olympic athletes from Russia 6-5 over South Korea. Then as you mentioned, Canada defeated the Olympic Russian, thrashed them 8-2. Switzerland defeated South Korea 6-4, USA 10-3 over Norway, China 10-5 over Finland. And in the final rounds of the day, they are happening today, as in day two, Sunday. So the standings for that, I do believe Canada have already qualified. Am I not mistaken there, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, for the semis.
BEN WATERWORTH: The top four nations go to the semis. So Canada's already through. So in second place currently, Olympic athletes from Russia, followed by Norway and Switzerland. So they're your top four at the moment, semifinalists potentially. But Canada are locked into the semis, so you've got a 75% chance of a medal in curling. Who would have thought? So other ones, just quickly, non-medal event, Canada didn't compete, but just in the ice hockey results yesterday, we had two games going on in which Mallory would have gotten super confused watching this because both Switzerland and Sweden played. But I was loving Sweden vs Japan. This is a women's round, Rob, and I should mention. That was a tight game. Sweden took that one in the end. Speaking of fans, I'm a fan of the Sweden women's hockey team as well. They seem very nice to hang out with. 2-1 over Japan. Was that shown much there in... It's hockey, of course it was shown much in Canada, wasn't it?
COLIN HILDING: It was. That's what I woke up to, actually.
BEN WATERWORTH: Did you watch much of it, Jarrod, on the app at all?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I did just see a little bit of the in-between sweeping of the ice and the third. I thought hockey had four quarters. I just got really confused. Is it three or is it in thirds?
BEN WATERWORTH: Three periods, yeah.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, because I got confused because it was third and then it finished and I was like, I thought it was four, I'm so confused. But no, that makes sense, thanks.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I just want to establish that I was also very much enthralled with the in-between, intermission Zamboni watching on the app. That was so exciting. They certainly focused a lot on the Zambonis going up and down. I think, Jarrod, we established on Twitter that that's the Korean ice dancing team, isn't it?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, exactly.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's amazing, it's amazing. Sweden also, sorry, Switzerland, see I'm doing a Mallory now, they thrashed the team from Korea 8-0. Now, let's be honest, I bet you South Korea now are wishing they didn't ask the North Koreans to play with them, because if North Korea wasn't on that team, I think they probably might have maybe only lost 7-0, I don't know. Special props can I mention to the North Korean cheer squad in the audience who just were going off. Did you see that, any of you? Like they actually kept just showing just the North Korean supporters. They just had these like in unison cheering going on. I think they're just told to, they're like, if you don't cheer in unison, we'll kill you.
COLIN HILDING: That's, yeah, I mean, that's, you know, I guess the retaliation from the lack of enthusiasm in the opening ceremonies.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just back up to the curling as well. Can I just say the curling was packed when you looked at the crowd. We're going to talk about the crowds, I think, a little bit, because when we get to the ski jumping, I don't know if they realise in Korea that the ski jumping is part of the Olympics, because no one was there. I mean, I think Jarrod and I were almost included in the crowd there for staying up to 2.30 in the morning to watch it. The Luge, after 2 runs at the moment, Felix Lopron, Germany's leading ahead of David Gleischer of Austria, and Roman Replov of the Olympic Athletes from Russia, Canadians Sam Ednees in 5th after 2 runs. You've got another Canadian, Reid Watts. Looks like he's in about 11th or 12th there. Mitchell Malik, another Canadian. He's down a little bit further. Our Australian, Alexander Falazo, as I mentioned earlier, and bringing up the rear, for those who are wondering. Andrey Mandzey of the Ukraine. Disappointing. I spoke to him the other day. He was expecting more than that. Short track speed skating. You've mentioned a few results there, but can I just mention in the 3000 metre relay heats that what an event. God, I love the relays in the short track. I mean, Australia, we're just very fond of this. We won our very first Olympic medal, of course, in that back in 94, but it's good news for Canada. Colin, you're through to the final. You went through with South Korea in the first semifinal, and China and Italy will join you. And God, did not the Italian coach not go off? I don't know if either of you saw the Italian coach after that semifinal. He went absolutely gangbusters in that one. Sadly, the Netherlands, Japan.
COLIN HILDING: Lindsey Vonn would have a field day with that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes. Hungary and the Olympic athletes from Russia all through to the B final. Also, you mentioned, yeah, the 1500 metres. The gold medal. We should just quickly go over those results quickly. Gold to Korea. Lim Hyo-Jun in an Olympic record time took out the first gold for the host nation, defeated the Dutch skater. Now, I'm going to butcher this one. Is it Jinky Negget? I'm assuming those letters are silent in beforehand there. And Simeon Elesterov from the Olympic Athletes from Russia. Let's just say it. He's Russian. The Russian got third. One of the clean Russians. I'm so sick. These commentators must absolutely be pissed off at the Russians. Because they have to be like, Oh, I'm third. The Olympic Athletes from Russia. Just say it. They're Russian. The Canadians, Edward Gerrard, fourth in that one. And in the B Final, China's Han Tengue took that one out. And Canada's Pascal Dion got tenth. I think that's Celine's son or something like that. The 500 metres in the women's, you have two Canadians through to the semifinals. Kim Boutin. Oh, she sounds nice. She's like anything like Boutin. I'm there. And Marianne Saint-Galass, is it? Jalass? Jellyass?
COLIN HILDING: Saint-Galass. Now, I'm assuming you don't know who she is.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm going to go with no, I don't. I'm guessing she's a Canadian speed skater.
COLIN HILDING: Oh, she's... Well, she's the fiance of Charles Hamlin, too.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, of course. Absolutely. That was my next guess. But big news in that, though. We had two Olympic records set in that. Choi Min Jung, South Korean skater, 42.870, and broke the previous Olympic record set only earlier by a British speed skater, Elise Christie, 42.872. Now, every time I watch this, I swear the British skaters are the ones falling over all the time. So I don't know how... Did you see that, Jarrod? I swear every time I look, oh, there's a British skater, they're down again.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, they'll definitely be blaming their skates, probably putting in an inquiry for tampering there.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes. I'm there. Ski jumping, this is the event that kept us up to 2 o'clock in the morning. This was the normal hill, the individual. And for the first time since 1984, Germany have taken a gold medal in the ski jumping normal hill. Andreas Wellinger, he took the goal with a score of 133.5. No, actually, I'm looking at the wrong one. Let's go back over that. His score was 259.1. That was his qualifying score. But he took the gold from double Norway medals, silver and bronze. Johan André Forfang got a score of 250.9. And our mustached hero, Robert Johansen, 249.7. This guy is a cult hero. You're excited for this guy, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: I have to ask a question about him. Yeah, well, I have to ask a question, though, because our commentator multiple times referred to him as Mustachio Viking. And I think one time he said, that's the nickname I like to call him. So I don't know if this was being said anywhere else. Like, is this just a Canadian thing? They like to call him Mustachio Viking?
BEN WATERWORTH: I didn't hear that. All I heard was this British guy, he didn't even, did he even reference his mustache? I feel he didn't, Jarrod, because he was more excited for the statistic that he kept repeating over and over again that Germany haven't won a gold medal since 1984 in the normal wheel.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, he was a bit subdued about the whole mustache thing. He wasn't a great commentator, actually, because he just didn't, there was no, maybe it is just ski jumping, but there was no like, what do you have to do to be good at it? Or like letting like the audience know like what was really happening, or just like, yep, that jump will get them on the podium. No, that jump won't get them on the podium.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah.
JARROD LOOBEEK: We're waiting, we're waiting.
BEN WATERWORTH: He was, he was, I mean, I was, yeah, I was with you there and watching, thinking like it doesn't, it's kind of like the opening ceremony. You don't really need that much skill to be a commentator at the opening ceremony. You just read a script and basically say, oh, look, there's a child that's grown up to be a doctor. Yeah, this guy literally was like Jim Broadbent and Eddie the Eagle, he just sat there and he's just like, oh, he's a German. He's a Norwegian. Oh, he's waiting again. You know, and obviously we're getting the...
COLIN HILDING: And he's going downhill. He is in the air. Not good. Did not land in the right spot.
BEN WATERWORTH: He's obviously like, I think maybe the BBC feed or something like that. But when we get to the speed skating here in a second, we have an Australian commentating the speed skating. Whoever that man is, give him a gold medal himself. He knows everything about this sport, Jarrod. So like in a sport where, you know, we know more about the short track than the long track, we have a commentator who knows everything. We'll get to that in a second. I just want to quick mention though to Simona Mann, my man, the Swiss four time gold medallist. He was in 11th sadly. And our Japanese, Noriaki Kasai, the eight time Olympian. He was in 21st for Canada. Your Eddie the Eagle, Mackenzie Boyd-Klaus. I look forward to Mackenzie the moth coming soon to cinemas near you. He was, he at least made the final. He was 26 out of 30 in the final. He got a score of 208.1. And I just want to say every, like we talked about the British speed skaters falling over all the time. So every single time I looked up and heard our esteemed commentator talk about a bad jump, there was somebody from Slovenia. So special note to the Slovenian ski jumping team. Just try better next time. Anyway.
COLIN HILDING: Just in case I forget, I don't know if you have any like commentary fails for Australia. We have a great commentary. Yeah, we have a great one from this one from Canada. If you just want me to go now.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'll hold on to it. We'll do that in a second. I'll quickly go over these other results here. You mentioned the Slope style. Yep, Canada is absolutely shitting this one in. You've got four people into the final. You went over them. Four Norwegians into the final. We have an American. We have a Swede. We have a Belgian. We have a New Zealander in the final of the men's... Now, this is happening on air yesterday when we were recording going, Oh, that's nothing. Carlos Garcia Knight. Oh, he's a household name in New Zealand this morning as everyone in Auckland and Wellington wakes up because he's done something that no New Zealand has done since they won a silver medal in 1992, I believe, and made an Olympic final of the Winter Olympic Games. Jarrod, what is wrong if a New Zealander can make an Olympic final in the Winter Olympics?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, there's a serious problem here, and there's a serious problem with the commentators thinking that this is to be celebrated back in Australia as they kept on saying, Oh, Australia, lots of friends back there. We're very glad for them, our neighbours. I'm like, stop trying to claim people already. We do have events coming up. You've put so much faith in our other athletes. Surely, we don't need to claim people yet. But yeah, they just didn't understand that we don't want them to win a medal before we do ever.
BEN WATERWORTH: Now, can we just establish what this means for New Zealand and the fact that this is so unexpected? The Wikipedia page for Carlos Garcia Knight reads as follows. Carlos Garcia Knight, born 6 May 1997, is a New Zealand snowboarder. He competed in the 2018 Winter Olympics where he made the final of the men's slope style. That's it. Um, and then... Their team is so small at these games. They have a whole little box down the bottom of this 2018 New Zealand Winter Olympics team where they've got athletes in alpine skiing, freestyle skiing, skeleton, as I say in New Zealand, skeleton, snowboarding and speed skating. You're right, Jarrod, this is the thing, because this slope style is happening, I think, like midday Australian time today. Brit Cox, as we're well informed, is skiing at about 8.30 tonight, because they've only told us about 417 times. So the realistic nature is, even if Brit Cox takes a gold medal this evening, and somehow Carlos Garcia Knight lands, all he has to do is land, everyone's falling over in this event, that New Zealand could potentially win a medal. And some weird part of me, Jarrod, and I'm going to admit this on air, I wouldn't mind seeing him win, it's just a bronze, I don't want him to get the head of themselves with the silver or gold. But I mean, it's been 20...
COLIN HILDING: Not meeting the Canadians.
BEN WATERWORTH: Exactly, we want gold and silver for Canada. It's been 26 long years since New Zealand have celebrated glory in the Winter Olympics here, and if they win a bronze, it'll be a national holiday in Auckland on Monday. So, surely some of us have to...
COLIN HILDING: Everybody in the country is going to be wearing bare skin rugs on their back.
BEN WATERWORTH: They're going to be walking around with Carlos hats on, they're going to be wearing face masks with Carlos Garcia Knight, you'll get a street parade in Auckland on Tuesday. They'll be declared the winners of the Olympics. Just, you know, Yule Brenner style, they'll get Buckingham Palace. Just, we're trying to big up New Zealand here, you know, go New Zealand! Oh, Lord, this is hilarious. And finally, speed skating. It was the Dutch sweep. They were on the pipe, the Dutch. They were smoking their way through. That's a bit offensive. But no, who cares? They're the Dutch. I'll laugh it up. Let's try and pronounce these names, shall we? It was the women's 3000 metres. Carleen Akateke, she won in a time of 3 minutes 59.21. Yep, I'm trying. Irene Wurst-Wust-Wust. She only missed out by 0.8 seconds. I was watching that. That was tight. She was winning the whole thing. And she looked so disappointed at the end. She had a 3.59.29. And Antoinette De Jong, what a name. Third, 4 minutes, 0.2 seconds. She beat the great Czech skater. God, that Aussie commentator was talking her out. Martina Sabalikova. And two Canadians in 6 and 7 there. Avani Oblondin and Isabel Vitaman-Vitaman? She was 7th. And another Canadian, Brown Tut, she was in 20th position. Got through all of those, I believe. Oh no, I didn't. Cross-country skiing. Gold there to Charlotte Carla. 21-2, 3.4 in the skiathlon. Marit Bjørgen became the most decorated female Winter Olympian of all time with a silver medal. Congratulations there for Norway. 21-2, 3, 1. And it was a sweep for the Scandinavian nations. Krista Parmakosky. Bronze for Finland. 21-2, 7, 9. We went over the Canadian and Australian results. No, I didn't. Canada. Sandrine Brown was 33rd, knocking off Australia's Barbara Jezusek there. She was the highest placed Canadian. And in the biathlon, Laura Dahlma from Germany. Gold, Marta Olsbu of Norway. Silver and Veronica Vidkova of Czech Republic. She took the bronze. There was a Canadian in that. Julia Ransom was 40th. Another Canadian is Rosanna Crawford, 53rd. Emma Lunder, 54th.
COLIN HILDING: Oh, that's sad.
BEN WATERWORTH: Megha Tandy, 57th. Jesus, you had a few in there. What happened to your biathlon team there?
COLIN HILDING: All I'm going to say is this. I had one interview that I was trying to line up right before the Olympics with Rosanna Crawford. And she said, yeah, that's fine. I'll come on the show. And I just didn't have time to do it before the Olympics started. So let's also claim, if you don't rub your belly and you don't make time for us before the opening ceremonies, you will not win an Olympic medal.
BEN WATERWORTH: Exactly. It's all... We're the glue of all the medals of this Olympics. Let's be honest. So if New Zealand doesn't come away with a medal, it's not our fault because we are talking this guy up. So that's what I'm liking to say here anyway as well. All right. I think we went over everything there. What did we watch? Let's start with you, Colin, for this one. What were the ones that you were paying attention to? You mentioned the speed skating. We've kind of discussed this, but were there any ones that you kind of didn't really talk here about some of the other key ones that you watched on day one?
COLIN HILDING: The ones that I watched intently was the speed skating, particularly the 1500 and then the 3000 metre. I didn't watch all the pairs for the 3000 metre, but at least the finals. And then ski jumping. I mean, the ski jumping was just fantastic to watch. And some of those delays, I can imagine if it was 2.30 in the morning, I would be like, just get on with it already. But I was finding some of the delays funny just because our commentators were really struggling, as you'll hear in a moment, about how they were going to fill the dead air. So those are the two main ones. And then, of course, we were watching the Slope Siles all together last night as we were recording the opening ceremony episode. I did watch a little bit of the hockey that was going on. There's going to be more coming when Canada starts. And then anytime mixed doubles curling is on, you have to watch it in Canada. I think that you officially lose your citizenship if you don't watch it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I think we officially lose our citizenship if we don't watch the moguls qualifying about 328,612 times. Jarrod, did you watch anything else besides the moguls? Did you know that we qualified Brit Cox for the final of the moguls qualifying?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I was going to say, our team didn't have any problems filling the gaps and the breaks in the ski jumping because we had plenty of content ready and raring to go. Yeah, I mainly just watched the ski jumping, which I thought was great, although I would be interested to know if you accidentally somehow trip and go down the slope before the green light goes, is that automatic disqualification? I mean, is that the same as diving into the pool before the starter's gone? So I would love to know what happens in that situation. But yeah, the ski jumping, I don't understand how it's so enthralling. I was sitting there watching it with the delays and like, why am I still up at this point? And I just could not go to sleep, but I had to know who won. I don't know like what you have to do to do a good jump. It looks like they all start the same. How come some go further than others? Is this rigged? What's happening? But yeah, somehow it's enthralling watching people go down a hill and just jump and look like idiots in ridiculous hideous outfits, particularly the Polish team.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's kind of like watching my dad watch My Kitchen Rules because he's literally watching people cook food and a French judge and Australian judge try to make it so dramatic of taking a bite out of a truffle or something like that, to which they stare at a camera for five minutes. Yes, Colin, this is quite... You know, dramatic pause, dramatic pause. Delicious. And it's just like, what is this? And the ads I'm watching for My Kitchen Rules this week are showing that there's going to be some dramatic... Like, someone's getting murdered in the kitchen or something. Jarrod, I don't know what's going on. You will not want to miss this with My Kitchen Rules. It is so unmissable that we talked about for weeks in Australia. Like, Jesus Christ, Channel 7. Someone's going to burn a soup or something like that. I don't know. But yeah, I'm with you there. Like, I was... I love the ski jumping. And it's like, I want to be one of those volunteers who move that, like, the seat down. Like, when somebody decides they want to jump down a little bit lower, a little bit higher, there's like five Koreans who lift, like, a seat up with the Olympic rings on it for them to sit down. The gate. The gate. Thank you. There's a technical term for it. I also want to be a ski jumping coach because these poor ski jumpers are freezing their little bodies off in their tight little skin-tight suits, and they're all hugging them. They're all giving them, like, a wooly jacket, like, oh, it's okay. It's okay, mate. Like, let's stay warm, stay warm. And I think we could have gotten free tickets to the ski jump because, again, there was no one there. Like, there was no one at the ski jump. Those stands were emptier than the stands at the Athens Olympics. Like, there was just no one there. Oh, my goodness. I also watched. I pretty much watched everything. I'm just looking at the sports that we had. There was not one sport I didn't see at least five minutes of in between, you know, all the moguls qualifying. Just a word of advice for Australians watching it, download the bloody app. Like, I know Channel 7, shove it down your throat, but it's worth it because, like, you get to watch sports, people. You don't get to see Chumpy pull an interview 30 times, getting the esteemed question of, why is your nickname Chumpy? Now, look, I know I asked him that when we had him on the show, but, like, this is a question that's been asked so many times to this guy. He just literally presses play on his phone because he's just, you know, sick of answering it. I really enjoy the biathlon. Can I just point that out? The biathlon is fun. Every sport I watched was fun. It was so good. The luge, it was only the singles, but it's still fun to watch. The speed skating is kind of like the ski jumping to me because short track speed skating is so much more exciting. But the speed skating is, you know, Mallory said it yesterday. She's kind of bored by it. It's kind of slower if you're used to short track speed skating. But it's still enthralling watching them just literally, you know, left, right, left, right. Oh, there's a clock. Oh, they're two seconds. Oh, they're one second down. There's something about it. But yeah, you're sighing at me now, Colin. What did I said wrong? Did I just offend Canada?
COLIN HILDING: No, no, no. I was just thinking, like, it's actually one of the most intense sports. But like you're saying, it really shouldn't be because it's the little things like, like, I think he brushed him with his elbow. And when they come to the finish line, you know, we're used to, you know, the runners like Andre Degrasse or Usain Bolt stretching their head forward, like they're flying in like Superman. And these guys, they just have like a graceful pointing their skate out, like little things like that. And in the semi-finals, I mean, I don't know how it couldn't be intense. In the semi-finals, like with Charles Hamlin, they made a huge deal of it here, that it was like a photo finish. And it looked like it was like, you know, a millimeter ahead of them pointing their skate. I mean, every time a skater wipes out, you're like, oh, okay, well, now are they going to automatically advance to the finals because they wiped out? Or are they going to choose to try to finish this? Like, there's so many technicalities. Nobody understands the rules, but it's fun to watch.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, it's interesting to kind of think that sometimes you're better off crashing out of a goddamn event because you might actually make it through. Like, that kind of was my strategy there. But yeah, just, and this is again, just talking at the Winter Olympics, just like all these sports are so exciting. Even the boring sports are exciting. Like, you know, let's be honest. The skiathlon is the marathon, you know, the sort of marathon. I mean, it's 15 kilometres compared to 40. But like, look, I'm not taking away from marathon. I mean, it's something that I, in my current state, could definitely not do. So I am in awe of these athletes who can run that long. But I mean, you know, you try watching, you know, all what, an hour and a bit of the marathon. It's not exactly the most exciting thing in the world. But it still is exciting in many aspects, if you're really into it and get into the technicalities of it. My biggest thing, though, with watching these sports is, I mean, maybe we thought it was just the opening ceremony. I'm trying to be disrespectful to Koreans. Maybe they're just very nice. I don't like cheering, but I swear like they just don't cheer. Like even if a Korean's winning, they cheer a little bit, but then they just stop. Like, have you guys noticed the crowd interaction at these games so far isn't exactly, isn't huge there. Colin, you're getting in your coverage?
COLIN HILDING: Well, yeah, I mean, I think the biggest reaction we got was the two Koreans in the 1500 metre. And the commentators are making such a big deal about it. They're like, the crowd is going nuts for these Koreans. And I'm like, it sounds like the polite applause in like the Vancouver Olympics when an American would win over a Canadian, you know? We're polite and I was like, oh, yeah, good for them, I guess, biting our tongues. But that's like the all out excitement of the Koreans.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, Jarrod, are you noticing that too? I mean, again, we're ski jumping experts after saying up to two o'clock in the morning. But again, the only time you saw people in the crowd is when they cut to like the three Polish flags in the crowd, and that was about it.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, definitely at this ski jumping, it did seem to be kind of, I suppose, fans from different countries. I suppose it's not really a strong sport for Korea, so that makes sense. But yeah, it just seems like you have the Winter Olympics in your country, just go. Especially to something like that. I imagine a ticket to the ski jumping does not cost a whole lot.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I mean, this is the thing that maybe we just don't understand how expensive Olympic tickets are. I mean, it's all well and good for us to go back to Sydney, but that was 18 years ago. Obviously, things like this are expensive. On a comparison point, I guess, with the Commonwealth Games that are coming up, I just happened to randomly go through a bunch of the tickets on the website. And so many events are sold out. You cannot get a ticket to the swimming at the Commonwealth Games. The netball is sold out. The cycling is completely sold out. I think all but one session of the athletics is sold out. You know, it's crazy. And I feel it's my duty, considering that I'm technically an employee of the Commonwealth Games, to say visit the Gold Coast website to buy your tickets now before you miss out. But it's crazy just to think that's the Commonwealth Games. Like, maybe it's just an Australian thing. We will get behind anything. Did they have issues with tickets for Vancouver? Do you remember, Colin, at all? Was there news around that? Or, I mean, you guys seem to sell those out pretty quickly. Oh, no.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, no, I mean, I feel like every Olympics, there's huge attendance. And it didn't look bad to me. I mean, again, we're looking at the earliest days, but at least in speed skating, it looked maybe about three quarters full or whatever. But obviously, different countries are going to have different favourites, and it's, again, a very minor comparison, but you take the Canada games that were just here in Winnipeg, and some events like when we went to the tennis, you know, tennis is something, if you go to any type of competitive event, this can be huge. They offered it free here in Winnipeg, and I showed up, and there were probably about 20, 25 people there. And these were for like the finals. Meanwhile, you know, the baseball was selling out 6,000 seats, and this is to watch teenagers play baseball, and volleyball was completely sold out. Different demographics, different things, but at the same time, you can look at it and say, well, speed skating, that is Korea's national sport, so why is it not sold out from the beginning there?
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I mean, I saw the curling, and the curling looked completely full to me, but maybe that was a case that that's just the cheapest ticket. Like, you know, $5 for the thing. But I mean, I shouldn't like to always talk up Australia. I remember back during the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, they struggled to sell tickets to a lot of events, so they literally were like, buy one, get one, free to the Lawn Bowls. So, you know, I mean, it's not just necessarily always a thing like that. But I mean, it's day one as well. You know, it's plenty of time to see it and maybe Koreans just hate ski jumping. I don't know. Like, it's like, oh no, we're not seeing this crap. But we'll see how we go for the large hill, I guess. All right, I think we can look quickly here. Athlete of the Day, we'll get to some coverage here, some commentators and, you know, because I think that's going to be a bit of a longer segment to go through here. And I've also got some notes here from Mallory, who didn't join us this morning, but she wanted her voice to be heard. Did you have an Athlete of the Day, Jarrod, or any of them at all? Because I think you and I might have the same person.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I would say so. I just can't go past Moustachioed Man, Robin Johansen, in the ski jumping. I think if you shaved that off, it could have been gold instead of bronze. That may have been the wind resistance that stopped him getting those extra metres. But I'd say for the look, it was worth it.
BEN WATERWORTH: I think you might be right.
COLIN HILDING: The twirl of his moustachioed was creating too much drag in the wind.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, I think this might be a home run here for all of us because he was on my list. I've got someone else. Who was yours, sorry? I was just going to say unanimous.
COLIN HILDING: I was going to go with your hands. My runner up was going to be the previous year's gold medallist, Kamil Stok. Just because here the commentators were making a big deal about the fact that if he wins gold, he's going to be the first one to do back to back gold since I can't remember the guy's name. You know, Matty whatever, the Eddie the Eagle guy who won the gold. Who of course went on to stab people because of finger pulling contests and beat up his wife.
BEN WATERWORTH: Korean pop singer. Finnish, sorry, not Korean.
COLIN HILDING: So I mean, Camille Stock missed out on getting a medal, but I think he saved his own life and career here because we know the track record of back to back gold medallists in the sport.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, we do. You know, it is unanimous. He was on my list, but I just want to have a special runner up here too, in the biathlon, Makita Davidova. She's a Czech biathlete, and I'm not just doing this because she's very good to look at. She, her gun was very good to look at. She had a pink gun with little ponies on it. Um, so... Biathlon is exciting enough, but then if I'm watching this girl with a pink gun and ponies on it, like with a gun, like this is just like a sport where you're skiing forever. You got to stop every 10 seconds to shoot some target. It's just one of these sports. It's like, how do they come up with this stuff? It's crazy. This is why Nordic Combined is so brilliant, because let's add ski jump. We're combining our two sports of the day here almost. Buyathlon and ski jump. Wait till the Nordic Combined starts, people. But Markita Davidova, for having a pink gun with ponies on it, she's getting a special mention today on the show. So if we can find her, she's got a Twitter. We'll tweet her out and say, show us your gun, Markita. And I hope she's back in a later event, because I'm a fan. I'm sold. She finished 15th, for those at home wondering where she did. And good news, she beat a French competitor in 16th, so that's even better. The coverage. Oh, goodness. All right, let's start with CBC. I'm intrigued to find out some of these commentary fails and things that are happening. What exciting things happened on CBC Day 1 coverage of the 2018 Olympics?
COLIN HILDING: Well, I mean, the main one that I had alluded to, and you mentioned the little seat, as you say, which the CBC commentator people referred to as a gate. That's the big one that came up today. And it was just one of these really awkward things where, you know, a commentator makes a big deal about something, and then they only realise afterwards, and maybe I'm not an expert, and I didn't know what I was talking about, so it's just kind of like an awkward, oh, I guess that's not. So it was, I believe it was the one, what was his country, was he one of the, I can't remember the country, Johansson's country, what was it?
BEN WATERWORTH: Norway.
COLIN HILDING: Norway.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's the one. Oh, I want to take you?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, the Norway one who didn't make it, I think it was Daniel Tande. So when he was going, there was like a big delay, and you were probably nodding off as it was happening, but he had moved gates once, I guess. And it was like coming down that countdown clock, which is another thing that makes ski jumping so fascinating, to get that countdown clock. And all of a sudden they start moving again, and the commentator on CBC goes, they're moving gates again? How many gates are they going down?
BEN WATERWORTH: That sounds like if an Australian was commentating ski jumping, they would never clear what's going on. Why are they jumping so high? I don't get it.
COLIN HILDING: It was just totally awkward, because it was the first time I heard a motion at all. They're moving gates again. How many gates are going down?
BEN WATERWORTH: I have to ask O'Colem, because you're going to hear us rip shit more into Channel 7 in a minute. I would assume that when the ice hockey starts and Canada are playing, that's obviously the central focus for CBC. But given that you have so many athletes and so many opportunities to win, do they spread out the coverage? Do they focus more so? Are they focusing on Andy Norty at the moment? Are they focusing on the Snowcross people? Or are they just trying to spread it all out?
COLIN HILDING: It's pretty balanced, but I guess one of the reasons is because, like I said, we have CBC, but then we have Canada's version of ESPN, TSN, which has five different channels. Then we have Sportsnet, which has six different channels. There are potentially 12 channels that you could be watching English language coverage on. What usually happens is, unless it's a big prime time one, hockey ends up on TSN, so on one of the cable networks, and then CBC will cover the events where they could be in and out within an hour and move on to something else.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's my favourite thing to do in life. Can you watch the French coverage as well?
COLIN HILDING: Oh, yeah. We have the French channel. There's actually a Punjabi channel, too.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, wow. Geez, the Indian people in Canada must love that, too. And you get NBC as well. Let's move to Canada, Jarrod. I'd almost rather get the New Zealand coverage at some point, too. You know, 24 hours of Carlos Garcia Knight. That sounds more exciting to me than watching the Moguls again. I love the Moguls. But goddammit, if Brit Cox wins gold, we're not going to be seeing any events for the next 15 days. So I'd need to say, do you have an app? Can you download an app and switch between sports as well?
COLIN HILDING: Well, the CBC Olympic app gives you access to any event that's going on anywhere. So you can watch the actual CBC coverage on your phone, which is what I do if I'm not in the house. Or you can just choose this event that's going on, and it could be biathlon or whatever that isn't even being covered on any channels. But then there's also the TSN app, where you can actually watch live any of the five channels at the same time. So the apps basically give you all the TV channels on your phone, but it'll also give you any sports that aren't being covered on TV. We basically have everything.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, that's basically what we have.
COLIN HILDING: And it's free.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I will say props. This is the one time I'll say this in a sentence. Props to Channel 7 that you don't actually have to pay to watch all the sports this time around. They're all free. You just have to put up with My Kitchen Rules ads and Cuba Gooding Jr. trying to sell you optics every five seconds. But that's for you, Colin. If you're wondering where Cuba Gooding Jr. is, he's stuck in Optus ads in Australia. I don't know why they fired him. Between him and Usain Bolt, Optus are doing well, apparently. They can hire an Academy Award winner from the 90s and Usain Bolt.
COLIN HILDING: You mean he turned down The Fighting Temptations Part 2 to do ads in Australia?
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, it was OJ Simpson. So, I mean, you know, that's the last thing he did. But, yeah, he is the face of the...
COLIN HILDING: But they thought they were getting OJ for the ads, and he shows up like, oh, it's Cuba Goody Jr. Robert Kardashian, oh, it's David Schwimmer.
BEN WATERWORTH: But at least it's free, like, you know, the app, and it's so much better watching it on the app. But yeah, Jarrod, Channel 7, Day 1. I've got a few little one-liners here, which I've noted down. But besides the one-liners, coverage outside of the moguls qualifying 38,000 times.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I mean, it's pretty pathetic. And the fact that they interviewed Chumpy Pool and who, I don't hate him, I just hate how overexposed he is on Channel 7 for, like, never doing anything at the Winter Olympics. It just bugs me so much. I'm like, you have four channels and you're using one. Like, their coverage of the tennis, they had it on, like, two channels, and they pretty much covered, like, all the events in the lead up to the Open, and they'd have two matches during the Open on at the same time. You could watch the rest on the app. I'm like, why is that not happening during the Olympics as well? Like, you paid as much to have the Olympics, and then you don't show any of it. And then even the Australian athletes, you missed out two athletes in the skiathlon. Like, that's, your job is just, you cut away so often to show the Australian, like, the two seconds we'll get of the luge is the Australian going down the track. But then you miss the two Australian athletes in the skiathlon. Like, you can't even showcase the Australian athletes properly. Like, it's just, it's just pathetic. I'm like, just put sport on. That's the point of watching it. Like, so many people have complained about it. And I hope they keep doing it. Because, like, they just need to wake up and learn how to broadcast, basically. Put the horse racing on racing.com. Like, why is that even on? Why is that a thing?
BEN WATERWORTH: There are 51 athletes competing for Australia in the Winter Olympics. 51. I'm pretty sure we can cover them pretty quickly when it comes to that. We mentioned yesterday on the show, I just want to say this before I forget, about starting up a Kickstarter campaign to buy the Olympic rights off Channel 7. I went through the motions. I spent a good hour setting up this page. It was great. Kickstarter refused our page. They would not let it be a thing. Okay, I'm trying to raise $170 million. But at the end of the day, fuck you Kickstarter. All right, we're trying to save the coverage here to do it here in Australia. But you're absolutely right, Jarrod. I mean, why do we need to see a replay of the opening ceremony in prime time and not put on the other sports on the other multichannels? Now, okay, I realise I've got to show the women's AFL. Fair enough, that was a big night here in Australia. We had 42,000 people at a game of women's football. That was an iconic moment for Australian sports. I understand they're going to show that on one of the multichannels. But on the other channel, it was like fucking border security or something like that. Like, they legitimately said, oh, for our New South Wales and Victoria viewers, we're in that Tasmania. They never put us on there. You need to switch now to Seven Mate if you want to continue watching it, because at 5.30, half an hour before the news, they had a repeat of border security to show. Like, that's more important than showing the Olympics that you spent $170 million on. And then even last night, the ski jumping, at like 11 o'clock at night, they decide to, oh, there's a bit of a delay there, so let's show a replay of the speed skating. Like, just show the live sport. If you want to watch a replay, watch it on the app. And yeah, I'm just scrolling through here. Hashtag 7 Olympics is their official tag. And just reading some of the comments, here's some of the tweets that we're looking here on here. So we've got Sarah, at Sarah J. Wildy. Really hope Channel 7's coverage of the game improves. Several live events and yet I'm watching replays of the opening ceremony. You have so many digital channels, I should be able to watch at least three events at once. Hashtag 7 Olympics, hashtag 7 sports. There's another one here, Becca Leanne. Why isn't there an option to mute the commentators during the opening ceremony on 7 Olympics? And they've used the GIF here of Snape from Harry Potter saying silence. Brad Howard, at Brad Howard. 7 Olympics, please make an urgent change to your idea that we only want to watch the Australians. You are showing another replay of the opening ceremony at 7.30pm, prime time when live and action is on. Please show us some respect. Shut your commentators up and show sport. These are just a few here. It's just crazy. Do people complain like this about CBC, Colin? No, he's gone. I don't know what he's doing. Have a count-toe to take. I don't know if I'm meant to read that on air. Do you know what a count-toe is at all, Jarrod?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think it's a call-to-take. Oh, a call-to-take.
COLIN HILDING: I have a call-to-take. A count-toe? There's no space between Colin 2.
BEN WATERWORTH: What's a call-to?
COLIN HILDING: I had to answer a call. I'm sorry that taping with one hand is not as good as what you would do.
BEN WATERWORTH: You'll have to go in a second. I'm going to go to these commentary files. I need to quickly read this out on air about Mallory because she said something here that I need you to say. If you have to go, I'll read this out now. How long do you have here, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: I've got long enough to do the My Name Is athlete.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, okay. You've got plenty of time then. Maybe I'll just quickly go over these one-liners here from our Australian commentary quickly. These are some of our slope-style one-liners. This is... Okay, I still do not know who this woman is who is hosting a lot of this. She was one in the opening ceremony. Do we have a name on her yet, Jarrod? She's annoying the fuck out of me. I don't know who she is. I don't like her. Do you know who she is?
JARROD LOOBEEK: No idea.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay, that's our goal is to find out her name by the end of this coverage. She said, in between the slope-style, it's been described as the sport Johnny Knoxville would compete in, because I've always wanted to know that, but she followed up with, we'll go back to that later. Right now, let's go back to one of the more traditional sports, the moguls. Now, the moguls, I believe, debuted in 1994, did they not, Colin?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: The tradition of the last 20... Now, traditional, generally, to me, would be the downhill, figure skating, cross country, sports that have been in there since 1924. Not one that just barely made it in the last century. Like, who is this woman? I don't like her. And then some of the commentary in the Slope style, my favourite was, they call it a money beater for a reason, and that time the check was dishonored. Followed by the constant use of the term barn burner, that was a barn burner, that was a barn burner, to which then they cut to a commentator saying, we're now joined by Kenno, so Australian, he's Kenno, and to which they're describing the 12 finalists for the men's Slope style. They read out, four Canadians and a New Zealander, to which they refer to it as the Commonwealth Games on Ice. Not even half of the nations in the final are Commonwealth nations, and this is the Commonwealth Games on Ice. Tune in to our Commonwealth Games coverage on Channel 7. Anything to get a segue in. Yeah, they were my favourites of the day. Alright, I'll get to this Mallory one for you, and then we can go into the My Name Is and see if you can stick around for our Aussie fan messages at least. Okay, Mallory was watching this along the day. If you didn't tune in to our day one, going, who the hell is Mallory? She's a Canadian who was on the episode yesterday, who somehow is attached to me. But she couldn't join us. She didn't want to get up this morning that early. She's written to me. I'm going to read this. Men's Slope Style Qualifiers. Cowichan Sweaters. Cowichan Sweaters. This is a Canadian thing, Colin. How do you say that? Cowichan? Cowichan? Do you know what I'm talking about?
COLIN HILDING: I know the word, but I'm going to disappoint Mallory. I have no idea what it is. I wear T-shirts in the winter. I don't know what a sweater is here.
BEN WATERWORTH: She was so excited for you that this was going to be a thing.
COLIN HILDING: Somebody from Victoria who needs a sweater when it's minus 3 probably would.
BEN WATERWORTH: She said, Max Parrott looked at E's second run. Gorgeous. Mark McMorris is back. Yay. After injury last year. Three Canadians in the final from Heat 2. One Canadian Heat 1. Four Norwegians as well. She's then written, Women's moguls qualifies. We get it. They were on TV. Ozzy outfits. Love heart face. Love heart face. Love heart face. Japan's Jackets. Quebecois now Quebecois. Three Canadians. One Ozzy. Congrats. Ha ha. Women's hockey prelims. Sweden or Switzerland. V Japan. Half empty stadium. But Colin will appreciate that you know they're there. Did you? Did you appreciate that you knew that they were there?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, I mean, we're not having those terrible lighting effects on the seats. You can see that there's people in the stands.
BEN WATERWORTH: Not the greatest game. Look at shots on goal. Shitty commentators. Yay, Sweden. Followed up by Skiathlon, AKA cross-country skiing. Most boring sport I've ever seen. Why? So that's Mallory's Messages. The new segment on Off The Podium.
COLIN HILDING: All right.
BEN WATERWORTH: Who have we got today for our My Name Is from Canada?
COLIN HILDING: Well, considering by default, he was able to upstage our hero Charles Hamlin. We have to go with Samuel Gerard. And this is a good one, because I'm not sure how good his English is. Maybe they should have done one of these in French, just so he looked a little better. But it goes, Hello, my name is Samuel Gerard, and I am Canadian. My favourite Olympic moment is Men 5000-metre relay winning in Vancouver, which was a Charles Hamlin event, so some credit to him. This is great. If I could have any superpower, it would be Superman. So Superman is a power. My favourite sports movie is Eddie the Eagle. Draw a picture of yourself. It looks like he's either a lumberjack cutting out a tree with a chainsaw, or he is trying to present a bouquet of flowers to a tree. This one's hilarious. My funniest childhood memory is going camping trip. All going camping trips are so funny. My favourite pump-up song is Mud on the Tire by Brad Paisley. The most recent TV show I binge watch is Games of Throne. Draw a picture of one of your teammates. I don't even know what the name is here. It looks like it says Maxim Logan, but he's drawn a picture with somebody who I think they're carrying an Olympic torch and they're approaching a drone. If I weren't an athlete, I would be mechanical.
BEN WATERWORTH: I think he's speachy right now.
COLIN HILDING: My favourite vacation spot is Forest because it's calm. I don't even know. I'm going to go through the other ones to save this one for last. If I could be an Olympian in any other sport, it would be ski jumping. My favourite song lyric is, Le colours ma petite Julie, which translates as the colours my little Julie. My guilty pleasure is Pepsi and any dessert. Draw a picture of your favourite animal. He drew a dog and it says c'est un chien, which means it's a dog. Here's the one you can't top. People usually describe me as Woody Guy.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's a Ryan Lochte quote, isn't it?
COLIN HILDING: Woody Guy almost made a bronze medal by default today. So Samuel Gerard, your name is Samuel Gerard, which is all I can cover. I got to go now.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'll leave you on a Lindsey Vonn tweet from 2nd of February. Sorry I get emotional sometimes. Thanks for listening.
COLIN HILDING: Does it end with at Woody Guy?
BEN WATERWORTH: It should. I think she went off to watch Games of Throne after that. All right. Go Canada. Go Andy Naughty. Getting started for the moguls. We'll speak to you during the moguls. Yeah. Good night. Good night. Collard Hilding, everybody. All right. He's off. I don't know. That was an emergency. Maybe he got called up to be on the moguls team. I don't know. Jarrod, fan message, again, I don't know if you've read any of these. Feel free to chime in if you've got any of these to go. Sadly, none of ours have made the page. I looked at it. But let's have a crack here at one of our... Is he a figure skater? Harley Winsor? That's not figure skating. That is... Oh, no, it is figure skating. He's our... Oh, he's our indigenous athlete that they talked about a lot. He's in our pairs or ice dancing. From Julie in New South Wales. All of us in Keira Place. We know where Julie lives in New South Wales. Let's rock up to her house. I'm proud of you already, hun. But show the world what you two have, hun. Go get them. Glad your mum's going over. Yo, see you. She deserves that. Pity dad wasn't as well. But I'm sure there will be more games to come for you both. Good luck, hun. Ozzy, Ozzy, Ozzy. Oi, oi, oi. Pretty standard. How many huns have been mentioned in that one? To one of our freestyle skiers, Anton Grimus. This one is from John Oots of New South Wales. Hi Anton, I just wanted to wish you the best of luck. I spent the past month with your dad, Hans, in Noosa. He was very excited and proud of your selection. Again best wishes, John Oots. You ever spent time in Noosa with his dad Hans at all, Jarrod?
JARROD LOOBEEK: No, I haven't had the pleasure.
BEN WATERWORTH: No, no, not yet. Kaz Taman and Rob from New South Wales send in a message to Jarrod Hughes, a snowboarder. All the best, mate. We're so excited to see you on the TV and keep cheering loudly when we just hear your name. Go for gold, mate. We're all proud of you. That's pretty excited. So good is that message. They've sent it twice and it's been published twice. So thanks, Australian Olympic Committee, for publishing one twice. Another one here to, what about cross-country skiers? Jessica Yeaton, of course, who competed yesterday. We sent the message to her yesterday. This one can get published, but ours can't. Brian Mengini from an overseas fan. Anchorage fans, Seth Nolan here too, checking in. South High represent, we're watching your classic race right now. Well, obviously, they're not watching Channel 7. And cheering for you, good luck. Um, Karen Stokes sends one here to Bobsleigh, just to the entire sport. They're a big fan of the sport. Hi guys, I don't care about the women's bobsleigh, it's only about the men's. Hi guys, I just watched you interviewed on Channel 7. And you are awesome. Great athletes and excellent ambassadors for your sport and your country. Enjoy the games and compete well. We will be watching, smiley face. Um, here is literally one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight blank messages here. Two Oz Olympic team, 12 hours ago. Are you seeing this too? There's nothing written in these boxes.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Hmm, yeah, they're a big fan of the dash.
BEN WATERWORTH: And yet ours can't get published, but they care about blank messages. Uh, I love this one here. Ten Kit of Victoria has sent one in to Jarrod Hughes and to Scotty James. Both say, go Aussie. Uh, all right, here's one more. David Morris, our good friend here on the show, Olympic silver medallist, one of the high hopes for medals and an absolute legend of winter Olympic sport in Australia. This is from Mrs. Maria Teasdale of Victoria. Hi David, I teach a grade three and four class at Our Lady of the Pines in Donvale. I was there when you visited in 2014 after the Winter Olympics. The children were amazed when I told them that you went to school at OLOP and are really engaged with the Winter Olympics. Good luck, we will be following you. You are a great inspiration to the children. Oh, isn't that nice? I wonder if they actually read these. I mean, I'm sure they do. But we really need to help out, because I mean, you start to see a few messages to the same old people here. And this is our job, we're trying to message at least everybody. We've already done three out of the 51, so we're gonna choose another three today. But I mean, I feel there's some here, Jarrod, that aren't getting any love at all.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yes, yep.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm just trying to see who. I think what we'll do is we'll look at who's competing. We'll get to obviously who's competing today. If I quickly scroll through here. So, Callum Watson, who of course appeared on our show a couple of months ago, he's in the skiathlon. So, I think we can start off with him. Are we down for that? Should we go continue on who's competing on this day? I think we should go for that.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I think that's a good plan.
BEN WATERWORTH: Alrighty, so let's quickly get this while we're on air. Okay then, sport, Oz Olympic team. Shall we send them a couple more blank messages? What do you reckon? I think they're getting a few here. All right, Callum Watson, name. Shall we go with Off The Podium, or should we put some real names in here to see if that gets our chances up?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, Hans Grimus, Anton's dad.
BEN WATERWORTH: Grimus, yes, he's there. All right, email HansGrimus at hotmail.com. Sorry, the real Hans Grimus, if you get a few emails here. Select state, well, he's obviously from Dubbo's, that's in New South Wales, is it not? Oh no, Noosa, that's in Queensland. Where's Noosa? Noosa, Queensland, New South Wales. Shit, it's somewhere up that way. All right, what do we want to say to Callum, Jarrod? What are we gonna do? Cross country, the shit out of those skis? They probably won't publish it because it's got the word shit in it. So we've got to think outside the square here, don't we? Beat the Russians, no, I guess we can't refer to any countries here. Okay, really hope you ski the Athalon well and do the cross country proud. Bring it home for Hans. Go you good thing. Yeah, okay, that'll do it.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I listened to you on a podcast once.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, it's called Off The Podium. All right, I just signed Hans Grimes up for some exclusive Olympic e-newsletters, so I'm sure he'll be happy with that. All righty, so there's Calum Watson, who else is competing today. I'm just gonna quickly screenshot this one, and we'll put that up on our social media so everybody can see that we are comedic geniuses, continuing on with that like we did yesterday. All righty, so there's one down. This is all well edited, folks. Okay, post another message. Also competing today, oh, the moguls are on today, really? Didn't realise that. When is this happening? I haven't seen any coverage of that. All right, I guess we're gonna give something to Brit. Right, come on. This message will get Brit Cox and Mettle. Let's be honest, this is gonna do it. All right, Brit Cox. This is from, who can this be from? Andy Norty, don't beat me today. That's funny, let's do that. Andy Norty. We'll see if this gets published. Select state, overseas fan, dear Brit, please, please, please don't beat me today. I would like to win a medal, too. Let's go gold and silver and you take the silver, okay? Thanks. That'll do. I'm sure she'll get the message. Let's be honest, that one's not getting published. Alright, thanks Brit Cox. Alright, any more, let's see. Do we have a... Oh, how about we go to our snowboard slope style qualifier today. The 17-year-old Tess Cody. I think we can do some inspiration there if I can find her here to cross her off my list. Alright, are you happy with Tess Cody here?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yep, sounds good.
BEN WATERWORTH: Let's go for Tess, send another message. Alright, we're going for snowboard. We're going for Tess. Where is she? There she is. Name, what's that New Zealanders name? What was he like? Carlos Garcia Knight. Carlos? Shall we go for Carlos Garcia? You reckon he's going to send one? Email New Zealand at New zealand.com. I'm sure that's his email. I think they've all got the same one over there. Overseas fan, oi bro, hope to see you at the end.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Maybe we can grab fish and chops sometime.
BEN WATERWORTH: Maybe we can grab fosh and chops sometime. I'll shout after I win solver. Oh, we're idiots. Done. I really hope that even if the moderators are sitting here going, Oh, God, is this Off The Podium, he's doing it again, they at least just fought it through. That's the least you can do, Australian Olympic Committee. We're going out of our way here to send these messages in.
JARROD LOOBEEK: It's got to be more inspiring than a blank A4 page that they hand to the Oz Olympic team.
BEN WATERWORTH: Let's sit down in a meeting, guys, we've got some messages, to the entire team, blank message. Good luck. That's crazy. One thing I actually would love to do, this is something I thought last night, it's kind of a random thing, anybody listening to this outside of Australia and Canada, I would love to kind of see, I want to see what the studios of all the worlds coverage looks like, because I don't know if you saw the Hamish McLaughlin standing in front of a cheap green screen, they don't even have a studio Channel 7, they're just standing in front of a green screen and superimposing a shot of a mountain in the background. But I should have mentioned this to Colin, I'll mention this to him tomorrow, I want him to take a photo of the CBC hosts in their little studio, but it would be a cool little montage thing we could piece together, if we've got any Slovenian listeners, what do the Slovenian hosts look like when they're sitting in their studios there in Pyeongchang and New Zealand? I mean, do they have anybody there? I bet you they're scrambling to find some journalists to send her to Pyeongchang. Oh, shit bro, we're going to cover the Winter Olympics. Carlos is skiing for us, snowboarding for us. So if anybody's listening to us outside of Canada and Australia, if you can, take a photo of your national broadcasting, what they look like in studio, anything that would kind of be nice. Just find us on Facebook Off The Podium, and we'd love to kind of compile a little collage of what those look like. It would be interesting to see. But day two is here. Now I believe the moguls might be on today, Jarrod. Do you know if these are on today at all?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I'm not sure. They might be after that cooking show on Channel 7.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which we have to establish. Channel 7 can't take a break from My Kitchen. Let them still show that in prime time. Fucking Channel 7. Today, though, we got some good stuff going on. Alpine skiing, the men's downhill is decided today. I'm always a fan of the downhill. I mean, this is, as Basil described it last night in the preview, did you hear him say, the Formula One of the Winter Olympics. Didn't realise that they have engines in the back of those skis. But always got to love the downhill.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, it's a great sport and definitely a lot faster than the uphill.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well done. The men's sprint in the biathlon will be decided today. There's actually seven medals today as opposed to tomorrow, as opposed to five on day one. So we have the men's skiathlon, as we said, and the cross-country skiing, freestyle skiing, the women's moguls. What? They're happening. The men's singles in the luge will be decided. The men's slope style and snowboarding. And the endurance event of the speed skating, the men's 5,000 metres. Interesting, though, for an Australian perspective, that the slope style is about midday. I think all the other events are basically at night. But it's kind of weird to think that the slope style, the event that Johnny Knoxville would compete in, you know, that's happening during the day. Outside of the medal events, there will be more curling. There will be figure skating happening today as well. He's saying today. Tomorrow, in terms of when you were listening to this, but you know it's mainly today when we're recording this. So excited for that. Second day of matches in group stage of ice hockey will be happening and also in snowboarding as well. There will be qualifying in the women's slope style outside of the final of the men's. Australians competing on day two. For those who want to know, because Channel 7 won't cover this as well as we will, to make sure that you know that they're competing. As we said, Callum Watson will be in the skiathlon. Good friend of ours on the show. Go, Callum. Keep up the good run here for Off The Podium guests. Outside of Brit Cox in the final though, we should mention that there will be another qualifying run in the women's moguls. So there is still chances there for Jakara Anthony, Maddie Himbrey and Claudia Gwelley to join Brit in the final. Alex Felaza, I'm gonna say his name correctly one point, will be hoping to at least make it to the final bit of the luge, but he's still got at least one more run to go. And as we mentioned, Tess Cody will be going to the slopes in the women's slope style. Our youngest athlete, she's 17 years of age. Now, before we leave, I did not mention the medal tally. That was a bit awkward, but there's really not that much to go through. Germany are leading the medal tally on the basis of gold medals. We always have this debate, I feel, should we sort this by gold or total medals? But we're knowing the official way. So Germany, two gold, zero silver, zero bronze, a total of two medals. If we did this by actual total medals, the Dutch would lead just over the Norwegians. They've both won four medals on day one, but the Dutch got a gold, two silvers and a bronze, all in speed skating. That's all they ever win. It's like Jamaicans in the Summer Olympics, only when we win in sprinting. South Korea, Host Nation got a gold on day one, as we mentioned. Sweden got a gold, everyone won a medal. Norway, three silver, one bronze. Czech Republic a bronze, Finland a bronze, and Olympic athletes from Russia a bronze. And that's where we're currently sitting at the moment. Anything you're looking forward to the most on day two, besides the frickin moguls? I mean, let's be honest, we are excited. We hope that Brickhoff's gonna take home a medal, as much as they're promoting it. We know that's Channel 7 job. We'd love to see her walk away with a medal. But I mean, are you hopeful? Is Brick gonna do it? Is she gonna pull a Campbell sister? Is she gonna pull something else, or is she gonna actually live up to expectations?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think she'll do all right. I haven't seen her on any Swiss ads, so I'm hoping that bodes well for her.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, no, I agree. Anything else you're looking forward to outside of what we've already talked about?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I am looking forward to lose. It will be interesting to see if the German Felix Lock can win his third gold medal in a row. So, looking forward to seeing if he can pull that off.
BEN WATERWORTH: Pull the Dawn Fraser. Let's see who does that. I'm also looking forward to seeing Carlos go for gold for New Zealand. Come on, Carlos. Get a bronze. I want him to see, I don't want him to win a gold. I don't want him to win a silver. I want Carlos to win a bronze, all right? That's the only medal that New Zealand deserve, a bronze. So, come on, Carlos. Get bronze behind two Canadians. I'm hoping for a good day for Canada today as well. I'm not meant to root for them over Australia, but I do sometimes, and I'm also going to do that for Colin because he's not here right now. But we'll be back. In terms of listening to this, you're listening to this early on a Sunday morning. We will be back probably very late Sunday night because we're going to be planning on recording directly after the moguls finals to talk all that up and give you all the coverage that Channel 7 hasn't and everything else in between. If you like us, if you think we're funny, thank you. Like us on Facebook, Off The Podium Podcast, and remember to use the hashtag Off The Podium whilst watching the games, and we can join you in going through what has so far been a good start to the Pyeongchang 2018 Games. Thanks to Colin and Jarrod. Thank you very much for joining us.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Thank you. It's been fun.
BEN WATERWORTH: And thanks to Mallory for sort of joining us. But we'll be back soon. Thanks for tuning in to Off The Podium. We'll speak to you tomorrow. Goodnight.
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