PyeongChang 2018 Day 15 Review
The penultimate day is here and it's time to make sure you're updated and fulfilled as we declare it the games of Ester Ledecka and Canadian bronze with day 15 of PyeongChang 2018. Why is it such a big deal for Canada to break the bronze drought in Men's Ice Hockey and eclipse the fortune of the great Grenoble 68 side? Why is it such a big deal for Canadian's to break the car robbery drought and create a new Ryan Lochte? Are squirrels that scary that snowboarders should run them over? Can Jarrod try and explain to us the rules of mass start speed skating? And why has Australia just packed up and gone home? Listen in, get educated and excited as another episode comes through your ears!
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Please note this is an automated transcript that may contain errors.
BEN WATERWORTH: Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Off The Podium. An Olympics Podcast, as we come to you for our penultimate episode of Pyeongchang 2018, Day 15, the penultimate day is done and dusted. It's been a historic day. It's been an amazing day. So much greatness, so much amazingness, and we're here to talk about everything else in between and all the amazingness and stuff as well. Joining us is the number one expert on amazingness from Emu Plains, Mr. Jarrod Loobeek. Jarrod, welcome back to the show.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Thank you. It's good to be back.
BEN WATERWORTH: And also speaking of amazingness, it's Colin Hilding. Colin, welcome back to the show.
COLIN HILDING: Thanks. I will bring the perspective today on stealing cars and ruining the Olympics for everybody.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, yes. Happy Canadian Day for that. Here it was. A glorious day in Canadian history when it comes to the esteemed bronze that you so much craved in the Men's Ice Hockey, a great day for Canadian Ice Hockey. Another gold medal in the esteemed sport of Men's Big Air. Finally, Canada break its duck in getting its first ever gold medal in the Men's Big Air. But then you have a dickhead who goes along and officially becomes the Ryan Lochte of the 2018 Winter Olympics, a Canadian athlete and his wife, I believe.
COLIN HILDING: And his coach.
BEN WATERWORTH: And his coach, oh god, it's a whole gang.
COLIN HILDING: It was a whole trio.
BEN WATERWORTH: David Duncan. A gang, yes. David Duncan, the esteemed David Duncan and Mrs. Duncan and Mrs. Duncan's probably lover, I don't know. Try to steal a car in Korea. This is overshadowing everything. I thought the squirrel, An Ester Ledecka, everything was going to be talked about today. But no, you've got these Wally burgers stealing a car. And it's a Canadian. What's going on? This should be an Australian thing. Who is this guy?
COLIN HILDING: I mean, apparently, he made the semi-finals in Ski Cross, which I watched and still don't remember the guy. So I don't want to call conspiracy theory here, but this may very well just be something that the media has invented, a character, just so they could have a Ryan Lochte. And they say, oh, he's Canadian, but I've never heard of this guy. None of us have heard of him. He does not exist, OK? Drop it.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's it. Done. I'm seeing here you apparently try to steal a hammer. Good luck there. Don't all hammers come with Arnold Schwarzenegger security system like step away from the vehicle. Get to the chopper. But I mean, I love the headline on the Toronto Star website. One idiot stunt shouldn't ruin the Olympics for Canada. I mean, you don't expect this from Canadian athletes. You expect this from Ryan Lochte, an American athlete. You expect this probably from an Australian athlete, you know, the Dutch probably, but not Canadians. Like, what's going on here, Colin? I didn't even think people in Canada stole cars. I thought you accidentally, like, opened a wrong car. Oh, sorry, this isn't mine. I'll go to my own car.
COLIN HILDING: Again, I don't want to play conspiracy theorist, but I'm pretty sure Lindsey Vonn put them up to it.
BEN WATERWORTH: I just think it's funny. I shouldn't think it's funny.
COLIN HILDING: It was quite like, here's the funny thing, is that they didn't release his name right away. I guess they kind of, they sadly had to announce this, or I guess the media had started to pick up on it during the press conference where they were announcing our flag bearer. So, I mean, I didn't even realise the flag bearer had been announced. I went last night to Black Panther, and it was probably like one in the morning by the time I was coming home. And I turn on my phone and I see, oh, Canadian flag bearer announced. And then right below that story, I see Canadian athlete gets drunk and steals car and is arrested by Korean police. And I'm like, what? Like, if you tell me that it is Michael Kingsbury, like, I don't think I will ever get over this. Like, please let it just be, you know, somebody pathetic and sad and not a medallist. Cause we have to give a medal back after all this. Can you imagine if this was Caitlin Laws? Like, what would have happened?
BEN WATERWORTH: She wouldn't do that. She's too perfect to do that. I mean, you know, just wouldn't do it. Caitlin Osmond, you know, just anybody out there, possibly doing it. No, no. I mean, maybe the silver medallist who took a medal off after losing the ice hockey, you know, maybe her. You don't understand. She's had a hard day. But yeah, I mean, the esteemed David Duncan. All the David Duncan fan boys and girls out there are losing it right now. I love this article here in the Washington Post. So David Duncan, his wife, Maya, and his trainer, Willie Rain. He had a blood alcohol limit well over the legal limit. I don't know what that is in Korea, probably zero. And they released a statement. But this is so Ryan Lochte. I don't know if you've read this. David Duncan reportedly explained to local police that they climbed into the park vehicle, which belonged to a tourist visiting the village of Dae Walyong for the gains because he was cold. He's Canadian. He's like, this is like what he's used to. The statement, we are deeply sorry. We engaged in behaviour. Okay, just let's back up. It's very Canadian when we open with the lines. We are deeply sorry. We engaged in behaviour that demonstrated poor judgment. It was not up to the standards expected of us as members of the Canadian Olympic team or as Canadians. You're right, mate, because you're complaining that you were cold and you had to break into a car. Like, if this is the case, all Canadians are just breaking into cars every five minutes. I'm calling bullshit on this. Absolute bullshit. At least people believe Ryan Lochte for five minutes. No one's believing this, douche.
COLIN HILDING: I mean, it's such a David Duncan thing to do.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, it really is. Jarrod, you're a David Duncan aficionado. I mean, he's always up to this sort of stuff, isn't he?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, he's one to watch, and it is sad that he's just ruined it for the whole Canadian team, and now they'll be marching under the Olympic flag at the closing ceremony.
BEN WATERWORTH: Swapping flags is Russia. It's like, Rain also apologised in his statement to the trader, to teammates, friends and my family, as well as the owner of the vehicle calling his actions inexcusable. I'm sorry. It's just cold, people. If you're the friends and family of esteemed Canadian ski cross trainer Willie Rain, are you like hanging out in your house back in Canada? My family's got so much shame on it now that he broke into it. If only he would release an apology to his friends and family. They don't give a shit. They don't even know he's in Canada, Korea. They're probably just chilling, watching, you know, Spartan, whatever it's called, Australian Spartan. Oh, this is hilarious. And then, of course, you've got... I just love the official lines here. Chief executive of the Canadian Olympic Committee, Chris Overholt, has said, We expect our athletes and team members to conduct themselves responsibly and in keeping with our Canadian and Olympic values. What is a Canadian value, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: Not stealing cars, being sober, a day before the close of the Olympics.
BEN WATERWORTH: Not being cold.
COLIN HILDING: Not being cold, yeah. Being warm no matter what the temperature is.
BEN WATERWORTH: Jesus Christ. But, I mean, let's be honest, at the end of the day, no one knew who he was yesterday. Now everyone knows who he is, so he's probably achieved his goal. He's famous. That's it, that's all he's got.
COLIN HILDING: Now he's gonna have to give back his eighth place finish in the ski cross. So, I don't know, the United States will be bumped up a spot.
BEN WATERWORTH: Look, that could come in handy if there's a count back on the medal table. Like if all of a sudden, America win a couple of golds and medals and tie with you, it goes all the way back to eighth place. And because of his douche nozzlantics, Canada gets demoted to fourth.
COLIN HILDING: Thanks a lot. David Duncan.
BEN WATERWORTH: David Duncan. When you think of douche, you just think of David Duncan.
COLIN HILDING: Like, let's replace the word douche bag with Duncan bag from now on.
BEN WATERWORTH: Such a Duncan bag.
COLIN HILDING: Such a Duncan bag.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, I can't wait for what would David Duncan do coming soon to, I'm a man in the morning and I'm a man at night.
COLIN HILDING: WWDDD.
BEN WATERWORTH: I wonder how long his merchandise takes to get off his website. Anyway, outside of Duncan nozzle antics that have happened at the Olympics. I mean, for Canada, though, you got a gold and a bronze. You must be happy with that, I think.
COLIN HILDING: It's a good way to close the Olympics, especially with the gold. You know, it bumps us up at least one more. And I mean, they were good events, too. So it still would have been nice, you know, if we could have medalled in curling, which apparently we've given up on. There have been some fun stories, though. I mean, again, a very Canadian thing, just to say they're like, it's sad for Canada what's happened in curling during these Olympics, but it's good for the rest of the world, as if like we decided we would just pass on the curling this time, you know, just to give them all a little bit of an eagle boost. You know, now they feel like it's a competitive field. Like, yeah, that was our reason the whole thing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. I assume that's why they did it. Like, oh, we're so sick of winning, E. Let's just give someone else a go. Speaking of which, the curling, the Women's Gold Medal game, the time recording this is on Korea, a one nothing up over Switzerland, I mean Sweden. So, you know, they're doing well. This is, we talked about this, the one that no one saw coming, the one that all the host nations will always remember, of when Korea won that curling match that got them the gold medal. But obviously when it comes to the bronze, as we said, Colin, you know, this is just a famous victory for Canada. You know, people always think of, as I said yesterday, Vancouver 2010, Sidney Crosby, you know, getting that goal. Salt Lake 2002 breaking the 50 year drought that was finally getting that gold medal. And then going all the way back to 1968 to finally breaking the bronze medal drought since Grenoble France. It's been 50 long years, but finally, finally the ice hockey team have cracked it and they've gotten the bronze.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, and I think we finally, I guess, separated the difference between men and women because the women were so upset for winning the silver and then the men are just like losing it because they won the bronze. The country overall is happy that we won the bronze too. I mean, I think that we're kind of over the losing thing. We all think it's funny that Germany is going to be in the finals. But I don't know, I thought it was a close game too. There were times where it was obviously a blowout, but it just seemed like the Czech Republic just keep coming back and that made it a little bit more exciting. We didn't have to feel like, oh, well, this should have been an easy win for us. There was some real competition there. I guess pretty much the entire tournament, there was some competition. And then just being able to come back after that shootout loss that we had earlier in the tournament, I think it's a fitting end for the men's hockey team.
BEN WATERWORTH: The Czech choke has happened as we predicted. So there we go. Just quickly, I mean, we said at the beginning of this, it was unknown how the men's tournament would go, lack of NHL players. I guess current NHL players, obviously there were former NHL players playing in this tournament. Do you think overall it was a success? Do you think it lacked the current NHL players? I mean, what's your viewpoint? What's Canada's viewpoint of how this has turned out?
COLIN HILDING: I think people got behind the players more than I thought they would. And it had a lot to do with just as soon as the media did pick up, just being able to interview these guys and hear them say, you know, I never thought I would get another shot at anything, let alone be in the Olympics. And it kind of just clued in for the whole country there. Like we're watching people that, you know, maybe they got a bit of a break in the NHL, but if they were still in the NHL to this day, that doesn't mean they would have ever had a shot at making an Olympic team. And you realise like how exclusive that Olympic team is. And you kind of just, I guess, can be happy for these players that they do have that shot. But I think in a way, it made it a more exciting tournament that we had no expectations. We really didn't know what was going to happen with any of these teams. If this were to happen again four years from now, you know, with NHL players or without, I think that there would be probably a little bit more excitement. But I think part of the excitement this time around was just the unknown and not knowing what was going to happen. And that made it a lot more fun than I thought it would.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, Jarrod, Australia, sadly, we didn't pick up the bronze in Men's Ice Hockey, you know, next time, I'm guessing Beijing. But, you know, while Canada added a golden bronze, Australia added a 56th and a 58th, which I think we were pretty satisfied with. I think we were aiming for top 60 on the cross-country skiing. And as always, Phil Bellingham and Callum Watson didn't let us down.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, no, classic effort from them. What a sport to be involved in, I think, over the Olympics. Like, if you're into cross-country skiing, you get about 10 events to compete in. I think it's a smart choice.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, it's, I mean, it's... I always have enjoyed the cross-country and the biathlon, and it always seems to be the one that they... You very rarely see it live on Australian TV. I mean, you never see really any events live on Australian TV. But when you do, it's kind of that and curling, I swear, the ones that, you know, it doesn't matter who the broadcaster are, they will always generally just ignore it. But I've always been fascinated by cross-country skiing, and of course biathlon. But yeah, just the fact that Australians compete in it, I think it's fantastic. And we obviously had Callum on the show last year, and he was a great guy. Had a very fun chat with Callum. And yeah, and obviously the great rivalry he has with Phil Bellingham, very well known here. It's just like Chumpy and Jarrod Hughes, you know, like they just don't get on. But you know, they put their differences aside. And then you just look at, like, I'm just seeing the times here. So Phil Bellingham, two hours, 30 minutes, 39 seconds. And Callum Watson was three minutes behind him. I mean, I can't even ski. Do you think, Jarrod, you could get on skis for two hours and 30 minutes and just ski over 50 kilometres on a casual Saturday afternoon?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I doubt it. I don't know why you would want to put yourself through that. But, yeah, impressive.
BEN WATERWORTH: Can you ski? Callum, you're Canadian. You just got to ski to work every day. But I mean, I mean, I've never gone skiing. Jarrod, have you ever gone skiing?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I haven't, no.
BEN WATERWORTH: So there we go. I mean, God, how often do you go skiing, Callum? This must be a Saturday night for you.
COLIN HILDING: I mean, I did it the last time in the eighth grade. And I mean, it was fun because I think during I mentioned before that even curling is at least for us, it was a third grade winter gym activity. And I thought it was just our school because we had a curling rink outside. And I talked to somebody else this past week like, yeah, we had curling in the third grade, too. So apparently that was like all over Winnipeg. But it was like a seventh and eighth grade thing that you would do cross-country skiing. And that was part of your gym class. And I think I mentioned here before like how bad I was that that two hour mark was probably about a kilometre and a half when I was at eighth grade winter camp. The worst part is just climbing a hill, which they eventually would say, you know, if you don't have the momentum or strength to get up a hill, like every time I watch cross-country skiing and I see them climbing those hills, I mean, I could feel the pain because they would teach us just walk sideways on your skis up the hill. And that was impossible. I just ended up taking off my skis, walking to the top of the hill, strapping them back on and just pretending to go downhill for about 10 feet. It's pretty awful, to be honest. It's not something that like every Canadian does well. I think most Canadians give it a try and they're like, yeah, I think I'm done with this.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's why you don't generally win medals in it. Yeah, I'm still going with Jarrod's idea that he said the other day about cross-country snowboarding. I'd like to see them going up the hill in a snowboard. But I just love hearing that, you know, oh yeah, we just did curling in gym class. I mean, what do we have to take out? Jarrod, like, I don't know, cricket. So we just did a variety of different sports. I don't know what you do. Boomerang. No, I don't think I've ever done boomerang in school. That's racist. I mean, what were some of your favourites, Jarrod, in gym class? Did you do curling in Sydney?
JARROD LOOBEEK: No, they just made up sports for us. It didn't exist. Like, binball. Yeah, binball was probably the highlight of primary school sport, I suppose.
BEN WATERWORTH: Binball, coming soon to Paris 2024. We had Prygian Squash, which basically was just wall squash, but because our teacher was called Mr. Prygian, he changed a few rules to it, and it was kind of fun. So that was one I remember.
COLIN HILDING: That's pretty vain.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes. We actually, I do remember one time we played handball, and obviously not like four-square handball, like Olympic European handball. And that was great fun. I actually loved playing that. And I think that was officially the only time European handball has been played in Australia. So it was fun. You would have done the four-square handball, right, Jarrod? That's just like an Australian school tradition.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, you have to do that. It's like a rite of passage.
BEN WATERWORTH: Do you know what that is, Colin? Four-square handball?
COLIN HILDING: No idea whatsoever.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's kind of like, how would you explain it, Jarrod? Like you have like a grid on the, painted on the concrete. You each get in your own square and you've got like a tennis ball and you just basically hit it back and forth to each other. And then you kind of, you got to make your position to like the king's square of the handball square. And I mean, I don't know, it's been so long since I've played. It was just fun. It's just Australian, Australian tradition. That's why whenever you used to say like handball at the Olympics, like that's what I always thought it was. But have I explained that well, Jarrod? I feel like I'm not explaining. Colin's like, what are you talking about?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I think you need to watch a video. Probably of Kevin Rudd playing handball is the highest level.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, Kevin Rudd did do that, didn't he? Former Prime Minister of Australia playing handball with the kids. Why not? I've just Googled it, 2013, playing handball at Brisbane State High School. Kevin Rudd, uploaded by Kevin Rudd. Oh, he's uploaded it himself. Colin, I'll quickly send you the link. There's our former Prime Minister playing handball with school kids. It doesn't get any cooler than that. He's actually...
JARROD LOOBEEK: He takes it way too seriously.
BEN WATERWORTH: I miss Rudd. Oh, look at him go. You never see Malcolm Turnbull do that. He's off in Washington right now making... Look at him, he's celebrating getting a win. Oh, God, good old days. He's such an old geek. Anyway, Kevin Rudd. I think we really need to talk about our star, our favourite person in the world. No, it's not the squirrel that nearly got decapitated in the snowboarding. Ester did it. Ester Ledecka, she has created history. She is the first female in the history of the Winter Olympics to win two gold medals in two different sports. Only the fifth person to do it in the history of the Winter Olympics. Absolutely incredible. I mean, this was the expected one. Of course, she wasn't expected to win the Super G, but I sadly didn't get to see it. I only saw some of the qualifying rounds, and then kind of we had people over here, so I didn't get to see it. But that was the first thing I had an opportunity to look for. Did she do it? Did she do it? I mean, in all seriousness, we've talked her up, but this is such an amazing feat, to win two medals, let alone two golds, in two different sports. I feel we haven't really talked about this. Another athlete who did it at these games, Jorrien Ten Moors of the Netherlands, she won medals in both short track and long track, which is a feat in itself. But at the end of the day, short track and long track, the only difference is you've got a shorter track and a slightly different skate. It's basically the same thing, whereas, you know, this is snowboarding and skiing. This is just an outstanding achievement. There's a headline here, I think it's on the Washington, no, the Brisbane Times. No, I'm going to find the title, I don't know where it is. But they're basically claiming she's the best athlete of these games, and I think that's hard to argue with. I mean, I'll start with you, Jarrod.
COLIN HILDING: She won the Olympics.
BEN WATERWORTH: She won the Olympics. She's getting Buckingham Palace. She's doing what Yule Brenner couldn't do. I mean, Jarrod, this is incredible. This is something that just nobody does this anymore. Nobody wins medals in multiple sports in the one games anymore, and she's done it. It's incredible.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, exactly. This is not like back in the day when four people went to the Olympics. I just think, yeah, super impressive. And the fact that this is the one time channels haven't replayed this about five times, and this is the one thing I wasn't annoyed at them replaying, because it was Ester. I was like, she deserves five replays. Keep it going.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, it's like she's so humble about it. Like, I just love watching that footage of her winning the Super G. Just the way she reacted is just absolutely incredible. I mean, is this getting replayed a hundred times over in Canada too, Colin? I mean, is this a story over there as well?
COLIN HILDING: No, there's, I mean, her name is being mentioned over and over again, but that's a story for our commentary fails we'll get to later. I mean, we did get live coverage of it and that's something, but I have officially seen the men's bronze medal hockey game played three times in the last day. So she was kind of one and done here on Canadian TV, but still a big deal. I mean, they were definitely making a big deal and talking her up a lot.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, this is, it is the Washington Post. I found the article here. Ester Ledecka is the greatest Olympian at the games, even if she doesn't know it, that's the headline. And then obviously a journalist asked this article written by Jerry Brewer. I don't know if he's the one who's asked this question to her, but it says, Don't ask Ester Ledecka if she's the best athlete at the Pyeongchang Olympics. She will stare through her polarised goggles and recoil at what she considers a preposterous notion. What? She responded Saturday afternoon. No, seriously, I don't think so. No. There are the greatest athletes in the world here. Well, the same bolt's not there. And the greatest athletes in the world. Now gush over Ledecka, the 22-year-old Czech who just accomplished the unthinkable, winning gold medals in two different sporting disciplines, shattering all preconceived notions about the impossibility of mixing elite skiing and snowboarding or any other exotic combination of world-class athletic pursuits. She must be the greatest. And then she replied to that, Yeah, whatever, Ledecka said. I mean, it's just absolutely incredible to achieve this. And just so happy that we can see this in our lifetime. I mean, as I said, this hasn't happened, I think, things like the 1920s or the 30s, when as you said, Jarrod, like four people were competing. So such an amazing feat. And yeah, as I said, like, Jordan Temos, you know, obviously a lot similar to sports, but I mean, still two athletes in these games to win multiple medals in two different sports. It's pretty crazy. So I think this needs to be a trend. I think Summer Olympics, you know, we need to see this more again. You know, go back to the glory days where someone will win a gold in the swimming and then a gold in wrestling. You know, it doesn't happen nearly enough. And just really try to mix it up.
COLIN HILDING: You need the equestrian jump to also win in the surfing in Tokyo.
BEN WATERWORTH: Exactly, exactly. And the rock climbing mixed with karate.
COLIN HILDING: Rhythmic gymnastics and weightlifting.
BEN WATERWORTH: One of the big Bulgarian dudes with a ribbon. Yeah, I just think it would be fun. I challenge any Olympic athlete out there to try their very best to do it. But great for Ester, so happy for her. And obviously the squirrel as well. I mean, this has been replayed a few times. The limited stuff I watched yesterday, I think I saw this squirrel about 10 times. Jarrod, how many times did they actually show it?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Oh, probably double 20\.
BEN WATERWORTH: This is so funny though, because like, you know, you kind of, you see this squirrel, you're like, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit! Just misses it, then it just buckers off. Did you see this too, Colin? I mean, I'm guessing this has got to make it in Canada as well. Nope. He doesn't know what we're talking about, the squirrel. I think you might mute yourself, Colin, unless you're breaking into a car.
COLIN HILDING: No, I just had a screaming baby in the background.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's all right. Tell Casper about the squirrel. Casper loves squirrels.
COLIN HILDING: He's probably watching you right now. I mean, this is actually the first I've heard about this.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, Google it.
COLIN HILDING: I'm viewing the story right now.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, it's actually quite funny just seeing these footages, this squirrel, like kamikaze squirrel across the ski course. Is it wrong that I kind of wanted it to get hit? Is that wrong of me? Yes, I take it from the reactions. Jarrod, come on, you wanted it to get hit too. Don't lie. Yeah, I...
JARROD LOOBEEK: It just makes me think of... I used to have this, like... What do you even call those, like, snowmobile ski things? I don't know what they're called, but anyway, this game on, like, PS1 probably back in the day, and you could hit, like, rabbits, and you'd get extra points during the race.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, it's just when you play, like, Grand Theft Auto and there's animals in it now, you're like, oh, look at the doggy, boom, boom, sorry.
COLIN HILDING: It's like David Duncan's game.
BEN WATERWORTH: I do love animals. You know, I'm sad we didn't see this in Sydney, like, you know, the marathon or something like that, a kangaroo bouncing across the, you know, the city.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Ibis attacks somebody.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just magpies flying down on the road cycling. But a tiger snake biting someone in the middle of the judo.
COLIN HILDING: Oh, I can't wait for the sharks to just bite somebody's leg off during the surfing in Tokyo.
BEN WATERWORTH: Mick Fanning punching him in the head. But Colin, if you ever see our famous car race here in Australia, the Bathurst, it's in kind of a ruralish area of New South Wales. But it's always famous. You'll see kangaroos jumping across the track in the middle of this car race. It always happens. And actually, there was a... It was in one of the main streets in Melbourne about two or three days ago. There was a deadly tiger snake that was in the street. So they had to cordon off a whole lane of traffic. And I need to find the headline. I know this is kind of going on tangent. But there was like the most Australian sentence in a story, because it was like, Bob the snake catcher was brought in to get the snake or something like that. Like, you don't even make this stuff up. I'm trying to find it quickly if I can see it. But yeah, animals and sporting event and public thing, it's always funny. Has this squirrel been given a name? I don't know if I saw that at all. No. We'll call it.
COLIN HILDING: We can name it.
BEN WATERWORTH: We'll call it Duncan.
COLIN HILDING: Jumpy.
BEN WATERWORTH: Jumpy. Good idea. Barry the snake catcher. That was literally the sentence. Actually, the headline was like, A tiger snake found its way in the corner of Spencer and Coln Street this afternoon. Police blocked off one lane of traffic before Barry the snake catcher arrived to collect the venomous reptile. Is that not the most Australian sentence ever? Add a chumpy in there and like, god damn it. Anyway, squirrels aside, car thieves aside, the curling update for you right now, Sweden are leading 3-1 over Korea at the end of the fifth end. Is that what it is? Coln an end? End. I know my curling. I'm so on to the curling. But we had a lot of medals yesterday. Decided, so in the Alpine skiing, the mixed team, I was enjoying, I saw a bit of this. It was a bit entertaining. I like this. We had Switzerland taking the gold over Austria and Norway got the bronze. The cross-country skiing, the 50k's we went over. It was gold to Finland and if I'm not mistaken, this is their first gold of the games. So congratulations Finland, you nearly got beaten by New Zealand in a winter Olympics. So you just snuck through there. Just backtracking to the mixed team event in the Alpine skiing, Canada were knocked out by France in the round of 16. Damn it. And I was very sad that Liechtenstein didn't make it through to the knockout round. But you know, better luck in 2022. And in the 50 kilometre classical, yes, Ivo or Livo, is that an I or an I? I don't even know what that is. I know it's two I's I think. God damn, I can't read. Ivo Niskanen from Finland over Alexander Bolshinov and Andrei Larkov, both of the Olympic athletes from Russia. Canada got fourth. Alex Harvey. Yeah. How is this possible? You're almost celebrating this as much as any gold. You got a fourth in cross-country skiing.
COLIN HILDING: And Alex Harvey is one of the athletes they talked about a lot going into these games just because apparently it's like his last games and, you know, he's been around forever. And I remember as I was watching this, it looked like he was in like for a while there, he was in the bronze position. And then even right at the end, the real race seemed to be, you know, between about three guys for that bronze medal. And it looked really promising for a while there. And I think the last time we medalled in cross-country skiing was like 2006, so it would have been great. But of course, Alex Harvey had to blow it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, very Canadian thing to do, let's be honest. But yeah, so he was fourth there. Other Canadians, you had Devin Kershaw and Graham Killick in 26th and 27th. Luckily for you, though, you beat your great Andoran rival of Iron U, Steve Altamiraz, who only was in 34th. Disappointing there from Iron U. He was expecting a lot more from these games. Russell Kennedy, 49th for Canada. And as I said, Australia was 56th and 58th. And good news is, we won't last. So that was good. Irish, sad day for Ireland. Thomas Harmer-Westgard did not start. So he would be disappointed that he made it all the way to Pyeongchang and probably got caught in that car that was getting stolen or something like that. So he's wondering what happened. Curling. The US! The fact that Canada can't even medal in the curling, the Americans win the goddamn curling. What the hell, Colin Hilding?
COLIN HILDING: And this goes back to what I've been saying for the last two weeks about the difference of curling in Canada versus other countries, that other countries, it's not nearly as competitive, so you'll have the same people up every time. And I didn't even realise until it was over and they had won the gold and all of a sudden, they had this big story on them on CBC about this guy, this skip, that he had had his best results in 2006. And then 2010 and 2014, he was like ninth or tenth place. And I realised, I'm like, they have had only one male curling team and they're not even that successful for over a decade now. And then all of a sudden out of nowhere, they win the gold. It's a crazy story, but again, it's weird for us as Canadians where if you were to hold the Olympics every single year, we'd probably have a completely different person qualify every single year. And here's a country that you have one male team in the entire country of the United States that's qualified for the Olympics. And somehow they win gold at the end of their career.
BEN WATERWORTH: This gives us hope, Jarrod. This gives you and I hope for when we eventually make the Australian curling team. We are in. We are going to win a medal. Because as I think we've discussed, we've got like 20 people in this entire country who curl. And I think there needs to be a change of the guard. It's been too long of Australian curling, of choking and not making the Olympics. So we're going to rejig this sport, Jarrod, and we're going to pull the USA. And our only curling team is going to win gold in Beijing 2022.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And if we don't, we'll just keep going for 12 years and look out at 2030.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. And worst-case scenario, we'll contact that Russian guy, get some of what he's on, because I don't think anyone's going to be drug testing the Australian curlers, are they? So I think that we're going to be fine. Any of that, we've got to check here quickly, I feel, Colin. Any of these curlers from America born in Canada? Because I kind of feel like they've, you know, snuck over the border or something. We've got one was born in Wisconsin, OK, one from Minnesota, one from Wisconsin, one from Minnesota, we'll get a trend here, and another from Minnesota. How about the coach? Do you know that? I'm trying to find here.
COLIN HILDING: No, I just know that all I've been seeing for the last 24 hours, you know, there's that big deal about the Great Britain coach who was re-edited on Twitter to be the Trader Curler, or sorry, on Wikipedia, Trader Curler. But since then, like they had the Japanese who won the bronze today in women's curling, they had a Canadian coach. They had a huge interview with the Korean women's hockey team coach who also was, you know, from Canada. Apparently, like Canadians just, if they don't make the Olympics themselves, they just go coach for every other country.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I'm just trying to find here because sadly, there's not a Wikipedia page for the US men's curling team. US men's curling coach...
COLIN HILDING: Gold medallist.
BEN WATERWORTH: Phil Drobnyk, okay, we found his name. That's a start. Phil Drobnyk, an American curler who has been involved in the sports. So they're all Americans, and they've been coached by an American. We're getting a movie made about this in like 20 years, aren't we?
COLIN HILDING: God bless America. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, and apparently there was a mix up. They got given the wrong medals. So hang on. A time article. The world was not prepared for America's men's curling team to come from behind and capture gold, but capture medals they did. Then it came time for the medal ceremony on Saturday, and there was a little mix up. John Schuster, US men's curling team, stepped up to the podium for the part when they bestowed that prize hardware. There were million watt smiles and a few tears, and other emotion ones associated with moments like these. But after the ceremony, the winning team members looked down to notice something was off in the upper right section of the medallions. Two words, women's curling.
COLIN HILDING: Does it also say that David Duncan had made a heist and was running away in a stolen car with the gold medals?
BEN WATERWORTH: Probably, probably. Well, congratulations to the US men for winning the women's curling. Not only did Ester Ledecka become the first athlete in Winter Olympic history for female to win both gold in two sports, the men's curling team became the first ever men's team to win a women's event at the Winter Olympic Games. Equality in full practice.
COLIN HILDING: It's the most progressive Olympics ever.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, gender neutral. Whatever medal is sitting around. Ah, fuck it, give them the women. That'll do. Anyway, so yes, Sweden took the silver, Switzerland took the bronze. There you go. The men's big air, gold to Canada, Sebastian Tartant, Tartong. Tartong? Tartong. Certainly got something in your nose. Gold for Canada. Yes, fantastic. Ahead of Alex's brother, Kyle Mac, and Billy Morgan. Now, I saw a photo of Billy Morgan. His little athlete image. I don't think he's an Olympian. I think they've gotten the wrong photo. So, bronze to Britain. Congratulations. And great news. New Zealand were 11th out of 12. Carlos Garcia Knight pulled a Carlos Garcia Knight and choked again. Great. Is Canada celebrating this? Your 11th gold and probably your final gold of the games, let's be honest.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, this is actually a big deal. This is one of those weird things where even though Max Perot and Mark McMorris, who meddled in the Slope style, they're like the big deals. You see them on TV everywhere, like literally everywhere. It's just Max Perot and Mark McMorris, 365 days a year here in Canada. They're the big stars. And Sebastien Toutant, I mean, most people probably wouldn't even know his name had he not won this. And it was sort of one of these weird things where he won the gold medal and everybody realised what a big deal it was afterwards because they started saying, you know, he was the senior most member on this Canadian team for snowboarding. He's the only one who had never won a medal, never even gotten close. And then for him to win the gold, it's suddenly, I mean, it just he exploded out of nowhere. And now everybody's in love with this guy, and nobody cares about Mark McMorris anymore, including his own brother, because I talked about how Craig McMorris, who's Mark McMorris' brother, does the commentary for the snowboarding. And when Sebastian Toutant won, he completely flips out and goes, there is nobody on Team Canada more deserving of this than Sebastian Toutant. Your brother just lost to him.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's funny. Jarrod, we're obviously happy about Carlos. I mean, that's what, he's done it again. He's gone into something leading the table in terms of qualifying, and he's choked, so good for us.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, exactly. I thought this was a bit, like, Big Air is a bit of a stupid event with the whole, like, your best two runs out of three counts. Like, what, what is he doing? Like, what's, no other sport really does that. Like, you could say that the figure skating does it, but that's kind of different because your short program is qualifying. But, like, it gets sent to the third run. These people who can't win are left in the field, so they just don't do any tricks. They just go over and, like, grab the board, and that's it, no spins or anything. Like, what's the point? Just make it your best run so that, like, for the spectators at least, they can watch this event to the end and have some suspense of who's going to win.
COLIN HILDING: Like, did either of you watch the whole event? Because that's basically what happened with the, you know, the last one to go. He had already had, I think it was his second run where he wiped out. So the third run, and he's the last one going for this entire event, the inaugural event for Big Air, and it was irrelevant. And he basically just sort of slid down the hill and, you know, didn't even try. It was completely anti-climactic.
BEN WATERWORTH: Was he from Hungary and like originally from America and try to go for Venezuela at the same time? I mean, it sounds like it's a trend at these Olympics.
COLIN HILDING: It might have even been Carlos. I can't remember. I'm pretty sure he went for...
BEN WATERWORTH: It's gotta be Carlos.
COLIN HILDING: I mean, he could have been in the... That's the New Zealand thing. If you're a snowboarder and you're in the lead, you know, just sort of like slide down the hill.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, bro, whatever happens, this is the best. This is the best we can do.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, he was winning, but he didn't realise that was best of two runs. So he just purposely didn't do anything on his next two and then was like, what? Where's my medal?
BEN WATERWORTH: New Zealand snowboarders are kind of like Jehovah's Witnesses, right? Like Jehovah's Witnesses go to all that effort. They're all knocking on the door. They're like, yes, I'd like to talk to you about Jesus. They're all there. But they're not used to being invited inside. It's like if you get them inside, they don't know what to do. They're like, oh, shit, do I talk to you about Jesus? I never get this far. It's like New Zealand snowboarders. They're all like, yes, we're at the Olympics. We can do this. It's like you're doing well. Oh, shit, I don't know what to do. What am I doing? I'm winning. I'm just going to do this at the end.
COLIN HILDING: It's not just the New Zealand thing. I mean, as I've made very clear during these Olympics, at every single snowboarding event, somebody wipes out, they basically break their nose in the middle of their half pipe run, and then they get to the bottom of the hill, they sort of shrug their shoulders, well, whatever, man, I gave it my best shot. I just want some emotion out of these people.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's why Lindsey Vonn is never a snowboarder. But good for Britain getting a bronze again. I just thought I'd point that out. Billy Morgan, what a guy. They'd need a calendar of athletes. He'd be on there, wouldn't he? Billy Morgan.
COLIN HILDING: Could he be up there with... What's his name? The Moustachio Viking? As like... A Spodville look ever for the Olympics?
BEN WATERWORTH: This, yeah, absolutely. We need to start a calendar of just oddball-looking people. Okay, so they're snowboarding the Giant Slalom in the men's. It was gold for Switzerland. The esteemed snowboarder in Neven, Gal Marini, beat, sadly, beat the South Korean snowboarder of Lee Sang-ho. And it was bronze to Slovenia. Zan Kosia took the bronze there. And obviously, as we said, the women's parallel Giant Slalom. Ester did it. Gold for the Czech Republic. She beat Selina Jorg of Germany. And Ramona Theresia Hoffmeister. Could you get any more German name than Hoffmeister? Great result there. Just in the men's, there were no Canadians. There was one, but they didn't make it into the elimination round. Darren Gardner choked, as he often does. And JCJ Anderson. What happened there, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: That was a funny story, because, again, I mentioned yesterday, he's sort of my all-time favourite Olympian, going all the way back to Nagano, because I knew who he was before Nagano even happened. And he had like, this is Nagano when it was, it wasn't the parallel slalom. And at his first run, he was like, well in the lead. In the second one, he kind of stumbled and fell behind. And he basically had a career as an Olympic loser in Nagano, Salt Lake City, Turin, and then out of nowhere won the gold in Vancouver. Decided he was going to retire and then came out of retirement. And in Sochi, he was the all time oldest male snowboarder to compete at 38. And now he comes back again at 42. So this is the second Olympics in a row. He's set the record as the oldest male Olympian. And it's very much showing now because during, I guess, his qualifying run, he kind of had a grumpy old man rant. And this is what made TV, they didn't even show his run. They just showed him on TV being interviewed saying, what went wrong up there? And he was talking about, well, the conditions weren't the best. And I tried to warn them. He's really emotional. I talked to them beforehand. I said, this isn't right. And he's like, you come to the Olympics, you have two snowboards. You have one if it's clean snow and one if it's rough snow. I assumed it would be clean because this is the Olympics and all. But no, I was wrong. So what are you going to do? I tried to tell them and nobody listened to me. It was like the biggest crybaby I've ever seen from my all-time favourite Olympian. But somehow, because he's a 42-year-old man doing this, I want to see him back at 46 and just telling kids to get off of his slope or something.
BEN WATERWORTH: Get off my slope.
COLIN HILDING: This guy's going to become a legend. If I could find that, maybe I'll upload the video to our site or something because it's amazing.
BEN WATERWORTH: I do like his Wikipedia profile here. Personal life, when he's not snowboarding, Anderson lives on a blueberry farm in Mont-Tremblant, Quebec. Since 2007, JCJ is part of the Trombalon Athletes Ambassador Program. Good for him. That's pretty incredible, though. 42 years old, he's been to every Olympics that snowboarding's been in. So, yeah, good on you, JCJ Anderson. Go, get off your slope. The women, get off your slope. There were no Canadians in the women's, so nothing to report there. Oh, men's. Australians, I should say. Now, I only, sadly, got to see a bit of this. I wish I had to see more, because in what I saw of it, it looked amazing. The mass start in the speed skating. So, the gold in the men's went to Lee Sung Hoon of South Korea. Bart swings.
COLIN HILDING: Bart got a medal! Yes!
BEN WATERWORTH: Silver for Belgium. And Cohen Verweij, bronze for the Dutch. Canada's Olivier Jean, or Jean, whatever, 14th, beat the esteemed New Zealand speed skater of Peter Michael in 15th. And in the women's, it was gold to Japan, Nana Takagi, South Korea's Kimbo Ryum, and bronze to Irene Schutten of Netherlands. Oh, Estonia just missed out in the middle, damn it. Saskia Alussla, fourth place in Canada's Kerry Morrison, was 12th. Jarrod and Cohen, I'll start with you, Jarrod. I only saw this briefly, but from what I saw, this looked like an absolute blast. I have recorded it. I'm going to watch it again. But I mean, this looks so much fun. Jarrod, were you glued to this?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Um, I was, but I'm like, I'm angry at this event for not being as good as it could be. So like, they go through this mass sprint, or 16 laps or whatever, there's these three kind of sprint points in the race and then the final sprint point on the last lap. The sprint points throughout the race, if you win a sprint, you get five points. If you win the final sprint, you get 60 points, second gets 40, and third place gets 20. So basically, the three sprints that happen before the end have zero impact on who gets a medal. So what is even the point? This just comes down to a last lap sprint and the first three across the line, and the medallist. So that is the only person who finished fourth. She won the first three sprints, and then, I don't know where she finished at the end, but who cares? Then she finishes fourth because she wasn't in the top three across the line on the last lap. Like, is she ridiculous? What is even the point of having the sprints in the meantime? Like, it just determines ninth to like 20th in the field. It's such a joke. I was like, what is this scoring system? And it's so messed up. There's no strategy to this race at all because it just comes down to the last lap and who is across the line in first, second and third.
BEN WATERWORTH: Interesting, interesting. Colin, did you have the same opinion of it?
COLIN HILDING: No, not completely, but I also wasn't paying attention to the rules. I was just sort of watching them skate. So if I had known all that beforehand, I might have been just as angry. But the one thing I didn't understand was I don't know if it's the person who qualifies first, they get this advantage, or for the first lap, nobody is allowed to lap them. So you have this first place skater, and then probably a half track behind everybody else is just sort of politely gliding along for the first minute or so. But I will say that last lap, two laps or whatever it is, the very finish of this race is one of the most exciting things I've ever seen in speed skating. And for the most part, I think most of us would agree that short track is a lot more exciting than long track, at least in the individual races. But between this and the team pursuit, I mean, those are the things that really keep me glued to long track. So I probably would rank this mass start and the team pursuit above anything in short track. But then again, once I go back and pay attention to the rules, I probably will be very angry.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I didn't know any of those rules, Jarrod. It's interesting. But I mean, again, only briefly seeing it. It just looks fun. And I kind of like watching these skaters slipstream each other just the way you just got them very close to them. Wee, wee, wee. I just always love that arm movement that speed skaters do too. So yeah, it's a fascinating, fascinating event. The other ones quickly I didn't mention. Collins obviously said that Britain didn't get the bronze in the women's curling. Oh, you didn't know? You just found out.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, it was spoiled for me, and yet I still went back and watched at least the last few ends, even after I knew the result, just because I wanted to see how close it was. I think Jamie's just sick of hearing about Eve Merehead now. She pretty much just gave up at some point during the day today. She's like, enough about this woman already. I understand she's celiac. I understand she's from Great Britain. I understand she's a bronze medallist. I understand she probably should have won the gold. I think Jamie needs an Eve Merehead break now, so she's just happy that she lost.
BEN WATERWORTH: Now, on the men's team, Thomas Merehead, is that her husband, her brother, her son, brother?
COLIN HILDING: Both of her brothers, if I'm right, both compete on the men's team.
BEN WATERWORTH: I did have that up a second. Glenn and Thomas, of course, they're those famous British curling brothers.
COLIN HILDING: Let's be honest, they're not celiac, so who really cares?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. That's what all of us say. You just need to say that to her every time she mentions a shirtless man. Oh, I'm sick of you talking about him.
COLIN HILDING: Oh, that came up too, as I was looking on YouTube, trying to find out, because I didn't want to disconnect everything so I could watch this on my app on the TV. So I was looking on YouTube for it, and I just ended up watching all these Eve Muirhead working out videos. And Jamie's like, I'm right here, Colin. I'm actually kind of getting offended. I'm like, I'm going to remember that the next time there's a Hugh Jackman. Henry Cavill, Tom Cruise, Chris Pratt, Chris Pine, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth movie. And it was like probably about 20 names mentioned before she's like, all right, okay, I get it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, that's funny. The other one, Bobsleigh, which is happening right now in terms of run three, Germany currently leading South Korea. Is that correct? That can't be correct. I don't know what this is looking at here. But we don't, you know, Germany, I think Germany probably going to get that 14th gold medal today. Probably going to be in the Bobsleigh. Hopefully the Ice Hockey, I wouldn't mind seeing that. And Norway probably, I think there's a cross countries and there are a biathlon on today. So there's only four medals to talk about on the final day. But anyway, but the medal table, speaking of which, which if I can get the right thing up, here we go. So Norway, 13 gold, 14 silver, 11 bronze. Germany, 13 gold, 8 silver, 7 bronze. Canada, 11 gold, 8 silver, 10 bronze. 29 medals, it's a record for them in terms of medals won. USA, fourth, 9 gold, 8 silver, 6 bronze. And the Dutch, 8 gold, 6 silver, 6 bronze. South Korea now are in 5 gold, 6 silver, 4 bronze. So for them, they could possibly win this curling. How is the curling going? I know they're getting belted in curling. It's 4-1. So I don't know if they're going to add one there, sadly, for that. And you know where Australia is. Australia's long checked out of these Winter Olympics. So yeah, they're not too fussed with that. Interesting, just looking here, if South Korea do win one more gold medal, it will equal their highest ever gold medal tally, where they won 6 in Turin and Vancouver. But the good news for South Korea, they've already won the most medals that they've ever won at a Winter Olympics Games, Winter Olympic Games right now. What did we watch? I feel like we've discussed a bit of this. Jarrod, was there anything else that you watched that we haven't really talked about?
JARROD LOOBEEK: No, I think we kind of covered... I caught a bit of the ice hockey when Canada was leading and then I just went to bed because I figured they had it in the bag. So obviously that was the right decision this time.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, good job. Colin, anything that we haven't mentioned that you watched?
COLIN HILDING: No, the thing that I enjoyed the most was the parallel slalom. That's hands down one of my favourite events of the Olympics and then watch the curling for the men and the women and well, at least the bronze medal for the women. And on and off between three different airings of the men's hockey bronze medal win, I've probably seen the entire game. I did not watch it all in one shot. I'm happy to say I showered last night before the game was on because I knew that if I showered during the game that we were going to all of a sudden be down four goals to one. So you're welcome, Canada, that I showered a day ahead of time in advance of this.
BEN WATERWORTH: You helped the Grenoble curse get broken. You got them the bronze basically. Yes. Yeah, I mean, I really didn't see a whole lot to be honest with you. I saw a bit of the big air, a bit of the parallel cross. I saw a bit of the Alpine mixed team. Do you guys like, did you see any of this? Did you like this mixed team event? The only disappointing thing about it, I think, was there was just the slalom basically next to each other. I wanted them to have like a downhill next to each other. I mean, that would have been fun. Or downhill.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, no more downhill.
BEN WATERWORTH: Did either of you see any of the Alpine mixed team?
JARROD LOOBEEK: And I thought that it was actually one of the best events of the winter Olympics. And I do think that we need more of it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay, interesting. You're just boycotting Alpine skiing, Colin. No more Alpine skiing ever. Yeah, so athlete of the day, I'm just going to chime in. It's Ester Ledecka for me. She's the athlete of the Olympics for me. Colin, who's yours?
COLIN HILDING: I mean, we're all going to agree it's Ester, but I want to put an honourable mention out there to one of the Canadian men's hockey players, Derek Roy, who I don't know if either of you are watching this, where in the third period, he got cut on his chin or something like that. And this must be some weird Olympic rule, because I've never heard of this anywhere else, but if they get blood on their jersey, they have to change their jersey, but they only had so many. So his chin kept bleeding, and they had him change jerseys once, and then the second time, they actually showed shots where they were cleaning, trying to clean the blood stains off of it, and they kept coming to, his chin is still bleeding. So eventually they gave him an alternate sweater, which was number 75 with no name on it, where apparently each team just keeps a jersey with a random number on it in case a player needs to change into it, and they suddenly become that number. So Derrick Roy became number 75, and all the concern was about, he could not have any stains on his jersey in the middle of the game, but nobody was worried about the fact that he was bleeding for 20 minutes straight on the ice, and eventually the commentators just said, they're in the process of gluing his chin right now to try to stop the bleeding. They have run out of jerseys. I'm like, how is this an Olympic rule? Like, get the man off the ice, get him some stitches, but no, we can't have blood on the jerseys.
BEN WATERWORTH: The Olympic Charter, no blood on jerseys. Like, doesn't matter. Oh, they've been decapitated. No blood on the jersey. Oh, Jarrod, he's your athlete of the day.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I mean, it has to be Ester, but Honourable Mention to Billy Morgan just for that mug.
BEN WATERWORTH: I also want to give Honourable Mention to Bart Swings just because he lived up to my reputation from a week or so ago that he's just got an awesome name, and he's finally coming away with a medal. Is that Belgium's first medal of the games as well, perhaps? And also David Duncan, come on. Like, the douche athlete of the day. Good for him. The only one I'm just going to chime in here is they had another great montage of Hamish McLaughlin. They were showing like a Korean pop concert, and they were all like... It was like in the Metal Plaza. I had it on mute, so I didn't know what was being played. But all the Koreans had all their phones out with like the torch on, and they were dancing, so they cut back in between Hamish McLaughlin and this concert of Hamish McLaughlin waving his phone with like, I'm just, fuck off. Just stop trying to be cool.
COLIN HILDING: That sounds amazing.
BEN WATERWORTH: He's a dickhead.
JARROD LOOBEEK: And he even said, I didn't expect them to cut back to me. I didn't know I'd be on camera. I'm like, oh, yeah, sure you did. Because when you watch a concert with people with their phones out, you just have to get your phone out, turn the light on and do the same thing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Because they keep showing that montage to... They have the Justin Timberlake can't help this feeling one or whatever with all the athletes dancing and being happy. And they always cut back to this shot of him and Ed Weiner, Weed Hat and Matthew, whatever her name is, doing the Gangnam Style dance. It's just so cringe-worthily bad. Like, oh, God. Was there any other ones that I missed at all, Jarrod?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I just wrote a comment about how Channel 7 throughout the day, obviously they were sick of showing sport because they never do, and they must have been out of replays. So they just kind of did this segment of like our favourite moments of the game and went around to all the Channel 7 commentators and just kind of like talked each other up. So like they had Richo and Kenno and they're going on about how they have done such a great job of their coverage at the bottom of the hill. I'm like, yeah, in a useless position that nobody's interested in and like why are they even there? That's just where they live, in a little tent at the bottom of the hill. It was just so bad. It was basically like our coverage has been so good and there were so many highlights from our coverage. I was like, yeah, right. The only thing that you showed was replays and we'd all already seen it before.
BEN WATERWORTH: The funniest thing was, you know, because I had people over last night and my friend Sam, you know, doesn't really care about the Olympics and that, but we were sort of just in the room when they were on the screen. The first thing Sam does when he sees him is like, that guy's not even a sports reporter. What's he doing there? And I'm like, welcome to Channel 7's coverage of the Olympics. He's Rachel Finch. Yes, I did see that they did do another recap episode last night. Was that what you're talking about? They had like, you know, the best of the games. Like, who cares about the live sport? Let's show another replay thing. And then on the front bar thing, which I didn't watch, but Scotty James obviously was on the show because he's back in Australia and not giving a shit about the Olympics. Colin, I think you said you had a fail.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, this is all about Ester. So we have two commentators that are both going on during the event. And one of them is referring to her as Ester Ledecka. And then alternating in between times referring to her as Ledecka, referring to her as Ester Ledecka. And this went on for all runs she had, like the semifinals, finals, everything. Ester Ledecka, Ester Ledecka, Ester Ledecka, Ester Ledecka. And the only thing they weren't calling her is Ester Ledecka. And then after a while, I'm pointing this out, and Jamie's like, well, maybe her name actually is Ester Ledecka. I'm like, yeah, maybe it is, but then why are they calling her Ledexa all the other times? And then they cut back to the studio, and this must have just been rubbing off, because Scott Russell, who's like our main in-studio guy, does all the interviews and the recaps and everything. You know, he's talking about this afterwards, and he all of a sudden starts mentioning, like, gold medal goes to Ester Ledecka, and all of a sudden he can't pronounce Esther. Like, it is not that hard. Ester Ledecka.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, don't you hate it when people mispronounce names? It's terrible. They should be more professional. That's funny. I like that. Speaking of names, do we have a Canadian, Ester Ligexta, to give us some of our names today? Or do you have a comparison of the best ofs or whatever you want to do?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, I'm just going to kind of wrap up. Again, you guys may have covered a few of these on the episodes I wasn't on.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, they're all boring ones that we did. Don't worry.
JARROD LOOBEEK: We won't remember anyway.
COLIN HILDING: Then this will just sort of be like a greatest hits so we could wrap up some of the good ones we haven't gotten to all along. So Sarah Nurse, who is a silver medallist for women's hockey, one she has here, if I could have any super power, it would be teleportation and she put in brackets, aka apparating with a lightning bolt next to it. So I don't know if this is like the technical word for teleportation is apparating, but she decided to correct everybody on that. This one here that Sarah Nurse has, my funniest childhood memory is dressing my little brothers up, pretending they were my sisters.
BEN WATERWORTH: We actually did do that one. We remember that one.
COLIN HILDING: There was at least one good one. Oh, come on. Are all my other pages here frozen? Olympic.ca is not responding. Do you want to recover web page? I've just got six of these. So let's, here we go. I got one of them open here. Kim Bhutan, who's of course our flag bearer.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Where's the good one here?
COLIN HILDING: Draw a picture of yourself. She drew a picture of herself drawing a picture of herself, which was great. She's sitting there with like a painting and an easel and everything. Very meta. And then another one. Yeah, another one here. Draw a picture of one of your teammates. She drew one person slipping on a banana, and the other one already flat on her back behind her, with the word bubble coming out. It always happens to me. There's got to be an inside joke here.
BEN WATERWORTH: Look at us not remembering what we did, but then there's two there that we remember.
COLIN HILDING: You're like, they all sucked.
BEN WATERWORTH: They all sucked, except for the drawings and dressing them up as girls.
COLIN HILDING: Come on, some of these have got to come up now. Erin Mielninski, who is a skier. Did you get her too?
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm just being a sarcastic dick. Move on.
JARROD LOOBEEK: That name doesn't ring any bells.
COLIN HILDING: Wrong. My least favourite food is cilantro. I just wanted to get your guys' opinion. Is cilantro a disgusting food? Apparently, it's the most popular garnish in the world, and I don't know a single person other than myself who likes cilantro. Are you guys cilantro fans?
BEN WATERWORTH: I thought it was a flavour. I didn't think it was a food.
COLIN HILDING: Like cilantro-flavoured coffee or something?
BEN WATERWORTH: No. I can't say on that. I know what it is, but I don't know what it is.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Isn't it like coriander?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, I think they're the same thing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Coriander is great. I like coriander.
COLIN HILDING: It's popular everywhere but here. Marietta O'Dyne, who is a slopestyle snowboarder. If I could have any superpower, it would be all of them.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'll just lay some for other people.
COLIN HILDING: If I weren't an athlete, then I would be probably a mechanic or a welder, which just seems right. Yeah, I would be everything. And if I were an animal, which would you be? She drew a peacock and put, I'm a peacock, captain. I don't know why the captain. I think my computer might be shutting down, so if I suddenly go silent, just stall for a while.
BEN WATERWORTH: The Canadian Olympic team are hacking into your computer. Stop making jokes about our athlete day. Yes, if Colin all of a sudden disappears, we know where he is. Do you have any more? Or is this? Or is he gone? I think he's gone. Technical difficulties, everybody. Please stand by. There it is, welcome back, Colin.
COLIN HILDING: Let's continue this before I'm shut down again by angry Canadians, or David Duncan here. Denny Morrison. Doosh Duncan, yeah. Denny Morrison, Speed Skater. As a kid, my favourite sports team was the 1992 Toronto Blue Jays and my junior high school volleyball team, 1999.
BEN WATERWORTH: Often compared, those two.
COLIN HILDING: Those are all of our favourites too.
BEN WATERWORTH: I still have the DVD of that volleyball team. I always watch it.
COLIN HILDING: This one might be one of my favourite ones ever on here. If I had to do karaoke, I would sing to, he wrote NA and then crossed it out and wrote Josie, my wife.
BEN WATERWORTH: They had a fight in the first draft, the second half, Josie, my wife.
COLIN HILDING: Forgot about my wife there. Here, I'm going to sed you guys, because this last one is pictures, and if I don't do a good enough job explaining these pictures, feel free to do, and you've probably covered this one too while I was gone. Mark McMorris, slope style bronze medallist. What does he have here? As a kid, my favourite sports team was Burton Team, which I have no idea what that is.
BEN WATERWORTH: I have the jersey.
COLIN HILDING: Exactly. With number 75 on the back. Absolutely.
BEN WATERWORTH: I got blood on the other one.
COLIN HILDING: I just have to show you guys his pictures. Draw a picture of yourself. He drew two eyes and a smile.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's like a Nike tick with dots above it.
COLIN HILDING: If you scroll down, draw a picture of your favourite animal. I have no clue what this is. It looks like a wooly mammoth crossed with a giraffe.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's a brontosaurus.
COLIN HILDING: My favourite movie, this is such a snowboarder thing to do. He couldn't write Step Brothers. He wrote, my favourite movie is Step Bros. If I had to do karaoke, I would sing to you. I don't know if that's me. Yeah, that's Josie as well. And then draw a picture of one of your teammates. Of course, Mark McMorris drew a stick figure on a board, giving us no indication who he is.
BEN WATERWORTH: Knight. He's just not on the right team.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, that's why he's doing nothing right now.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's what all the snowboarders think of Carlos Garcia Knight, a stick on a board.
COLIN HILDING: There we go. Those are the My Name Is Canadian or something like that. Maybe I'll dig up like one or two more for tomorrow. I don't know, but we found some good ones.
BEN WATERWORTH: I want to do like for Tokyo, I want to research to see if we can just find an obscure Olympic country that do something similar to like the fan messages or the My Name. So like, here's the Lithuanian, you know, get to know you or something like that.
COLIN HILDING: What is like Team Lichtenstein have?
BEN WATERWORTH: Team Lichtenstein. Oh, that's a good idea. The Lichtenstein Olympic Committee. I'm sure that's a valuable business to work for. The Lichtenstein Olympic Committee. Oh, Olympic.LI. Here we go. This is exciting. Anyone here speak Lichtensteinian, anyone? Oh, it's in English. Sport for all. Welcome. On the English side of the Lichtenstein Olympic Committee, on the English side, you'll find selective information of the original side. Above all, you find information about Olympic events in connection to Lichtenstein and its athletes. Good.
COLIN HILDING: And of course they have...
JARROD LOOBEEK: Thank you Google Translate.
COLIN HILDING: They have four athletes on the main page, which is their entire Olympic team, I guess.
BEN WATERWORTH: No, that's like a quarter of their population. That's not only their Olympic athletes, that's the president, that's the vice president, that's the secretary of defence, that's Monica Culpepper. She's moved over to... Does it actually give you any information about that? You have the headings at the top, Sport For All, followed by Lichtenstein, with Olympic rings above it, Elite Sports, to which you have Elite Sports, Eurengelisten, they're all in German, and then Organisation, About Us.
COLIN HILDING: I love this, the section on Pyeongchang 2018, Die 15 Olympischen Disziplinen. The 15 Olympic disciplines, I guess, are competing, Ski Alpen, Biathlon, Bob, Bob sled is just Bob there, Ski Lengluff, Eisgenstloff, Freestyle Skiing, Ice Hockey, Rodelen, Nordisch Kombination, Short Track Speed Skating, Skeleton, Ski Spriggan, Snowboard, Speed Skating.
BEN WATERWORTH: I can't wait for Bob. G'day, Bob. It's going down. Oh, that's my favourite thing of these Olympics. Oh, Olympic data. What's Olympic? Oh, database for the Liechtenstein Olympic Committee. You can log in. I just like opened up here. Let's create a profile. Gunther Wollen, Kick Boxing, Point Fighting, 1902, 1978, Personalize Bessler's Gong. This is the database of both Liechtenstein's Olympic athletes. Oh, Julia Hassler, Schwimmen. Hello to all our Liechtenstein listeners right now. Yes. Anyway, fan messages from Australia haven't been updated in four days.
COLIN HILDING: Didn't the same thing happen in Rio?
BEN WATERWORTH: I think maybe. I mean, the difference is in Rio, I think at least we probably expected maybe to win medals right at the end. I don't know. Like, Jarrod and I were just talking about this. Legitimately, it's a fuck you to our athletes competing on the final day. We have our four-man Bob team still to go, and our great cross-country skier, Jessica Yeaton. Now, as Jarrod and I were explaining, what if this is like a Bradbury situation? She's had been from the back, and then every single cross-country skier like trips and falls and, you know, goes in the wrong lane or something like that. Jessica Yeaton, famous gold medal for Australia in the women's 30-kilometre mass start cross-country skiing. Does she get the flag at the last minute? Sorry, Jarrod Hughes. You're no longer our flag bearer. Where's all the fan messages to Jessica Yeaton? She's probably got all the friends down at the local RSL. Like, Jessica, I know your brother Dave. You know, go for gold. Poor four from the AOC. No one would do this in Liechtenstein. Jesus Christ. Definitely not in the great sport of Bob. So we've only got four. I feel like we need to complete the set, though. I mean, we've only got four to go, so we may as well do it. So we're up to snowboarder Jessica Rich, who didn't she... She was a Big Air one, wasn't she? Big Air. Email bigair at hotmail.com. State, Western Australia. Any ideas here? No one's ever going to see this.
COLIN HILDING: Some douchey Duncan stole my car this morning. Do you know where it is?
BEN WATERWORTH: Some douchey Duncan stole my car this morning. Do you know where it is? Done. I'm going to sign her up for AOC News and Updates, because you know you're not going to get anything for another two years when Tokyo's on. I don't even know if they care. Do they care about the Summer Youth Games later this year? Probably not. Alright, post another message. We are up to, officially now, Greta Small. I like Greta. She was one of my favourites of these games. Very humble, very nice. She's crying at the fact that she's even at the Olympics. So, name. Who is the president? John Coates is our president, isn't he, of the AOC? John Coates. Email John Coates. That's probably at aoc.com, right? I'm going to sign him up for some news. Hey John, you want some news for your own organisation? I don't know. Hey Greta, what are you doing in Korea? Is there an Olympics on or something? Is there an Olympics on or something? Oh Greta, look at her smiling in that flight. I want to go out for a coffee with Greta Small. Greta, if you're listening, just look me up, alright? Just let's go for coffee. Nothing more. Just coffee. That's it. I'll pay for it. I mean, she's an alpine ski. She's not exactly rolling in the money. She's not exactly rolling in the money. She's not exactly rolling in the money. Hayden Smith, I think he's the bobsled guy who basically was put on some best looking olympian athlete. Jamie would like him. Name, Jamie Hilding. Email, Jamie. Oh, she's already used her before. Overseas fan, take off your shirt.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Do you have any workout videos I can watch?
BEN WATERWORTH: Do you have any workout videos I can. Watch? Don't tell Colin. Oh, alright. Yep. So our final one, and I feel like after this one, we should just maybe send one to the entire Olympic team. So our final one is Brody Summers. G'day Brody. What a name. Let's see here. He's a freestyle skier. He's an aerialist. Is he not?
COLIN HILDING: No.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, he is.
COLIN HILDING: Can that just be the comment? You're a freestyle skier. Are you an aerialist?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I put Ben Waterworth. benwaterworth.com.
COLIN HILDING: You're an aerialist. Are you not?
BEN WATERWORTH: You're an aerialist. Are you not? Right. Oh, look at that. We did it everybody. We've achieved our Olympic goal of messaging every single athlete on the Australian team. Great job. So we're going to wrap it up.
COLIN HILDING: And what's the count of those that officially got our message?
BEN WATERWORTH: We got only six, didn't we? Jarrod, six or seven?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, and I'm another ten pending.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, exactly. To the Australian Olympic team, name Off The Podium. Email, Off The Podium. I don't even think we have an email address, but it's www\.outmail.com. State, let's go with New South Wales. No one gives a shit about Tasmania. What's our final message to the Australian Olympic team?
COLIN HILDING: About, sorry, I didn't get to see you on TV.
BEN WATERWORTH: Get to see you on TV. Love you. See you in Beijing. xxxx.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Mogul, mogul, mogul.
BEN WATERWORTH: Mogul, mogul, mogul. Oh, what a wrap up. Oh, everyone's sad. Alright, so that now leads us into day 16, the final day. Just a quick update on the curling, because we're on day 16 right now. Sweden are on their way to gold, it seems. They're 7-2 up over Korea. Is it possible to come back from 7-2 down in the sport of curling, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: No, I think this is when the Swiss usually give up, so I think Sweden's got Sisolok.
BEN WATERWORTH: So obviously this will be decided. It looks as though Sweden are going to come away with the gold there. We have the bobsleigh, the final runs are about to happen soon for that one. The ice hockey, of course, Russia versus the Olympic athletes of Germany. And cross country, the women's 30 kilometre classical is up for grabs. So our hope today for Canadian perspective is no gold to Germany or Norway, to not equal the 14 gold that Vancouver brought Canada. But let's be honest, I kind of want to see Germany win the gold. I think it would be, wrap it up perfectly in the ice hockey. And also, I guess the closing ceremony is on. So, final thoughts on the final day. What are you looking forward to? Thoughts on the closing ceremony. I'm saying it right now. Si is not at the closing ceremony. I'm done. The Olympics, they didn't happen. Si has to close this with Gangnam Style, otherwise Korea, you fail as an Olympic host. Jarrod, what are your thoughts on the final day and the closing ceremony thoughts?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, looking forward to the ice hockey. Hoping that it is a close game, but I am with you, hoping that Germany wins that. And then closing ceremony, I agree with you. I think if Si is not there yet, it's officially a fail. It's like the games didn't happen at all. We might just get a replay later in the year in a neutral country. Switzerland, I think, is going to host them. If Si doesn't compete, all the medals are taken away, and we start over.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which of course Roger Federer will come out and do Gangnam Style. According to Channel 7, I'd love that. Colin, your thoughts on the head of the final day and closing ceremony?
COLIN HILDING: Believe it or not, I really am rooting for Germany. As I said, it doesn't really matter if they beat Canada's gold record because there's like 16 more events now than there were in 2010. But also, it would vindicate us for losing if we lost to the gold medal-winning country, and if it was Germany. And Germany somehow won a gold in the great sport of hockey as such a hockey nation. That would just be hilarious. For closing ceremonies, I don't know. I mean, as long as Hobo John Lennon is there, I think it will be a success. So that's all we need. Without him, then these Olympics may very well have just... They should never have happened. Cancel, Tokyo, Asia has failed us all around. We need Hobo John Lennon back.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I'm just looking at a bit of a preview for this. Because I mean, generally the closing ceremony is the fun ceremony. You know, the opening ceremony is the official look how great our country is. The closing ceremony is the fun one. I mean, one of my favourite closing ceremonies was the Vancouver 22. I love the Vancouver closing ceremony. It was so much fun. And so it was the Sydney one, just to be completely biased amongst those. But so officially, there's the pop concert section I'm seeing here. So get excited, everybody, because Psy hasn't been officially announced. But I can say officially, South Korean-Chinese boy band EXO will perform Growl. Oh, that sounds exciting. It's one of your favourites, Jarrod. South Korean singer and rapper CL, leader of disbanded South Korean girl group 2NE1, which I know, sorry Colin to bring that up, I know you're so sad about that, will perform I Am The Best. I believe that was written by Ryan Lochte. And South Korean-American singer Milk will perform Ooh Child. Popular amongst pedophiles, I believe. A handover of the Olympic flag will happen, yes, that's there. And the performance for Beijing 2022 will be directed by Chinese film director Zhang Wimou, who also did the 2008 Summer Olympics opening and closing ceremonies, which are often regarded as some of the best. We're obviously very Asian for the next few Olympics, aren't we? Because we're off to Tokyo and Beijing, so the next six or so years, four or so years, we're all up in Asia for the closing ceremonies, opening ceremonies, and the Olympics. That's funny. Obviously not including the youth games. But we will be back. We're going to be planning of recording our wrap-up episode essentially straight after the closing ceremony. We'll look over the final four medal events and hopefully be talking about Cy, because we've been playing Cy on this show since we started our Winter Olympics handover about a year or so ago. So we've predicted it. It's not a very hard prediction to make because he's probably the only Korean anybody in the world knows. And Daniel Dae Kim. Daniel Dae Kim might be at the Olympics. Get excited for Daniel Dae Kim! Yes! But I'm pumped up, I'm excited, and I'm also a bit sad. Jarrod, thank you for your company. Look forward to the final day of coverage here on Off The Podium.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Thank you. It's been fun.
BEN WATERWORTH: And Colin, of course, as well. Don't go robbing any cars now, would you?
COLIN HILDING: Hey, Canada's officially gone 24 hours without stealing a car, getting arrested. And so I think that's a good streak.
BEN WATERWORTH: Is your car outside? You better go check. Thank you for your company. We'll speak to you next time on Off The Podium.
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