Tokyo 2020 Day 4 Review
Another golden day for Australia and Canada is here and we're back to cover all of that and more with our Tokyo 2020 day 4 recap! Why are we pumping our own tires today by declaring that THE CURSE IS IN THE PURSE? Was the 100m backstroke final the best event so far of the Olympics? Why is Kaylee McKeown the hero we never knew we needed? Is our commentary of the final our best yet? Is surfing now our new favourite sport? Why are we all angry that softball won't be returning at the next Olympics? How sad do we feel for Jess Fox? Why do we find weightlifting so funny? And why is today's athlete of the day the hardest one we've ever had to decide on? All of these questions will be answered and more on another epic edition of your favourite Olympic podcast!
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Please note this is an automated transcript that may contain errors.
BEN WATERWORTH: It is Off The Podium, an Olympics podcast coming to you today for our day four recap of Tokyo 2020. And allow me to start this episode, how every episode of this will start moving forward. Fuck yeah, that's right, another gold medal to Australia. And what a gold medal it was. On Instagram, Kaylee McKeown is an Olympic gold medallist. The first ever gold medal, I believe, that Australia has ever won in backstroke, Jarrod. Is this true? This can't be true. Welcome to the show, first of all, Jarrod, but I'm baffled. Aren't Australians good at going back?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Evidently not. I did hear that comment, and I did think that was a bit odd, but you know, obviously we're cleaning up the other medals and not the golds in the backstroke.
BEN WATERWORTH: We don't. Yeah, apparently we don't like going back. But a massive day for Australia and a massive day for Canada, because the curse is off in the purse. I can't even speak properly. Hashtag kind of, sort of, maybe sort of back out of the purse. Well, another result today might kind of question that. I don't know if it was a good or bad result. We'll talk to Colin about that. Colin, welcome back to the show. It's an exciting day to be an OzCanadian.
COLIN HILDING: I'm still drying the tears from the backstroke. It was an incredible moment. And I'm going to say this right now. I don't care if you're Australian Canadian. If you're a fan of Off The Podium, the real winner last night was Kaylee Mast.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes. I mean, look, we are excited for the fact that we've got a new hero of the world in Kaylee McKeown, not only because of her swim, but because of her amazing reaction, which we'll talk about, and you may have heard at the beginning of this episode. But in all seriousness, as a podcast that has a bit of a dodgy reputation for cursing our athletes that we get on this show, I mean, literally one of our best chances to break this purse. Purse? The curse in the purse, I'm shocked that it's been broken.
COLIN HILDING: The curse in the purse and the who?
BEN WATERWORTH: He didn't even make it to the Olympics. He ended up pulling out after I said he was a guaranteed gold. So, I mean, it's still not a gold. Let's be honest. Let's look at the head of ourselves. It's only a silver, but I mean, for Canada, a silver may as well be a gold, which-
COLIN HILDING: Only a silver.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm so Australian, aren't I?
COLIN HILDING: Pretentious Australian would say only a silver.
BEN WATERWORTH: I blame Channel 7.
COLIN HILDING: Canada didn't know silver existed until last night.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, true, very true. I blame Channel 7 for the fact that we have hopes and dreams that these athletes are gonna do better because they pump their tires up so much. But it is been a good day for both Australia and Canada. For Australia, it was a golden and bronze day. Gold for Kaylee McKeown in the woman's 100-metre backstroke. Bronze for Owen Wright in the men's surfing, which was pretty exciting to talk about, will be pretty exciting to talk about. And Jarrod and I called it yesterday. We said she wouldn't do it, but she got a bronze, Jess Fox, in the K1 slalom, which was very interesting as well. And for Canada, it was a silvery bronzed day. Kaylee McKeown in the same event that we just talked about, the 100-metre backstroke. The curse is in the purse with our former Off The Podium guest getting her first individual medallist. After a day after having Tasmania's first ever individual gold medallist, we have Off The Podium's first ever individual medallist. Well done, Kaylee. And bronze in the women's softball. As I said, Off Air, you're welcome, Canada. You can have that medal that we gave you. And in judo, back-to-back judo bronzes for Canada, day after day, women's 63 kilo. Catherine, let me try this, Bushamon Pinnard. How did I go with that one?
COLIN HILDING: Close, close enough.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay, we'll accept that. Passable. Passable. I'll start with you, Jarrod. How are you feeling today with a gold, a bronze, and a bronze?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think good for the most part. I mean, the gold this morning was obviously incredible. The bronze in surfing was amazing. And the bronze in the kayaking, you know, take it. I just, I think of all that I was saying to you earlier, I think of all the results, the strength results so far, that was the one that hurt like the most. Like we predicted it yesterday, but she was just doing so well in like the lead up, the fact that she was the fastest in the heat. She was the fastest out of like the semi-qualifying to get to the final. And then just even in the final itself, the fact that she had two penalties and still wound up with a bronze medal just shows like how good of a kayaker Jess Fox is.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, that's the thing, isn't it? That take away the penalty is she would have won gold. She would have shattered in. She would have been about three seconds clear of a gold medallist. Let's be honest, if anyone wasn't gonna win but Jess, I want somebody called Ricarda Funk winning the gold. Like she brings the funk to canoeing. And a German too. We're happy when the Germans win. I'm glad it wasn't the Spaniard. But yeah, I've got mixed feelings on it because yeah, it's one of these things where it's like you wanted to win the gold, you wanted to complete the set. She just seems like such a genuinely nice human being who Australia can get behind. And I mean, yeah, she kind of had that initial disappointment at the end, but then she just shows just what a nice person she is, like just pointing out that she's still happy she won a medal. But then it's just, yeah, it's just disappointing because to me, it kind of, if you're gonna have, like Australia always has that one event that we want anyone to win, more than anything. And most of them, not they sometimes, there's some more so than winter. Like you think back, I'm sounding like Basil yesterday. It's like the Cathy moment, kind of the one that you kind of wanted to win more. I think back to Sally in London, you know, all that pressure and like she came through for it. I, yeah, but it's just, it's hard, but and channel seven, fuck you. Like seriously, like I fall into your stupid traps of just pumping her up so much that you feel this is like, I mean, we literally had a montage today where I think they interviewed every Olympian saying, oh, we love Jess, she's gonna win a medal. Like it's kind of like, whoa, okay. But I guess the good news is, Jarrod, that she still has one more event. Obviously the C1 has been introduced for women this year for the first time. She's a former world champion in that one. So there is every chance that she can break this little curse that Jess has. Unfortunately, she can't quite get the gold in the Olympics.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, fingers crossed for our silver in the C1.
BEN WATERWORTH: But the surfing, though, like, I mean, I want to save Kaylee to last, because I feel we can join that in the conversation with Kylie. But I mean, all the talk was about our women, about Steph Gilmore and Sally Fitzgibbon. And like, I will say, Sally Fitzgibbon, if you saw her interview afterwards, heartbreaking. Like, this is a woman who loved the Olympics growing up. I mean, as the commentators told us, she went to the Youth Olympic Festival and won a silver, I think, in running. And, you know, she wanted to become an Olympian, but she switched to surfing, and then, you know, her dream has come to reality. So it was heartbreaking to see her go out in the quarters. But Owen Wright might be one of my new favourite athletes. I mean, we're talking about this off air, about the skateboarders kind of piss you off with their obnoxiousness, and I feel the surfers should be there. But the surfers are like obnoxious, but like still the type of guys you want to have a beer with. Like it's kind of, you know, bro, hang 10, like, you know, gnarly, bro. But like at the same time, like you could totally, you know, Colin could leave Casper with Owen. Like he's a nice enough guy that he could just hang out with him. So history making moment. Australia wins our first ever medal in surfing.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, it was so good. And I feel that surfing, it's just I've gotten used to it and I've grown to kind of enjoy it, like to start with. It did feel like it was boring and it dragged. But now I think with the excitement of medals on the line, maybe that's what what makes it a little bit more interesting that you can sit through those 20, 30 minutes of waiting for somebody to actually catch a wave. But I think to the fact that it was a medal round, they went for like a lot more waves. Like, okay, this isn't ideal, but I need to post a score on the board early on in this so that I can get a lead. And the strategy too at the end of if you have priority, tailing the person who doesn't and then making sure they just can't get onto any waves so you can hold on for the win.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's kind of like, yeah, it's almost like a bit of a bout going on between them. I like that kind of strategy of it. And the thing that obviously has made a lot of news with Owen and it is a great story because sometimes they can, particularly Channel 7. I mean, I've seen that same ad for The Voice about 50 times about that young girl who's never, God, I'm so sick of it. But like Channel 7 liked to inflate the positive stories. But this is actually a pretty cool story with Owen. He had a traumatic brain injury back in 2015 at an event in Hawaii. And he had to learn how to talk, walk and surf all over again.
COLIN HILDING: Wow, Benz only learned one of those so far.
BEN WATERWORTH: I know, right? And I haven't even had that injury yet. But I mean, in six years to do that and come out and win an Olympic bronze medal, absolutely crazy. So great. And as I said to you, Jarrod, today in our conversation, it was, if there was one sport you feel Australia deserves to win, it's surfing. We have such a culture and a history. You think about surfing and beaches. You think of Australia. This is like, as I said to you, like if Canada didn't win a medal in curling the first time I was at the Olympics, it's kind of, you know, you associate it so much with that country. So yeah, the fact that we got a medal, obviously not the colour we wanted, but a bronze is a bronze. It's still an achievement. Owen Wright is an Olympic medallist.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, and I think the guy he was surfing against too was potentially ranked one in the world. He's very high up to the fact that he was the underdog going into it and was able to pull off that medal. Like you said earlier, the fact we were expecting the medal to come from one of the women, it just did turn out to be one of those great moments where an unexpected person came through and won a medal for Australia.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, talk about your two bronzes. The judo one, I mean, back to back days with judo medals, a sport that you never had a female judo medal, now you got two, I think you'd only won about four medals in this sport in history, and now you've nearly doubled that total. Was Catherine expected? Was this an expected medal for Canada or another surprise?
COLIN HILDING: I think both of them were surprised just in that there were no expectations. They weren't talked up at all, even though with Klim Kate, she was highly ranked, I mean, very highly ranked, so probably would have been expected to medal. With Catherine, I don't think there was any expectations at all. I don't even know if this was supposed to air. With Jessica Klim Kate, it was interesting that they had, sort of, sporadically throughout the night cut back and forth to her. Let's see how she's going here. With Catherine, I'm sure that they had already been awarded by the time they aired it. It was just, oh yeah, let's just check in with Catherine Beauchemin-Gunard. And then the really interesting thing is, I think we're seeing the birth of a sport that's going to be like a sport of the future in Canada, because they have not aired any judo on CBC except for our two medal wins, really. And well, and then the bronze that we missed out on yesterday. But they went on to air the gold medal after that. Now, that's unusual that if you just have one of the sports that you're just, let's just check in for what we're going to end up winning a medal in. That's all you get of it on network coverage. But they decided, let's stick with this now, which shows obviously Canadians interest has been peaked in judo.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just a quick question for you, Colin. Didn't you say that Klem Kate was the scariest bond villain, bond ally of all time? Or is that a joke?
COLIN HILDING: Their connection are missing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Sounds like King Kade. I would play the screaming sound effect, but on a different show. Yeah, one thing I'll say, like just on that sort of a tangent, the same thing is you talk about sort of showing the type of sports like they did that back in Sydney when we got the bronze. And then, you know, you have certain sports where like taekwondo is a sport we never see. But when we won gold in Sydney and then silver in Sydney, you know, they kind of showed that a little bit. I was flicking channels last night on Channel 7, really late on to 7Mate. And they actually were showing, like, hey, let's show taekwondo. Let's show this. Let's show that. And like, I know they used to do that back in the day when you'd only have one channel that show all like the, quote, crappy sports in the middle of the night. But I flip back to normal Channel 7. It's one o'clock in the morning. Oh, look, here's a replay again of Ariane winning a goal. It's like, it's one in the morning. Everyone's going to bed. Stop showing the replay. Your other bronze, softball, three-two win over traditional rivals in Mexico, or as we like to call them, America B. Your first, I was actually surprised, is your very first medal in softball, because I mean, in your part of the world, like baseball's obviously quite big, and that translates it across to softball. I mean, I know when I was living in Canada, it was quite a prominent sport. So it surprises me that this has taken you guys so long to win a medal in softball. Admittedly, the fifth time it's been in the Olympics, it's been a bit of a break, but still, I thought you would have won one before this.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, and here in Canada, obviously we have, we've had two major league baseball teams, Toronto and Montreal. But even though those are the only ones that have major league, I mean, baseball's still big here. I mean, across Canada, you could say it's, you know, maybe the number four sport still. Hockey's number one, football's number two, basketball would be number three, and then, well, maybe basketball and baseball, even battling it out. Because Winnipeg, we've had a fairly successful minor league baseball team for 20, 25 years now. Whereas basketball, I guess we've struggled to hold onto teams, and it's just sort of they're in and out. The stadium that we have for our baseball team was built for the Pan Am Games, and it can hold like 6,000 people. They'll still come close to selling that out every once in a while. So yeah, there is interest here. And the last time the Olympics, what was it? Was it Beijing? That was the last time softball was in it? And that was time where Canada came close. That was like, oh, we were so close. And one of the great stories that they've been showing all over the place is that several of the players who were there in Beijing were like, you know what, I probably would have retired by now, but I knew that we had a chance. And after Beijing, we really thought we had a shot this time around at getting a medal. I don't think they expected that it would have been as easy to get there. You know, if you look at playing Australia. But it's great that you have this mixture of these new players and then these veterans who stuck around, who were there in Beijing, just because they wanted that vindication from having lost now 23 years ago, or 23, Canadian math, I don't know what it is.
BEN WATERWORTH: You were doing so well ripping into Australia, and then your math just let you down. Yeah, I mean, I found when I was there in Victoria that obviously don't have any pro teams in Victoria, but kind of the minorish teams. So outside of the Royals in the WHL, you had the Harbour Cats, which were in the, I can't remember the name of the league, but very prominent sort of side there. And yeah, I'd never got to go to a game because of COVID, but driving past a little stadium they had there, that held several thousand people. So it was obviously of interest there. And I did a bit of media work with them in the lead up to when they thought they were playing in very well run, organised team. And stuff you just would not see here in Australia when it comes to how we run baseball and softball. But I like the fact that, you know, the coach Mark Smith, who I believe is retiring, he's been coaching Canada for a long time. He was very vocal speaking out afterwards about the fact that, you know, it's kind of just been tossed around this sport. And I mean, well, I think we should do an episode in the future sort of looking at the sports of the Olympics. And we haven't really discussed about sort of this new model the IOC have adopted in the last 10 or so years, which has its pros and cons. It's very similar to the Commonwealth Games model. It then just makes it a bit cruel for a sport like softball and baseball that have been fighting so hard to get back in after being dropped in 2008. They get let back in only to be dropped again in three years time. I mean, I can all but guarantee it will be back in LA, but I would probably almost guarantee that it wouldn't be in Brisbane, because I feel that Brisbane will not fight for it. I know it was somewhat popular in Sydney, and we've generally got a decent softball team, but yeah, I feel the sport's not that big in Australia where that we would be keen to keep it. So again, you're looking at a chance of it's on again, off again, on again, off again. So how are you meant to develop these players who, and you're talking about judo maybe becoming big in Canada. I mean, this has got to set girls alight in Canada. Like, look at that, a bronze medal at the Olympics, but there's no opportunity. So yeah, it's interesting. I like it when these sort of people involved in the team are speaking out against it.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, and really, this is going to become a common thing, I think, across all the Olympics here is, exposure means so much to whatever country you're in, getting interest up in that sport. I've mentioned this on interviews before, but you look at tennis in Canada, before Bouchard and Ronich, nobody even watched tennis, let alone even tried to play it. Now, you've got tennis clubs all over the place opening up. Probably within 10 years, we're gonna be serious contenders in tennis, men's and women's. Hockey, a big player for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Austin Matthews, one of the best players in the NHL. He's from Arizona. They saw this huge uptick in kids registering for hockey once he was drafted into the NHL and started playing for the Leafs. When we talked to Sammy Joe Smalls, that was one of the big topics that came up for women's hockey, is that until you get the exposure, you're not really going to get interest. You're not going to get crowds. You're not going to get the best athletes actually going out for this sport. So when you have something like judo that's exploding in Canada, you're going to get more people interested in it, which means you have more contenders going forward. With softball, how are you going to keep the interest up when it's only there if it's in a popular country? You know, let's be honest. The only reason that we're watching this right now is because we're in Japan. And like you said, when we go to Los Angeles, yeah, we're going to get it back, but then we're going to get a layoff for a couple more Olympics.
BEN WATERWORTH: I say to the Brisbane Organising Committee, keep it in, come on, because I mean, I'm an advocate for baseball and softball. I think it should be in the Olympics over skateboarding and a few other sports I could argue for. I'm 50-50 on golf. Jarrod, I mean, obviously we're shitty still, we're salty that we lost to America Bee yesterday, but I mean, what are your takes on baseball slash softball? Because I will say, I think, I don't know if I said it to you on air or it was an off-air thing where I mentioned about how they lump baseball and softball together under baseball. There is actually a reason behind that, because both baseball and softball are under the same governing body, so therefore softball is technically classified under the baseball banner, even though they're two different sports. So there's a reason behind that. Jarrod, what's your take on the poor old softball and baseball players who are kind of getting cock-teased every four years?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think it should be here to stay. I think, if anything, they should be adding in more teams to the event. I think easily it could be at least eight teams, split them into two pools of four, or just have a pool of eight. Yeah, I think the issue with this is the fact that, so softball is not a sport that only one region of the world plays. Like it's got teams from all different regions, there'd easily be enough teams to make eight. I just don't see why you wouldn't include it. It's something that, I suppose, particularly for like softball, the Olympic medal is like the pinnacle of the sport, which is another good reason for keeping it around. It's not like a tennis where it's a little bit, whether a gold medal is quite on par with winning a grand slam. Yeah, I just don't see why not. I would be disappointed if they didn't put it in Brisbane. I think they should make a move to have it. And with that in mind, be training well before the lead up to that games to make sure that Australia is in with a genuine chance of a silver or gold medal.
BEN WATERWORTH: Because the Australian Baseball League, it gets a bit of coverage. Like it sort of Fox Sports and you know, they attract like, I know speaking back when I was doing some of the media stuff with the Harbour Cats, I interviewed their coach and he had mentioned that he had had a stint. He'd come to Australia and sort of train on the teams. And he said, like, you've got a pretty well run sort of league down there for such a small fringe sport that's not that big in Australia. Similar to sort of hockey, the Australian ice hockey league is kind of very well run and for what it is. But yeah, I agree with everything you said. And I think that, you know, I love Olympic handball. I think it is one of the most underrated sports that should get more coverage. But look at the pool of countries that play and compete in that. It's very small and selective to mainly Europe. You know, you would argue rugby is kind of very small and selected to certain parts of the world. If you were to have cricket, it's gonna be a similar thing. Ice hockey is a classic example of a, you know, there's maybe a few more in ice hockey that there are when it comes to some of those sports. But yeah, like if your excuse is that this is a sport that's maybe not popular in Europe, that's not, you know, why then is a sport that's only popular in Europe and not really popular in, you know, North America or Oceania or Asia, then consider it over. It's very Europe-centric. So, I mean, it's, again, we'll do an episode, I feel, where we talk about sports and things like that, because I think it's got its pros and cons the way the ISE certainly do it. But I feel, I really feel for softball and baseball, you know, to come back. Like, I guess you could say we feel for karate that it's making one appearance and it won't be in Paris, but karate's making its debut. It's kind of, it's a first-time thing. It's like, you know, there it is. Whereas baseball and softball have been there for a while, got taken out, they've been fighting so hard to get back in, they get back in, and then they're kicked out again. So anyway, congratulations, Canada. This is the first time Australia's never won a medal in softball, this is the first time. Again, you're welcome for the bronze, Colin. We feel sorry for you guys.
COLIN HILDING: So generous of you. You know what you should do? You should give us the gold in the 100-metre backstroke.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, speaking of the 100-metre backstroke, great segue, Colin. I'm wearing my gold again today because we're gonna hear our commentary for this very, very shortly, but we talked this up. This should have been the race of the Olympics, and it lived up to expectations. The top three were the three former world record holders. Kaylee McKeown wins the gold. Now, I've mentioned before about me following her on Instagram, but she came out of nowhere. I don't even remember how I ended up following her on Instagram. It just happened. You probably know the answer to that. Move on. But when she broke the world record in the trials a month or so ago, out of nowhere, no one expected it. And that's why I think, as we were talking about yesterday, maybe she's not getting a lot of stuff talked about her because it's kind of like, oh, maybe it's just a flash in the pan. We saw it in the semis, boom, boom, boom. The Olympic record went three ways. And then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, we get this great final. Kaylee Mass just shot out of the blocks. I thought she had it. And Kaylee overruns her right in the end. And bronze went to Regan Smith, the former world record holder. So our three former world record holders and current world record holder to get the gold, silver, and bronze. Jarrod, I don't know if you watched this live. I don't know when you did. I mean, I'm sure you possibly caught up. I don't know if Channel 7 has shown it at all today. But I mean, this is epic. And I'm not even on to the great part after the race, which was even more epic.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, it was such a good race. The fact that it felt similar to the 400, the fact that Australia had to come back to get this gold medal, it just makes it all the more exciting. And like you said, having the three previous world record holders in the same race, the fact that it did come down to those three people, the fact that there was a touch in it, it just, it lived up. It exceeded the hype.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, 100%. Colin, you and I obviously called it, and we're gonna hear that very, very shortly, outside of your literal tears, because this is personal for our podcast. What's the talk like in Canada for Kaylee Mass going from getting a bronze five years ago to now getting a silver?
COLIN HILDING: The word upgrade is what's being thrown around most of the time. I think Kaylee herself even referred to it as like, I'm happy that I upgraded my medal. If I'm being honest, I think that the expectation was for her to win gold before this started, but just seeing everything that happened in the heat, Canadians are realistic enough to lower expectations, unlike Australians, I guess, which from what I'm hearing. So I feel like going into this, it was like, oh yeah, Kaylee, we're really hoping she gets a medal. So if she had just won bronze, I think it still would have been great, but the fact that she has upgraded now to silver, and since the last Olympics, and you know, as a two-time world champion, I mean, Canada couldn't be happier. I bet you anything that she is probably kicking herself right now for not getting the gold, but I mean, just wait what's gonna happen, you know, once we get to Paris in a couple of years, only through, I was gonna say four years, only three years now. That's not Canadian math. That's just weird labeling of the Olympics. But I think the best thing about this event is that, you know, sometimes you'll have, you know, a Thorpe and a Phelps, where it's, you know, two people are just battling it out. But we have three, and I think that's so unusual that you could get that in the Olympics, where you have such an open field, where the medals are almost predetermined. You know what the gold, silver, and bronze are gonna be. It's just, what's the shuffle gonna be and who ends up in which spot?
BEN WATERWORTH: It reminded me a lot of, I can't remember what they labeled it back in Athens, but it was a 200, where it was Thorpe versus Phelps versus Vanden Hugen band, and they just absolutely, build that as the race of the century, basically. Maybe that's what they called it, and Thorpe won it. But yeah, that was kind of one of the ones I'm thinking, well, you had the three. It's actually interesting. Dear friends on news.com.au, who I feel we have not bagged out as much today, are these Olympics as we usually do. I was on there for some strange reason. I must have been drunk, and they had a poll on there where they were like, what is Australia's greatest ever swim at the Olympics? Ariane Titmuss at Tokyo 2020, Kyle Chalmers, Rio 2016, Ian Thorpe at Athens for the 200 metres, or Kieran Perkins, 1500 metres, Atlanta. Now, I would say that Kaylee McKeown's better than Ariane Titmuss. Not to take away from Ariane Titmuss' result. It was a great result to beat Ledecky. But again, this goes into this three-way battle, which I feel they so undersold. And to correctly answer that from news.com.au, it is Kieran Perkins from Atlanta. That is one of the greatest Olympic swimmers of all time, not just in Australia, to barely qualify for the 1500 metres, scraping there by, I think, like a tenth or two, and to basically win by a length, like a whole lane length in lane eight. I mean, God, that was just iconic. But yeah, I like hearing that, though, Colin, what you're talking about there, that so Canadian, like you got these expectations. Oh, this two-time world champion, world record. But we're happy with Silver. Like, fuck, that is not happening in Australia. Like, no way. We still talk about the fucking Campbells choking five years later when they were guaranteed to win that. And we were beaten by a Canadian. So, you know, I've got some fun comments around the commentary on that when we get to our Channel 7 section. But I missed the comment straight away, her interview, because Colin and I were doing the commentary. And then all of a sudden I see like social media light up, basically about what she had said, what Kaylee McKeown said. I played the clip at the very beginning of this episode, but it is just hilarious. It is the most Australian thing ever to literally have them going like, oh, you know, your mum and dad, what do you want to say to them? Fuck yeah! And then like she even backs it up with, oh shit, sorry. Live to the world. There she is, Kaylee McKeown. Oh, so good. Colin, when you see that, like a Canadian's never doing that, are they?
COLIN HILDING: Oh no, and I've actually come to realise that Canadians use the seven second delay a lot more than Australians, not just because of that, but because we've done a lot of these commentaries where we're watching them at the same time. And even last night, it was live, but Canadians were five or six seconds behind you. So you would never see that in Canada. And Canadians, they're so, with Kaylee's interview, I was almost hoping we'd get like sometimes, I'm not saying a big reaction like that, but like something out of character, but like she just doesn't break the professionalism in interviews. And it's been really interesting watching a lot of our swimmers because we have a few of these experienced ones, like Penny and Kaylee and Taylor Ruck, who have been there before, where you can see that, been there, done that, I'm gonna be the professional interviewer. And then you got the young ones who you think are gonna be the ones to have slip ups like that, but instead they're just like very awkward in the interviews. And you're like, wow, that was awkward. So I think we need to have some middle ground. We need to have somebody who's inexperienced enough to give you like a big sound clip moment, but somebody who is experienced enough to be comfortable behind a microphone.
BEN WATERWORTH: Jarrod, again, I don't know if you're watching it live or seeing it that way, but I mean, this is just very straight. Like this is the thing. Like I don't even think that Nathan Templeton or whatever even apologised. Usually they often will all apologies for the language. It was so Australian. It was just like, yeah, you're full of a, fucking drop the C-bomb while you're here. Why not?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, it was so good. It was, cause it was just a genuine reaction too. It wasn't like, it wasn't filtered. It wasn't her saying what needed to be said. It was just straight thought of it in the brain, straight out of the mouth. Like, yeah, it was just such a good moment. And it spawned so many great like commentary moments. And then when you saw her family, like it was very clear like that they were just like exactly the same. Like, so yeah, it was so good.
BEN WATERWORTH: What was some of the quotes from her sister? It's fricking awesome. And then her mother said, she pushes herself till she vomits. To which I think-
COLIN HILDING: She needs to go for the triathlon.
BEN WATERWORTH: Whoever was interviewing, whoever's there with the pods basically says something like, oh, you know, Brisbane, and mum's like, I don't think she'll be swimming still by then. Like, she kind of shuts it down. I wanted to say this for the channel 7 one, but I've got to bring it up now. Joanna Greggs, I thought Bruce McEvaney's comment the other night, you know, the same boulder flag, but Joanna Greggs won the Olympics with her comment when she said, the first time we have seen a C-bomb and an F-bomb after the same race. Perfect from Joanna Greggs there, Jarrod.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, that was in my list as well. Such a highlight from the day. Yeah, I feel like nothing's going to be able to top that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, just on the topic of Kaylee, though, I mean, the curse is in the purse. Are we calling this again? It's a silver, like, I mean, it's pretty cool. Like, we've got to admit this. We're inflating our own tires. You do say something in this commentary in just a moment, which kind of shut me down. But I will say that the certain other athlete that didn't do that well today, I wasn't on that interview. So, I mean, you can't fully blame me. But you did the Kaylee Mouse interview. I sadly didn't join you for that one. And I listened to a great interview. Everyone should listen to it. But I mean, this is exciting. Like, you know, the monkey's off the back. That curse is in the purse. It's probably going to be back out of the purse in the next couple of days. But hey, cool. Right. We'll take this right now.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, you know, it's it sounds so weird because I think we make a joke out of this on the show. Like what happened with Pyeongchang? All these we're talking about top athletes. I mean, look up Charles Hamlin. You know, he went into Pyeongchang expected to become the most decorated Canadian Olympian of all time and had announced his retirement preemptively on our show, said, yeah, this is going to be my last Olympics. Went on to win zero individual medals and is still coming back now in Beijing. We had Andy Noddy and Brit Cox, who were by far the two front runners. It was one of them will be the gold medallist.
BEN WATERWORTH: To interrupt, we famously said on our Pyeongchang preview episode that Andy, that Brit is basically a lock. We can lock that in right now 100% and look what happened.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, like they were like the two top in the world. There was no contest. And I'm pretty sure on our commentary, there was even when whoever was went first failed, whether it was Cox or Noddy, when one of them went first failed, that means the other one's gonna win the gold medal. Like we were that certain. And it wasn't just us. Everybody was that certain. Neither one. This has been going on for so long that I think we've really started to let it get to us. What is wrong with us? The Derek Druin thing is what pushed it over the edge because you brought it up to one athlete ever. And with two weeks to go until the Olympics, he has to drop out and he was one of our locks. So I mean, it's done. It's buried. Well, we'll have to see. Maybe there's a winter Olympic curse. Maybe the summer was never the problem. I don't know. Now we're really getting inside our own heads.
BEN WATERWORTH: I want to get inside our heads a bit more because I want to burst our bubble slightly here, Colin, because it's a great achievement. It's happy. If Kaylee wasn't going to win, I wanted Kaylee to win, but she didn't win gold. We'll just point that out. And the second thing is she was probably our best chance to win a gold because I feel that out of the other athletes, I don't know if we, I mean, Charlotte, maybe the rugby girls could go back to back, but I don't know. Like I feel that maybe I'm just being the Canadian on the thing and not getting too cocky because I feel that, you know, silver isn't gold, Colin. Like if we left Tokyo with one silver, I'm still not saying it's broken.
COLIN HILDING: If we had had a silver medallist or even a bronze medallist in Pyeongchang, we never would have been talking about the Off The Podium curse. So I'm going to say, it doesn't matter what the medal is.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's clearly me. It's clearly me. The two medallists have not been on any of them.
COLIN HILDING: You know what? It's the pressure you put on these athletes, Ben, because first we're just like, you know, we want a medallist. Then it's like, oh, no, no, no. You're going to be the guy to break the curse. And then it's, no, no, no, no, no. Silver's not good enough. The pressure you put on these athletes, this is the most Australian thing I have ever heard. We don't want to put pressure on the athletes. Leave it up to Off The Podium. Thanks, Ben.
BEN WATERWORTH: Clearly Brianna Walker's not winning the gold in Beijing. Clearly Tommy Halloran's going to break a leg halfway out the wall in a week or so. Like, yeah, good job. And any chance of some of our guests we've already recorded for Beijing after these Olympics, one of them in particular is a very solid chance of winning a medal. She's not winning one. Jarrod, are you glad now that you don't go on these interviews so you don't get blamed?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, I've got nothing to do with this. If I interviewed the athletes, they'd all be winning, but I'm not giving away gold medals that easily.
BEN WATERWORTH: Can I actually, I want to point out something right now on a bit of a tangent. I've never mentioned before that I have actually interviewed Ash Barty many, many years ago, so clearly. I mean, she won Wimbledon. Like, she could take me for that.
COLIN HILDING: It's time for a shake up on Off The Podium. Ben is out, Cable Brandon is in.
BEN WATERWORTH: And Sam Stozer, I've interviewed Sam Stozer too. Holy crap.
COLIN HILDING: Jesus.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm really, I have an interview with Naomi Asaka, and she went out today, so you know, come on, there's that. We're going to play right now our commentary of the 100-metre backstroke. The one thing though that I can say about Off The Podium is that when we do commentate swimming, we get the Off The Podium quinella. Two from two, Colin, that's a good thing.
COLIN HILDING: The other thing I want to say going into this is, I mean, it's a short event, so it's not going to be 20 minutes of commentary or whatever, but I think we start this and it's like, all right, let's try to do our thing. Let's try to be funny. But we forgot about that. It's just, no, no, no, go, go, go. You really get caught up in the heat of the moment in this event.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, this is the thing I'll say, I'm enjoying doing this commentary. We're going to try and do it every day. We're getting a bit carried away. We're a bit silly in the fencing, but we've got some good comments. I'll talk about that in a moment. But I mean, yeah, I think the difference is when we're doing something like swimming, it's a legitimate race. And when we've got personal interest in it, I mean, we should have talked about today that Leesl Jones was cheering. Yesterday, Thorpey was cheering. Like, you know, they get caught up in the moment when it kind of happens, right? And I can see why, because like, you know, I'm legitimately wanting Australia to win a gold medal. Colin's legitimately wanting Canada to win a gold medal. So yeah, like it's fun that it is to commentate the fencing and the dressage. We don't quite get as animated, clearly. But you'll hear that now. This is Colin and I commentating the women's 100-metre backstroke. And I will say we did do this live. This wasn't a taped thing that we did after the event. We were literally doing this live. So let's cross now to the Tokyo Aquatic Centre. It is over to you, Ben Waterworth. Welcome, everyone, to the Tokyo Aquatic Centre. For the race that doesn't stop the nation, it stops two nations. Maybe three, maybe even four. Israel, I hear, are on tenterhooks right now. But we are here for the women's 100-metre backstroke final at the Olympic Games. What an absolute honour it is to call this one. And what an absolute honour it is to be joined by the 1972 Munich Olympics eighth-place finisher in this event, Colin Hilding. Colin, what a pleasure this will be tonight to call this swim.
COLIN HILDING: It's an exciting night. Michael Phelps, Katie Ledecky, Penny Alexiak. Those are just some of the people who are watching at home right now on Pins and Needles.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, Pins and Needles is the way to watch this one because not only is this a race that stops about 28,000 nations around the world, it is a race that stops podcasting. So much on the line tonight for Off The Podium. Not only is it the battle between Australia and Canada, but will the curse be put in the purse? We're gonna find out very, very shortly, but here's one person that might be able to stop the curse being put in the purse. Emily Seabom from Australia, starting in lane seven. The golden child of the Australian team, we'd like to see you win a gold, even though she might not be our great chance, but can the curse be put in the purse tonight, Colin? Well, on Carly Mast, not only is the pressure on her shoulders from all of Canada, but all of Olympic Podcasting.
COLIN HILDING: You know what? I would love to say yes, but I know that we've cursed ourselves one too many times for that. So I'm gonna say no, the curse will not be broken, and I will be happy to be wrong.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, we're gonna find out, just as the swimmers are coming out now to the blocks, I will say that Australia and Canada, and here's Kaylee McKeown, giving the horns up, isn't she loving life at the moment?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, she's a good follow on Instagram, by the way, in case anybody's wondering.
BEN WATERWORTH: You believe me now, thank you for catching on. Oh, hang on, hang on, Colin, here we go, here's Kaylee. Here's our star, Off The Podiums. Oh, she's got the Off The Podiums strut coming out there as she walks out onto the deck. But no Australian or Canadian.
COLIN HILDING: She's like 18 minutes of my life on Off The Podium, and it all comes down to one minute in the pool.
BEN WATERWORTH: And she had nothing to do with underwear at all on that interview, I believe, that's what I've heard. No Canadian or Australian have ever won the 100-metre back in Olympic competition. Bonnie Mealing and Emily Seabombs, silver medals for Australia in 2012 and 1932 for Canada. Silver, iconic moment in Mexico for Elaine Tanner back in 1968. Colin, as we're getting ready to go on the blocks, of course, they're gonna jump in the pool. The backstroke's different. They don't start on the blocks, they start on the water. Take us through the mindset right now of what these eight women are feeling.
COLIN HILDING: It's actually very simple. The mindset is don't go forwards. If you do, you hit a wall, you knock yourself unconscious, and the race is over. So focus on backwards, backwards, backwards.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, they're about to jump in the pool. The race that everybody has been waiting for. White's in the pool first. It's a very typical move by her. But as they get ready to the blocks, we're gonna hand over to our esteemed former Olympian Colin Hilding to call the first 50. Colin, it's over to you.
COLIN HILDING: Couple of leg wiggles there just to warm them up. And they are ready. They're hanging. They're hanging. They're hanging. They're getting ready. I'm gonna hear a gun. There we go. All right, let's see. We got it right in there. All right, and they're off, and they're under water, and it's a backwards swim, and they're still going backwards. Luckily, nobody's gone forwards yet. Everybody's still focused. And the water is still clear. No greenery in there. And we don't know where Kaylee's mass is because I wasn't paying attention to who was in what lane. But we're gonna assume that Kaylee or Kaylee or somebody with a K is actually in the lead right now. We know that a woman is gonna win this race. That's all we know. And they're coming up to the wall, and Ben, take it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow, mass is in the lead. The curse could be in the purse right now, but the three big ones are first, second, third, the three former world record holders. Kaylee Mass is in the lead right now for Canada. Wow, Off The Podium is getting excited because the curse could be put in the purse. Kaylee McKeown's coming back though. She's backstroking. Kaylee's in the lead. Kaylee's ahead of the world record. It's in the purse. The first individual medal ever for Off The Podium athlete after being on the show, but gone for Australia. Well, you jinxed it now, clearly. But what a swim here from Kaylee. She was third going into the 50. She powered home. It looked like a world record, but an Olympic record. Look at the turn there from Regan Smith, the former world record holder. But look at the stroking of the arms there. Kaylee McKeown, a new Olympic champion for Australia. The first time we've ever won gold in 100 metres. And an iconic moment for Canadian swimming. Kylie's channeled Elaine Tanner from Mexico. Her icon, I believe, her idol. She loves Elaine, posts on the wall, tattoos on her body, and the horns up again there from Instagram's Kaylee McKeown.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, this is an exciting day. And here we're going to get the full standings. And it's fuzzy on my screen, but I'm going to take your word for it that Kaylee did win this over Kylie. She's got an A in her name. And she also has a couple tenths of a second over Kylie. Regan Smith, three Olympic record holders in the top three. And Emily in fifth place, not terribly disappointing. That's not bad.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, look at them embrace each other there. The typical Australian hug after the event. But what an iconic moment for swimming. And what an iconic moment for podcasting again, Colin. Two swimming events we've been at. It's been the Off The Podium Quinella for both. Gold for Australia, silver for Canada. We need to do this more often, I feel.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, and next time we do it, we should have Canada and gold and Australia and silver, just to change things up, to keep it fresh for the audience.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, we might talk to Fina about that. I'm not too sure with that. But we are thrilled to have called this one for you. Kaylee just looking fantastic there. Look at her pulling out the mask. No one pulls out a mask there. And just a fantastic moment again, Australia's third gold of these games, Canada's third silver of these games. Do you take any credit, Colin, for the interview with Kaylee in order that the curse is in the purse now?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, so I've actually finally narrowed it down. The curse was never off the podium. The curse was just Ben. Because Ben was absent on that interview. So that I know I will bring good luck to anybody I interviewed. If Ben was on there, it's still up in the air. Undetermined.
BEN WATERWORTH: Look, I think we might have to go to the judges for that one. I'm not too sure. We'll see how Catherine Penderel goes later on today during day four of competition. Colin, it's always a pleasure to have you in the box. We look forward to our next call together. But for the rest of our listeners, let's cross back to the Off The Podium studio for some more hilarity between our three hosts. And that was Steve Jarrett. I'm so sad that you just, are you allergic to chlorine? Like, do you just not want to go on the swimming? So what is with you not coming with us there?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I'm just not wanting to upset, set the current trend. I'm worried if I come along that it might change what's happening, and what's been happening has been great. So I think I might just leave all the swimming events to you two if there's Australia, Canada, and the US in it.
BEN WATERWORTH: All right, well, that's a big call, but fine then, if that's how you want to be. I just want to quickly add, I mentioned before we got some comments on our fencing commentary. We actually got a comment from Max, Max von Haster, our guest who sadly went out in the event, we wanted to commentate on him, but he couldn't. He commented on our post saying, this is the type of commentary that fencing needs. And then he tagged the Fencing Olympic Committee basically in our post. And we're waiting for that call up. And then I actually sent him, we do dub it over the video footage of it. And I sent him a message and sent it to him and he loved it. So, Max, you got connections. Maybe you can pass it on to our Italian and German fences from yesterday, but don't tell them our real names, because they'll probably come and kill us.
COLIN HILDING: More importantly, does he know where Max is? Can he find Max?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, can Max find Max? Max, where are you? We can't find you. And also speaking of social media and our commentary, we actually got a like from Alexandre Ayash, our dressage the other night, Jarrod. So he loves your commentary as well.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, what more could we want? Yeah, we're making it. But-
BEN WATERWORTH: We're waiting for him. We don't know what we're going to be commentating tomorrow. So stay tuned. We'll keep you entertained with that. Going over the other medal results today, as always, we do have a few that are happening right now. The gymnastics is on, which is quite distracting. I've also got the 3X3 basketball quarterfinals going on beside me as well.
COLIN HILDING: Don't spoil it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I can spoil the fact that Rock are coming out onto the court right now. Do you want me to spoil what they're wearing or what their names are or their height? I can tell you this guy's 24 and has a 2.04 metre height. So sorry to ruin it for you. As I mentioned before, the best name so far to win a gold medal in the slalom K1, Ricarda Funk. She likes a funk. Yeah, great name. And is that Germany's first gold of these Olympics? I feel like it is. It is. So one of the great nations of the Olympics off to a bit of a slow start. So there you go. The women's, I was thinking we went to the Winter Olympics right now, the women's cross country. I'm like, what's happening? Clean sweep to Switzerland. Didn't realise the Swiss did so well. Yolanda Neff won the gold in that one. But I guess the other Off The Podium, the curse out of the purse again, is sadly for Catherine Penderel did not medal. She got 18th, which, Colin, is that a good result for Catherine? You told a bit of a story. She's obviously given birth and kind of wasn't expected to do that well. So are we locking that result for Catherine?
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, I don't even know if Catherine had plans or had expectations to even compete in these Olympics. I mean, certainly after COVID, you're delaying another year. If you look at the timing, it's a last minute thing, because if this had been going on during 2020, she wouldn't have been there. So COVID allowed her the opportunity to come back, but we're talking about limited training. I mean, she gave birth only a few months ago. So I don't think anybody was really expecting her to meddle, except for our anchor, which, wow, our overnight anchor, Heather Hiscock. I'm not gonna be cruel the way that you were to your what's-her-name rival, but whoever's scripting here is just not helping matters, because the event, I had to get, had already happened. It was not happening live. They just decided we're gonna cut to this event, and they gave it a good half hour, 40 minutes of it. But they started off with the segment saying, you know, Catherine Pendrill, who just gave birth, going on and on and mentioning her kid's name, says, her daughter, who is however many months old, is probably at home right now with the grandparents, watching her mum compete in this event. It was one in the morning. Like, if you're hoping that these poor grandparents, who are elderly, they're probably in their 70s, are having to deal with a baby at one in the morning, you're a cruel woman, does this whole introduction, yes, Catherine, who just gave birth, they then showed the event. I don't think they even showed Catherine in the 30 or 40 minutes. The entire time, part of it was because you could only follow the Swiss riders. You had three Swiss, they found it very difficult to even get invested in the event. Because if you know, if this were Canadians, and you know, oh, I'm rooting for this Canadian, it's different. A lot of times you're watching the Olympics, you're just picking one country or another. Oh, I want to see this country go forward. You have three Swiss riders. Okay, which one's gonna win? The whole event ends, and then they don't even mention her position. I have to Google to see where she placed after it. So why even bother giving her the segment at the beginning if you're not even gonna show the results. And Catherine came in 18th place.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which, look, I was gonna talk a little bit about that when it comes to what we watch, but I found it difficult to follow because the commentators we had, I don't know if they were having audio problems or just the helicopters were so damn loud because it was literally like, and here comes the riders coming in the thing, like helicopters over the top.
COLIN HILDING: They got the dressage commentating team.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm like, turn up your microphones, guys, or turn the helicopters down. And I actually, I found it thoroughly entertaining. I've watched it in the past. I love mountain biking when I've watched it. I always forget it's on, and I feel it's one of these ones I always miss. So I was enjoying it. But yeah, I don't know if it's just the world feed because they just kept showing the Swiss riders. And again, they were so far ahead that even there was an Australian at one point, I think she was in about 11th. But I was literally more concerned about Catherine. I'm like, fuck the Australians. Where's Catherine? Oh, the curse is in the purse. Like, come on.
COLIN HILDING: Where's Max? Where's Catherine?
BEN WATERWORTH: Eventually, I looked at the results when it was live. And at one point, I think Catherine was like nearly last. So like she must have come through to come forward later. But yeah, it's a weird one, but it's definitely sport like come Brisbane. I would love to go and watch the mountain biking and be one of these ones where I feel like a ticket wouldn't be that hard to get, and it would be an entertaining one to watch.
COLIN HILDING: I don't even know if you need tickets. Well, I guess it depends. When the Canada Games had it here, where my work is, they built the cross-country cycling course right behind my work, which is still there to this day. And I actually usually go for a walk on my work. I kind of climb up the little mountain that they have there and then go through the trails. And you'll always see a half a dozen people at any given hour of the day, still to this day running that course. But I was able to see the cross-country when I was on my lunch one these days, and it was just one of these things where, like, okay, just wait a few minutes, a few riders are coming by, okay, now you can cross and just sort of pick your position and watch it. And it was great to watch.
BEN WATERWORTH: I know when I was in New Zealand, we went to Rotorua, they have like a sort of a lugey, kind of like a, not snow luge, but like a concrete luge thing. And you go up on a cable car, and as you're going up to this place to go down this hill, there's like a mountain biking course underneath you. So you would see these people do it. It was pretty cool to watch. So Jarrod, I mean, we're on the topic right now. I might as well ask you, did you catch any of the... Just call it mountain biking. Why is it called cross country? It's too confusing. This isn't the Winter Olympics.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I did. I saw kind of the start, I suppose you would say, and kind of lost interest in it part way through only because it was hard to follow. The fact that they were only showing the people at the front, the Australian, she was only really showed. You might see her in the back of some shots when she was closer to the front in like 11th spot. But it really felt like so much of the race depended on that start and just getting ahead of like the bottleneck. And then for some of them, I feel like they were walking their bike more than they were riding it. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's kind of interesting to watch them that way, isn't it? Sort of, it's just, it's a fascinating spot. And like cycling is one of these really fun sports to watch, but Rebecca McConnell is the name of the Australian. And she finished, I think, in about 19th or 20th from memory. Diving, the women's synchronized 10 metre platform. China took the gold in that. The US, I believe, got their very first ever synchronized diving medal, at least on the 10 metre platform. So congratulations, USA. Not happy with that, Colin, or?
COLIN HILDING: Well, actually, I was gonna say it's the opposite. We're talking about, you know, oh, America, you didn't win a medal. I can feel so bad for you. I think I kind of get caught up with this because when we do the commentary, it's like, all right, we beat America. Like that's bragging rights, right? If you beat America, you know. But in this event, like diving is huge in Canada. I mean, you have what, if it wasn't for the timing, let's just say, what are your prime time events? What are you going to either air or re-air during prime time hours? You know, swimming is gonna be big here. Diving's right up there. Like if you're talking about the events that you'll show over and over again, it doesn't matter whether Canada's in it or not. Our diving gets shown two or three times a day. Like every shift will show the diving events in their entirety. This was one of the ones that I was watching really closely and the Canadians we had in it, the sticktogether.ca, Megan Benfetto was in it. It wasn't the best performance they had. They really only had one dive that they missed. They were doing great. But when the Americans won and they had sort of mentioned they've never won a medal, I felt myself getting caught up. I'm like, good for them. And then I thought to myself, I'm like, they win everything. Like they have to take this as well. So I was actually very happy for them. I'm like, kind of like with Tom Daly, you know, the other night, it's like, oh, finally wins his gold. But I'm like, now I'm really torn. I'm like, I felt good that they won a medal in an event they never won before. And then I realised that's just one more event that they've won a medal in. How many are left? What's left that they've never won something in? We need to find out.
BEN WATERWORTH: Actually, that's a very valid point. I would like to look that up. That's a very good one. Sport climbing, they've never won a medal in sport climbing. Karate, they've never won one in karate. You lost out on a bronze by, what is that, six tenths of a point.
COLIN HILDING: What was most heartbreaking about this is that, all the way through the third round, we were easily in a lock for the silver. And the fourth round dive was just so atrociously bad that there was no coming back from it. Because I think our final round, the Canadians were nearly flawless. It's just that that nearly flawless dive wasn't enough to make up for the complete catastrophe in the fourth round.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm seeing that China has never lost this event. So that was not a surprise that they won that gold. In the equestrian dressage, Jarrod, why are you recording? Go and watch the dressage, come on. What are you doing? I'm seeing right now the live results is that Portugal are currently in the lead of the team final of the dressage. It had Germany and Britain. So if we want somebody to win, we want Portugal, don't we? Stuff the Brits, come on, come on, Portugal. Ride that horse, dressage yourself out there. Fencing, team EPE, the women's team EPE, the iconic fencing nation of Estonia has a gold medal, everyone. Fantastic, they beat Korea and Italy got the bronze. The gymnastics women's all around is on as we speak. So hopefully we might have a result by the end of that. Come on, America. I don't know why I'm cheering for them. That's not a start, but come on, rock. Get out there and rock it off because America is already in mourning after the qualifying events. Judo, we had gold to Japan. Takanori Nagase in the men's 81 kilo. The women's 63 kilo went to France's Clarisse Agbegneur. Double gold for China in the shooting in both the mixed 10 metre air rifle team and the mixed 10 metre air pistol team. The softball, I believe, is on as we speak between the US and Japan. I'll give you a score update, which doesn't really matter because by the time you listen to it, you already heard this. Surfing, the gold went to, in the men's, Talo Ferreira of Brazil and Carissa Moore for the US in women's. As we already know, Owen Wright, the bronze for Australia in the men's air. Swimming, what we haven't mentioned. Bloody Britain got a gold and a silver in the 200 metre freestyle. Stuffed them. They were 100 metre back straight though. It was good for rock. Gold and silver for them with Evgeny Rylov taking the gold in that one. And I'm just gonna spoil this right now. One of my potential nominees for Athlete of the Day in the 100 metre breaststroke, Lydia Jacoby of the US. Now you might think, why would you give it to an American swimmer? They win everything. Lydia Jacoby is 17 years old from the great state of Alaska, a state that has a 150 metre swimming pool. Now, if you were to think of a gold medallist from Alaska, you're gonna think of every winter sport under the sun. I have been to Alaska, I have been to Anchorage. It is one of the most quirkiest, unique cities I've been to. I loved it, I loved it so much. And I love Lydia, and not for those reasons. She's 17, I can't like her, she's too old. So I am so on board the Lydia train. So I'm just saying that right now, a potential nominee for Athlete of the Day right now. And also another one, in the women's triathlon, Flora Duffy, the first ever Olympic gold medal for Bermuda, Jamaica, ooh, I wanna take ya. And we also should mention our Filipino gold medallist yesterday in the weightlifting. That was Philippines' first ever Olympic gold medal, Hideline Diaz. So congratulations to, I love it when a country wins their first gold medal, or a medal in general. And in the women's 59 kilo weightlifting, Kyo Shing Chun of Chinese Taipei took the gold. Ahead of Turkmenistan, now how many medals have they won in the Olympics? There's still the women's 64 kilo, so I believe you got a bit of a Canadian contige in that. I think we've got an Australian weightlifter in that as well. Also the Taekwondo still to be decided today as the men's 80 kilos and the women's 67 kilos. Is that making much news in Canada, Colin, about Lydia Jacobi and the whole Alaska thing, or is that just a Ben Waterworth thing that he gets excited about?
COLIN HILDING: It's actually the first I've heard about it, but I'm really excited because I just rewatched Mystery Alaska recently. We need a Mystery Alaska reboot just on swimming. Look what these kids can do in 150 metre pool in Mystery Alaska.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, Alaska's just like, I wanna boy's trip for Off The Podium to Alaska. Seriously, it's such a great city. On Turkmenistan, their very first ever Olympic medal. I've just pulled up the results here. So another history-making day, Turkmenistan, Polina Goyeva, party on the streets right now in Turkmenistan. I mean, Jarrod, I know you're very familiar with Turkmenistan. I mean, what's a Turkmenistanian party like?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Like no party you've ever seen before.
BEN WATERWORTH: I would agree with that.
COLIN HILDING: Ain't no party like a Turkmenistan party.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's going off in Ashgabat right now. It's just, I did not just look that up on Wikipedia. Cheating a little bit there. I will say the taekwondo though, Mr. Shirtless Tongan went out today. So it's really, he's not gonna win a medal today, which is a little bit sad. So I wanted to, while I remember that today, the medal tally as we speak, and if we get in the update, I'll bring this up at the end as well. The US had a good day, so they're back to the top, or the first time they've been on top, actually, all Tokyo Olympics. Nine gold, five silver, eight bronze, 22 in total. China back up to second. Well, they were in second yesterday, still in second. Nine gold, five silver, seven bronze, 21. Japan dropped to third. Nine gold, three silver, five bronze, 17 in total. Rock. They're starting to get those golds up and running after all those silvers. Five gold, seven silver, four bronze, 16 in total. Britain, bastards, four gold, five silver, one bronze, 10. Australia are currently in sixth with three gold, one silver, and five bronze. We need to stop winning those bronzes, Jarrod. I don't like seeing the bronzes up there. Nine in total. Whereas Canada, you were in the top 10 today, but you've dropped down to 11th. That's Canada's favourite position on the metal tally. One gold, three silver, three bronze, for a total of seven. All won by women, as my Twitter feed kept reminding me constantly today, Colin, I got to say that's getting a bit old here.
COLIN HILDING: Because I feel like it's getting to the point where you're being critical of the men, which these are all Olympic athletes. And I don't know how anybody's expected to perform when you're trying to constantly like, oh, and only the women win, like just be open up to say, hey, it's amazing that this many women have won, which it was the same thing in real. But like, how are the men ever going to perform? We know how men handle things under pressure. I mean, men can't always perform when you put this type of pressure on them. We need the men to get it up here.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, it's in many ways. But like, I mean, we've got a sort of similar thing here. Obviously, we've had men win medals here, but it's kind of I feel the montages they keep showing of like all these women winning medals to like Beyonce's Girls Round the World. It's like fantastic. It's great. Like, I get it. Celebrate it. But like, don't make it like this is an issue. Like, I get what you're trying to do. But why do we have to point out any gender? There are Olympic athletes who won medals for our country. Just celebrate it without going, Oh, look, they're women. They won medals.
COLIN HILDING: And like, just to go on a little bit of a tangent here, there are issues. There are some events where, you know, there are only men's events. But in all honesty, most of the time that comes down to the fact that there isn't enough competition or countries that would be able to put people up. Now, I've already talked about exposure is what will drive people to get into sports. But it's not like the Olympics is something where it's like a men's only club. I mean, there are, for the most part, just as many events for men as there are for women. So to say, oh, look at all the women who are winning medal. I mean, when you're when you come down to it, there's almost as many female medallists as there are men across the board. So if you just keep making such a big deal about this, what you're doing is you're telling the male athletes you're not good enough. And they're Olympians. Like these people are the top performers in the world one way or the other.
BEN WATERWORTH: I wanted to say sexist, there's no male softball. So, you know, it works both ways.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, there you go.
BEN WATERWORTH: I do I do in all seriousness, I actually believe that Paris will be the first Olympics to be 50-50. I think they legitimately have a 50-50 spread across the board, which is good. You know, it's it's yeah. Another episode we can do that there. I just want to quickly say for Bermuda, though, the only other Olympic medal in their history came in Montreal in boxing. Clarence Hill in the men's heavyweight got a bronze. And for the Philippines, they had going into these Olympics won three silver and seven bronze, got a silver in Rio. And before they have to go back to Atlanta when they won a silver, bronze in Barcelona, bronze in Seoul. So yeah, I just love I love seeing these countries just just winning it. I mean, Jarrod, like Turkmenistan, like, did you ever come into these Olympics and put your Turkmenistan prediction down and think, oh, they're going to win this? Like, I mean, that's great. Silver medal. Again, Ashkabad, they're going crazy right now, I can imagine.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I did. And it's it's ruining my fantasy league results at the moment.
BEN WATERWORTH: Bloody hell Turkmenistan, it's all your fault. Canada and Australia results outside of what we've spoken about. Let's start as we often do over in the true north, strong and free. Colin Hilding, what else happened today for Canada outside what we've already talked about?
COLIN HILDING: Well, let's see. I do want to give another criticism here to Canadians. Well, not because we are not performing, but because we're performing adequately and you're putting too much pressure on our athletes. We're being Australian about this. I already mentioned with Penny Alexiak that she's sort of broken her silence on some of her performance issues following Rio, that it was just the pressure of everybody being like, oh, the Penny Alexiak and the Canadian Olympic team and Penny Alexiak, the gold medallist, and she's like, how do you perform? How do you perform when you put that pressure? We're talking about putting pressure on people when they're underperforming, but when they're overperforming. A little bit of a criticism here that she moved on. That's a good thing. So the 200-metre freestyle, she moved on. Summer Macintosh didn't. Sadly, Summer just missed out. But Penny did not perform necessarily at her best. It was actually questionable after her semifinal whether or not she was going to make it, because I think she was only fifth in hers. It was only because the second semifinal was so much, like, remarkably slower than the first that she made it. But yet the headline that you read on the Canadian Olympic website is Penny Alexiak setting up for another medal. Now you're putting, again, more pressure on her than she probably needs.
BEN WATERWORTH: You are turning into Australia.
COLIN HILDING: Well, she's, and I'm not being critical of her. I mean, it just happens when you're in a lot of events. Some of them, you win some, you lose some. It was not her best performance. She swam like Katinka Hozu, you know, underperforming. But now all of a sudden, oh, yeah, she's going to get another medal. So just setting herself up for disappointment. But she does move on. And let's see, softball, obviously, we already covered that. Judo, we already talked about that. Diving, we already talked about that. Disappointing fourth finish. Weightlifting, we've talked about everything here. Let's talk about the triathlon. Emily Kretz finished in 15th, so that's now going to be the Canadian gold in the triathlon. Because in the last two Olympics, we have had three 15-place finishes. So that's our goal. Catherine Pendle was 18th, and Haley Smith, who's the other Canadian, was much further down and I don't have it. It's weird that they don't have it updated on here when events that came after that, they did. The canoe, the kayak, Florence Mayhew, finished in 23rd, sadly. That's a great event. Seriously, I'm going to talk about that. It's great. It's one of my favourites. And it's actually the reason I got into recording the Olympics in the first place, because I watched a lot during Atlanta, and then the Pan Am Games, because it was here in Winnipeg, I recorded as much as I could. When Sydney started, I didn't even think about doing another VHS recording the Olympics, but it was the kayak solemn that was on where I'm like, oh, I'm going to record this. And I just kept recording. And now 21 years later, I got my Canadian math right, yes. 21 years later, I still record every Olympics. Beach volleyball, our other pair, Bansley and Wilkerson, they won, so we've had two undefeated teams. Sailing, we've got somebody in it, I guess.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, we will talk about that next week when we win medals.
COLIN HILDING: Does anybody know how to follow sailing? I don't get it.
BEN WATERWORTH: They were showing it last night, like two in the morning, but I think if we can commentate that at some point, we will, because yeah, literally, Jarrod, you'll understand this. Even here in a country where we generally often rely on the sailors to help us, we will often pull off a couple of random golds, and you'll never hear from them again. But it just comes out of nowhere. It'll be like Channel 7, and in breaking in in the men's laser class, Australia has won a gold. Let's cross now live to our new gold medal. Even Australia doesn't give a shit when we win gold medals in it. Oh, is that it? Yeah, nothing more?
COLIN HILDING: Oh no, I thought Jarrod, you said Jarrod's name. I thought we were waiting for Jarrod to stop.
BEN WATERWORTH: Come on, Jarrod, pick your game up.
JARROD LOOBEEK: You're 100% right. We don't care. I didn't even dignify it with a response.
COLIN HILDING: This one's kind of exciting, and I'm excited to finish watching this. But table tennis, I watched the mixed doubles yesterday, but the individual table tennis, Mo Zhang is in the final 16, which is already the best a Canadian has ever reached in the table tennis. So we're going to have our best results ever, win, lose, or draw on that. Obviously, the disappointment Mandy Bujold went out quickly, having not been able to train, or even know she was coming to the Olympics until the last minute. But Miriam De Silva, in her weight class of 69kg, is already on to the 16 rounds, so that's good. And Babanton, I don't care about that. Archery, I don't care about that. Rugby, this is, I guess, the big disappointment. Rugby, we lost again and again.
BEN WATERWORTH: But I really do think you're understanding your achievements in rugby, though. You played some very difficult countries.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, and I mentioned in our preview episode, the rugby sevens was one of the sports that I really got into during Rio. It's an unfortunate thing. I haven't really been able to watch it, so I just sort of look at the results. And when you look at the results on paper, you don't get the commentators. You don't know, you don't follow enough to know, okay, is this a good country? Is this a bad country? Not bad country like Nazis, but just in performance.
BEN WATERWORTH: Bad Germany, stop playing rugby. Naughty.
COLIN HILDING: But it's just unfortunate that these are the events that play during what's overnight hours here in Canada. And because we record these basically in the morning, I mean, I wake up very early, I wake up earlier than I wish I was right now, like in the four o'clock hours, not even intentionally. I'm basically catching up on all the events. And because those are longer team events, these longer team events like rugby, I'm just not able to watch it. And by the time I get around to watching it, it's sort of been spoiled. And it's sort of different with team events. So I'm hopeful that I can watch more of this now where Canada is not invested, and I can avoid some of the spoilers going in.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, just to clarify, so around Robin, you lost to Britain, who was a silver medallist in Rio. You lost to Fiji, who of course are the gold medallists from Rio. You, I think, got closer to Fiji than we ultimately did. You beat Japan, who are a very emerging nation in the sport of rugby, so that was a pretty decent result. And then you played New Zealand in the quarterfinals, and only lost 21-10, so that was a pretty decent result. So you did okay. You won as many games as Australia did. So that's...
COLIN HILDING: You should have. Participation medal.
BEN WATERWORTH: I mean, it all fit us for Australia. Just while I'm on this, obviously Australia sadly went out in the quarter, so we lost to Fiji. But I guess, Jarrod, what really cost us was this game against New Zealand. So we were winning for all of it. And then New Zealand overcame us 14-12. So had we won that, we would have probably played Canada in the quarters and might have gotten a trip to the semis. Bloody hell, with two points, and we could have been away from beating Canada in the... Did you watch any of the rugby today, Jarrod?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I did not, no.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I caught the Fiji game. But if we're going to lose anyone, I want to lose to Fiji, because I want Fiji to win another medal. So come on, Fiji, go there. Just before I get to some of the Australian results, I just want to give an update on some of the live events here, because just following the social media here, Colin, your weightlifter Maude Charon, after the first round, was leading in the final of the Women's 64 Kilo. So they're currently now into the clean and jerk, having done the snatch. It sounds so inappropriate saying that. Having done the snatch. Yeah, just...
COLIN HILDING: Somebody very perverted, like Ben Waterworth is the one who named these.
BEN WATERWORTH: But it's like, I'm going to go have a clean and jerk in the snatch. Like, can we commentate weightlifting just so I can talk more about the clean and jerk?
COLIN HILDING: The clean and jerk, the snatch, the rub-and-tug.
BEN WATERWORTH: I mean, we were talking about the Pokey Poke. I feel somebody wrong invented weightlifting terms. I'm not sure about this. But she hasn't weight lifted yet. I mean, the clean and jerk. She hasn't jerked off yet, basically. She's clean still. But, yeah, she was leading after the snatch.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Oh, Ben, stop it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Somebody else talk about weightlifting. Australia's Keanu Rose. Keanu Rose Elliott, sorry.
COLIN HILDING: Keanu Reeves? Jimmy just heard that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Keanu Reeves. Currently leading the Italian Georgia Bordeon. But we'll update you on the Canadian. In the gymnastics, because I know we're keen observers of this, Rock is leading currently over the US. I've got it in the background, and every now and then I see Simone Biles, and every time she does something, she's just got this look on her face, like, oh, God, I suck. This is a woman who literally has had moos named after her. You know, people talk up the goats on these, you know, Cable Decky's a goat, so, I mean, Simone Biles has probably got more of a chance to do that. So the thing is about Australia today, like, we won a gold medal, we won two bronzes, but I feel like we've had a pretty shit day outside of that. We lost to Belgium in basketball. Who loses to Belgium? Jarrod, did you see this? Who loses to Belgium in basketball?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, it wasn't great. I was worried how we'd go. I feel like Australia in basketball with Liz Cambridge pulling out, it's always kind of felt like we're at certain points in time in the Olympics, a one person team. And I feel like we felt that tonight.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah. I mean, look, I admit I only caught bits and pieces of it. This is the Opals, the female team, of course. So yeah, like usually old reliable, the Opals, they were the ones that, you know, what about four medals in a row? I think we got, Rio was the first time we hadn't won a medal, I think, since Barcelona.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think we're like second in the world as well, currently at the moment.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah. Well, women's basketball was only introduced in Atlanta, wasn't it? So we'd medaled in, it was kind of like softball. But yeah, because we went, I think we went bronze, silver, silver, silver, silver. We always lost to America in the gold medal match. So yeah, not a good start. It's kind of like the US losing in the men's. In the archery column, I'm surprised you didn't mention much about the archery. You've got a couple of Canadians moving through into the next round.
COLIN HILDING: I've got a reason to watch the archery now.
BEN WATERWORTH: Crispin Duenas is through to the round of 16 in the men's individual. Actually, no, the quarterfinals, he went through. So he's into the quarters of the archery. I don't know your history in archery. Stephanie Barrett, I can see, though, lost. Classic Stephanie Barrett. She always chokes, doesn't she? Badminton, our pair of Somerville and Mapasa, finally won a match. Good for them. I don't know if you caught the little snippet they showed on Seven Tonight, where in the middle of that match, one of the players' racket broke and she still had time to jump onto the side, grab a racket, come back in mid-rally, and win the point. Did you see that?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I did. I didn't know how that's allowed, but it was great. The fact that, yeah, your racket breaks, just jump over the sideline, grab another racket, come in, still playing the point as if nothing happened. Badminton's got some good rules. The fact that you can do that mid-point.
BEN WATERWORTH: I don't know if it was Crosby, but I remember watching an NHL game once where a player's stick broke and he skated past the bench, grabbed a stick, and the first touch of the puck he got was a goal. Was that Crosby? Because I remember that was pretty famous a few years ago.
COLIN HILDING: I don't know, but it definitely rings a bell. I think it's funny because when you see events like the road race or the triathlon, where it's like, oh, my bike's not working, give me another bike, that's just a normal thing. And you get these other sports where, as Jarrod's saying, it's like, can they do that? But if you can pull it off in a blink-and-you-miss moment like that, then more power to you.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just also a quick update. I'll just open this before I go over the other results. In the gold medal game, the softball Japan are leading 2-0 after five innings. So that would be very well paid off for Japan, should they get that, including that in there. And actually, I forgot to mention, you mentioned Penny Oleksiak. So funny on Twitter today, because I don't think Penny Oleksiak uses her Twitter much. She tweeted today, and her tweet was, I'm tweeting OMGGG. That was Penny Oleksiak's tweet today. So she wins the Twitter war today, apparently. As I mentioned, the basketball Australia, sadly went down to Belgium. Not only did we lose by a point, we lost by 15 points. Spanked by Belgium. What is going on? Boxing, this isn't an Australian result, but I want to just pay a little note to our neighbors across the Dutch, David Nieker, who is through to the quarterfinals, beat a Moroccan boxer by the name of Eunice Baylor. And I don't know if you caught any of this footage, but Eunice decided to channel a certain famous boxing incident from the 90s, getting his arse whooped, leant in to David and bit his ear. Look this footage up if you have not seen it. It is quite disturbing. And I want to mention David, because in all seriousness, Nick Chess, a good friend of ours on this show, a New Zealand correspondent over in the Oz Network, he had talked a lot about this guy for a while, and I saw him win gold at the Commonwealth Games. And Nick now works with his sister at his work, so there's very close connections. They're all around the TV watching this, and he's a legitimate shot. Apparently, he's ranked in the top four in the world. And of course, in boxing, you make it through the semis, you win a medal, because the semifinal losers automatically win the bronze. So David is one win away from winning a medal. So is Skye Nicholson, who I've mentioned on this show before. She's through to the quarterfinals last night after we had recorded. So good possibilities there. A sports set often, I know Australia doesn't really pay much attention to when it comes to boxing. We mentioned the Canoe Slalom, of course. Bronze for Jess there. In the fencing, of course Australia wasn't in that, so I don't need to mention that. The soccer, the football, bit of tension going on here in terms of the results, because the Matildas, Neil Aldraw, Jarrod was a pretty shitty match. We got lucky to walk away with a point in that one, a disallowed goal from the US, which I have to say looked like a goal to me. But we're on nervous tentacles right now, because it looks like we're through. I think Japan has to beat Chile, or China has to beat Netherlands, like five-nothing for us to basically miss out. But it is looking likely we will finish third, and third in our group, best of the third place finishes, and it's every chance we will play Canada in the quarterfinals. So this matchup that keeps on giving. You watch the, I mean, you watch more of it than me, I think, basically, Jarrod. So this was a pretty shitty match.
JARROD LOOBEEK: It was bad. Just like the entirety of the second half, really, or maybe more. So I suppose the last 20 minutes was just playing possession, passing the ball back, just waiting with the ball on the back line. Neither team really wanting to attack, because it was for America as well. If they drew, they knew they finished second in the pool. There was really no advantage to America winning because they couldn't finish first in the pool. So if the Australians were just going to play possessions, then the Americans just did the same thing. So either side of the field you got to, they were both just passing in among their back line, kicking it as far up the field as they possibly could, kicking it out, taking forever to take any free kick or throw, and it was just really, I suppose, tactical, but it was just so unfortunate to be watching it because it was really boring.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which is famously in the World Cup why they now play the final group games together, because I think it was in the 70s or 80s, I think it was West Germany against Zambia or some random thing. They both knew they had to get a draw to make it through, and they didn't want to risk anything. So the whole game was literally them just passing back and forth between each other, because they didn't want to risk it. So that's why in the World Cup, you will always have games at the same time, so that doesn't happen anymore. The triathlon I will mention, it was a bit of a race of attrition. I think only about 30-odd competitors finished. And the only Australian that did finish was Emma Jeffcoach. She finished in 26th place. So that was our result in an event that we have formerly won gold medals in before. So, yeah, I guess disappointing, yes, no. In the hockey, the Kookaburras are still undefeated, 5-2 against Argentina. I started watching this morning. We fell behind earlier. I was a bit worried there. But walk away with the win there. So that's good. Canada are currently playing the Dutch right now. Good fucking luck against them, Colin. That's like, you know, the Netherlands playing Canada in ice hockey. You're going to get murdered in that one, I can imagine.
JARROD LOOBEEK: They're doing well. I'm watching at the moment. And they're doing well. Like, they're down 2-1, but against the Netherlands in the third quarter already, like, that's a fairly good result so far.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, also just breaking news. In the weightlifting, you are still leading. Maude Charon has lifted 128 in the clean and jerk, and she currently is leading with a point score of 233, and she is going to be attempting a lift of 130 next. So we could be potentially looking at a gold medal to Canada right now on air. So have you ever won? Is it one for the books? Maybe I can look this up quickly. Ever won a gold medal in weightlifting?
COLIN HILDING: Beats me. Not that I can remember. If we do, though, that's another excuse to get Jamie to watch the Olympics, because she loves watching weightlifting.
BEN WATERWORTH: You have. You have won a gold, two silvers, and one bronze in sport of weightlifting. Yes, you should have known that. And if I can see here, you won a gold in London. There you go. Recently, apparently, according to this, you won the gold.
COLIN HILDING: Christine Girard. I'm actually turning to it now, though.
BEN WATERWORTH: Christine Girard, 63 kilos in London.
COLIN HILDING: Well, no. But was that the one that was awarded like a year or two later because they took forever on like a drug test on somebody else? I can't remember.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's weightlifting, so let's just say yes. I'm assuming. Right now, breaking news too, in the water polo, the Sharks have beaten Croatia, which is a pretty big deal. Croatia are pretty good in our water polo, so that's good for them to bounce back. A couple of Aussies in the judo, but they didn't progress past the round of 16. That was Katerina Heike there, so unfortunate for that one. The Rugby Sevens, as I mentioned, Australia eliminated in the quarterfinals. Sailing, yep, there were some sailors happening. We had some shooters today. I did see some results, I think we went out in the quarterfinals with a round of 16 in the teams there. Surfing, obviously, as we said, Bronze, Owen Wright and Sally Fitzgibbon's out in the quarters. In the swimming, yes, gold today. We've got a couple of swimmers into the finals tomorrow, which is great. Table tennis, Jian Feng Lei, our great Australian table tennis. I've got a great quote that was said today on the coverage of Six Olympics. She made it through to round three, if I'm not mistaken, and got eliminated there by German Ying Han. So great to see Six Olympics, Jarrah. I think she's in her 40s, isn't she?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yes, that is correct.
BEN WATERWORTH: Good on her. Reba Stewart in the taekwondo was eliminated in the round of 16. And in the tennis, did Mr. Duxworth win?
COLIN HILDING: No, he didn't.
BEN WATERWORTH: Quack, quack, quack, his games are over. Sad to see that. Obviously, Naomi Osaka went out. Is Novak still in, Colin? Sorry, Jarrod, did he play today or did he hit a day off?
JARROD LOOBEEK: He had a day off today, so he's still in.
BEN WATERWORTH: Right, but Naomi Osaka, though, gone. Blows the women's draw wide open. Who's winning that now?
COLIN HILDING: I'm seeing a pattern here with tennis in this Olympics.
JARROD LOOBEEK: You know what? I'm kind of glad she's out because we crossed to, I don't think it was today, but the last, maybe the last time she played, and she was on Channel 7's main channel, and they showed her a match for at least like half an hour. While there were other sports on with Australians in them, I just didn't make any sense that they were showing it. Oh, so I'm kind of glad she's out due to the fact that now we won't have to watch over half an hour while other Australians are playing other sports.
BEN WATERWORTH: 11-8, the Sharks beat Croatia there to go over that. And am I seeing, is the weight lifting still going, or is it over? Because it looks like it might be, oh no, there's still people lifting. So Canada's still leading.
COLIN HILDING: I just saw somebody almost get crushed by the weights from Taipei.
BEN WATERWORTH: Great. Good to see that. And France now leading the gymnastics all around. So there you go. What else did we watch? We have Metacolon. I mean, you're watching weightlifting right now. So I mean, you know, I mean, you can answer that one pretty quickly. But what else did you happen to catch today?
COLIN HILDING: I think all the events we've already covered. Well, I watched the kayak, obviously, the slalom, and I caught up on the canoe slalom from the men, which I'll have some nice commentary moments on later on as well. Obviously, the swimming, the diving, the softball, and then that one judo match that they showed that I'm sure will be re-aired shortly. And I'm trying to think if there was anything else. Weightlifting right now, the 3x3 basketball. I'm watching pretty much all that. So again, no spoilers. Once I finish dropping Casper off this morning, I'm going to catch up on that one. I've yet to watch any gymnastics. I caught a little bit of it just to see, okay, who are the Canadians and what are they doing? But I'm excited now that it's getting closer to the end and knowing that the Americans might not have a complete sweep of everything in gymnastics to actually tune in, because I know that there's been a lot of talk about the Canadian team.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, let's be honest. You know what we're hanging out for. Jarrod's there, championing the bit. You're waiting for the ribbons and the balls to come out, aren't you, Jarrod? This artistic crap. Who cares about that? Bring on the rhythmic.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Yeah, the true gymnastics, the true test of skills and talent.
BEN WATERWORTH: I want the trampoline. I like the trampoline. Jarrod, anything else that we ever mention that you watch today?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I don't think anything else we haven't mentioned. Just the team sports really caught a little bit of the triathlon. Did see some of the gymnastics, and it looks like Simone Biles has pulled out of the team event with an injury. So it'll be interesting to see how that affects her individual repertoire moving forward in the week.
BEN WATERWORTH: Interesting. So maybe there's a reason why she was looking so uncomfortable every time I saw her on the screen. Poor thing was injured. Ben, you dick. Chin up, champ. You can do well, Simone. Come on, you can do it. Quick update on the softball. Top of the sixth. Japan is still leading to nothing. Outside of what we've talked about, I think I kind of... I mean, I've got the 3X3 on in the background. Looks like it's in between matches at the moment. The quarterfinals are happening. Thoroughly enjoyed the surfing. You know, really, really surprised that I enjoyed watching that a lot more. Yeah, I don't think there was anything else. Yeah, mountain biking. I saw the canoe. Nothing else really extra on top of that. Athlete of the day. Now, this is tricky, because I'm pretty adamant on our choice today. Just saying.
COLIN HILDING: I'm adamant on mine, too. Oh, wow.
BEN WATERWORTH: You're just not even going to question this. Was this somebody from Antwerp you're going to throw up today? What's your choice today, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: I'm going to say this. The curse has been with us long enough. How do we not choose Kaylee Mast? You have saved this show, Kaylee.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I mean, my argument is for Kaylee, because how can you not go for somebody who wins his gold medal, gives a horns up, and goes, fuck yeah, oh shit, sorry, like, I mean, that in itself should win as an athlete of the day. Come on, Colin. Come on, Jarrod, you're deciding this clearly.
COLIN HILDING: This is one case where a silver medal is more important just because of this show. This is our segment on this show. We're talking about Kaylee Mast, somebody we were lucky to get an interview with in the first place. We had her for only 15 or 20 minutes, and that 15 or 20 minutes somehow has saved us from a curse that's plagued us for years.
BEN WATERWORTH: All right, Jarrod. And years, three, two Olympics. It's not like this is since Atlanta.
COLIN HILDING: I mean, you know. How many podcasts out there have even been around for over three years on the Olympics? Everyone had a curse with them that long.
JARROD LOOBEEK: When did they start playing singles in the Olympics? Because the curses have been around since then.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. When did I interview her? But I mean, look, Jarrod, you might even have a third one that could sway somebody else's way.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I was going to put up Jess Fox just because I felt bad that I felt bad that she won a bronze. And it's impressive that she's just won like three individual medals in this event, which we've said is just it really feels like it can go any which way on the day. But out of the other two, I don't know.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I mean, my other option is we put up Lydia, Lydia Jacoby, our last guest. Colin's so stoic in his face right now. He's like, fuck you too.
COLIN HILDING: I kind of like the idea. Well, here's the thing. I was hoping that Ben, being the one who really caused this drought for our show and our athletes in the first place.
BEN WATERWORTH: I mean, I haven't been on any of these interviews where we've won medals. I still have a freaking curse.
COLIN HILDING: I really think, you know, us ending the curse, that's the big talking point here. But your Alaskan one kind of has me intrigued if we can't come to a consensus.
BEN WATERWORTH: But I mean, okay, like I get I'm not trying to talk down the curses in the per like like it is. But again, we're getting it. If the end of Tokyo, we walk away with one silver medal, I still feel that's a failure because it's not like we had two athletes.
COLIN HILDING: You're the guy who, hold on a second, you're the guy who keeps saying, you know what, when they go over the overall standings, it shouldn't be based just on gold, it should be overall medals. Overall medals were winners finally.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I mean, I'm just salty because I wasn't on the interview and I'm still cursed. Stuff it, I'm saying Lydia Jacobi, come on. Join me on the Alaskan page. You're so on Kaylee, don't you, Colin?
COLIN HILDING: I really think, I mean, we have a shot at Kaylee again still, so maybe we have to go with a consolation here in the Alaskan.
BEN WATERWORTH: What do you mean we don't have it? Oh, like with winning another medal, we call it. Jarrod, let's throw to Jarrod. Come on, he's not involved in this curse. He's Mr. Oh, I avoid this, I'm good. My reputation's intact. All right, Jarrod, you've got the choice between Lydia, Jess, Kaylee or Kaylee.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I feel like it kind of has to be Kaylee.
BEN WATERWORTH: All right.
COLIN HILDING: Come on, this is the curse. Like nobody knew who she was. We've been talking about Kaylee Mass for this long.
BEN WATERWORTH: I've been following Kaylee McKeown on Instagram for years.
JARROD LOOBEEK: The event, it was the event of the Olympics. The race had stopped a nation, and she won it.
BEN WATERWORTH: And come on, we talked it up before about the fact that there's these three people in one. And again, she says, fuck yeah, live on television. And it goes, oh shit, sorry. And her family are, I want a reality show on the McKeowns. Like this is fantastic. Yeah, you're outvoted, Colin. Yeah, Kaylee.
COLIN HILDING: I'm outvoted, but I'm saying this. There may be some protests coming in future dates.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Kaylee McKeown, any events left?
COLIN HILDING: I think she does.
BEN WATERWORTH: She had the medley.
JARROD LOOBEEK: She'll win a gold in that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Jarrod says that it's probably a lock now. Like I say, it's it's cursed. So yes, commentary, Colin, you said you had a few from the canoeing today.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, the Canadian commentators actually aren't too bad overall. But let's chuck this up to our Canadian math here. At one point, the Italian was going in the kayak. And he said the Italian here competed for Brazil eight years. I mean, five years ago in Brazil. So that's just funny because Canadian math has become a thing here. Apparently, the really good thing was actually it's from a day earlier. But I told you I didn't watch this event until after we finished recording yesterday. But was Dan Dan Watkins is the man, right?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yep, exactly. Tassie's a sexy Tasmanian. That's it.
COLIN HILDING: Yep. Are they referring to him as Dan the Van Man there? Because our commentators are calling him Dan the Van Man.
BEN WATERWORTH: Dan the Van Man? What is this? Because he's from the Huon Valley. He lives in a van or something?
COLIN HILDING: They are saying that apparently he lived in a van for a while and just drove around trying to find water so that he could, you know, canoe.
BEN WATERWORTH: Trying to find water because Tasmania doesn't have water. Are the Canadians also bagging out Tasmania? Get it from the cesspool of Tasmania moving to Queensland?
COLIN HILDING: The funny thing I was going to ask because they said, you know, oh, and he's lovingly referred to as Dan the Van Man. I'm like, really? I didn't hear you guys refer to him. They kept calling him Dan the Van Man. But it was this great moment. I told you they got very excited over both Australians in the canoe and in the kayak. The Canadian commentators just love you guys apparently. But they were so pumped up at one point during Dan the Van Man's run. And then all of a sudden there was just like a moment of, oh, and it's over. I got the full quote here. And Dan the Van Man, he's punching well above his weight class. He's moving down the course. He's ducking. He's weaving. He's taking every possible risk. And he just got burned. He just died just like that out of nowhere.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, breaking news right now. Canada has won a gold medal. Morcheron has won the women's 64 kilograms in weightlifting. Congratulations. Your second gold of the game. Yeah. I'm seeing here right now that she ended up with a total of 236, got 131 in the clean and jerk, and 105 in the snatch.
COLIN HILDING: It's OK. Australia is in 11th, guys. That's Canada's position, right?
BEN WATERWORTH: In weightlifting, that's Canada's gold. So that's pretty good. Congratulations. How are you feeling right now to have this happen live on air? I don't think outside of the ones that we've sort of commented or back when we did Kim back in Rio, we've never really had a live reaction on air before.
COLIN HILDING: Well, the great thing about this is that it's not even being carried on CBC right now. CBC is showing the soccer. So you kind of clued me into this. Hey, you know what? Something's happening, and I just watched one of the live feeds here, and I was able to watch it live. Probably one of the few Canadians who's actually bothered to watch this right now.
BEN WATERWORTH: Eighth on the medal table now, Canada. Two gold, three silver, three bronze. You're one spot behind us. If you win a gold tomorrow, you go ahead of us on the medal table. No pressure, Canada.
COLIN HILDING: That's what happens when you deny Kaylee Mast. She finally broke the curse for us. The lengths she went through to redeem our show's reputation, and then you spit in her face, this is what you get. Canada is coming back.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm calling this now. The curse is not officially broken until multiple medals are won in an Olympics.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Oh, come on.
BEN WATERWORTH: Until one of my interviews, Jess, with a frickin you watch Abdi will win a medal now. You know, cause I wasn't on that one. Is it the only other one I wasn't on? Yeah, it is.
COLIN HILDING: Abdi and, Abdi and Evan, yeah, do you have any hopes left in you?
BEN WATERWORTH: They're all my amuse. I wasn't on Evan's as well either. No, solo ones. Tom, again, Tom's gonna break his leg. Charlotte, clearly the rugby girls are gonna go out in a heartbreak. Did I do Brendan or Aaron by myself? I think I did Brendan by myself, didn't I? So clearly, he's gonna break a leg. So that is our dual ones. The only ones we've got left is Aaron. It's the only one we were on together.
COLIN HILDING: Aaron's got a shot and maybe even two shots. So the multiple medals will be won by me. This is now a competition between me and Ben.
BEN WATERWORTH: In all fairness, I will defend my boxes because Harry, Sky, and I don't know if Caitlin's still in. I think Caitlin might get eliminated, but they're still in it. And the other ones that I've interviewed outside of Off The Podium, Jay and Georgia, they haven't competed yet. So I'm sure they'll do well when the track cycling starts. So stick it up, you Canadian. Jarrod, what did you commentary today? Yes, Channel 7.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Well, we had some great commentary of the surfing in terms of fails. I don't know who it was, some random American dude, but he just, for the life of him, could not commentate like the right person catching the wave. I'm like, these people are wearing colour-coordinated shirts so you know who they are. And it was during when Sally Fitzgibbon's lost to the Japanese competitor. And he just kept, like the Japanese competitor would surf an amazing wave, and he's like, just what we've come to expect from Sally Fitzgibbon putting out a great effort here. She's going to get a really good score from that and leap into the lead. I'm like, that wasn't her. I'm like, that's the wrong person. I'm like, the other rider, she's just getting further ahead with all these great scores. And you could tell the person commentating with him, the ladies just every time you mention something, she'd be like, and actually that was Suzuki who is going to get a great score off that wave. And he just would not acknowledge it. He just kept calling it wrong. It was just so bad to watch.
BEN WATERWORTH: Colin, hello. Hi, how are you?
COLIN HILDING: I just noticed I have another one that I missed here. This was in the diving. So our pair, one of the divers, Kaylee something or other, she had her ankle taped up. And I guess this is the thing where she injured a couple of weeks ago, but rehabilitated and was able to compete in the event. You have your expert, which is usually your old athlete who knew about this. And then you have your other typical network commentator who obviously knew nothing about this. And this was a clear moment of we don't know what to say. So let me just improvise here. So our expert was talking about one of the dives. You see the jumping off point there, was pushing away from the platform on that ankle. That ankle looks quite sore right now, the way she took that. And then the other guy goes, yes, well, she needs to get that looked at.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, that's brilliant. There was a couple, I noticed that in the swimming, but yeah, I got a few. My Joanna Griggs, she saved the day with a brilliant one, but then I was a bit questionable when she was talking about our table tennis superstar. Her line was, one of the superstars of table tennis in this country. One of, like Jarrod, can you name me any other superstar of table tennis in Australia?
JARROD LOOBEEK: No. Yeah. The only one, other one I can think of is the, is she Melissa Tapper or the table tennis competitor who she's competed in both the Paralympic and Olympic Games? And that's the only reason that I know about her.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I actually know you're talking about. But I mean, the fact we can't name her flat out, like, I mean, like, I just, I just thought he's got one of, like, I mean, if you're talking about swimming and that, sure. Um, I did love it when they crossed to Basil, Liesl and Thorpey. They have a little commentary ribbon down the bottom. It's got, you know, Ian Thorpe, like five time gold medallist, Liesl Jones, five time Olympian, Basil Zempelis. Commentator. Now, have we ignored the fact? Basil Zempelis is the frickin mayor of Perth. He got elected as the mayor of Perth was it last year. Why do they not put mayor of Perth? Like, this is the thing. Like, does the mayor of Toronto, Colin, just like jump on CBC and commentate the swimming? You're muted, by the way, just to let you know. Boomer, come on.
COLIN HILDING: I am not. I was just miming. I think that we have a mayor here in Winnipeg who's actually very involved in sports, so I would love to see our mayor commentate. But I mean, I guess it depends on how buffoonish your mayor is.
BEN WATERWORTH: What about Doug Ford back in the day? That would have been fun. A couple of Liesl Jones, like I don't know what to call them, moments. She utters the line for Ariana Titmuss yesterday. It was genuinely a race that stopped a nation. She's like, school kids everywhere stop to watch this race. Like, seriously, like, I'm glad that she won a fricking gold medal, but stop making this like this is the greatest thing ever. Like, good on you for winning a gold medal, Arnie. Fantastic. But, you know, I did like you see this other interview with her, and they're basically like, oh, so apparently your mum's ducking your calls, is she? She missed a call from me yesterday or something like that. Um, I mentioned the sea bomb. We talked about that one. The other thing I wanted to say about Kaylee's sister is that when they cut back to her after, I think, a gold medal, like her name's Taylor, who apparently competed in Rio in swimming. She mustn't have been a huge name, but I love the fact she goes, oh, my God, I literally can't talk. She's so beautiful on TV. Just so fun. Lethal Jones also added Prince Albert, presented the medal to Kaylee McKeown. Prince Albert, big fan of swimming, because he's presenting a medal. I mean, gay. I love the surfing, our commentator, who I'm just going to flat out ask you, Jarrod, what is the best feeling in the world? What do you think, right? If anything in the world, what is the best feeling to you?
JARROD LOOBEEK: Winning an Olympic gold medal, surely.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay, Colin, to you, best feeling in the world?
COLIN HILDING: Eating a whole jar of dill pickles.
BEN WATERWORTH: Cool. I'd probably say sex, but I'm the normal one on this podcast. But according to the commentator, catching a wave is the best feeling. Nothing tops it. Nothing. Okay, I don't surf, but let's go with that, by the way. I loved the shade Basil threw on Thorpey at one point. I think this is in the heats tonight. Thorpey says at one point during one of the streaming events, oh, he's looking there, he's taking a peek. If I had any suggestions to kids watching today, I would never suggest looking over to your lane. It's distracting. To which Basil goes, well, if it wins, it doesn't matter. And then the line that Lisa said, efficient butterfly is better than slow butterfly, which I don't understand that, but I'm sure that was something there. The one thing I wanted to mention too, not really a commentary fail, but the ex-girlfriend of the New Zealander who won the bronze medal yesterday in the triathlon, of course, Haden Wild, for some reason, they interviewed the ex-girlfriend. They're interviewing her, and she's all like, yeah, I went to school with him, yeah, you know, he's a great guy, and I'm so proud of him that he's won a bronze medal. The commentator or the interviewer goes, oh, so if you had to say anything right now to Haden, what would you say? She goes, oh, I'm sorry, I broke up with you. That was like live on TV. So I mean, honesty, it kind of works, but yeah, anyway. We're nearly out of time because one of us has to leave. Looking ahead to tomorrow.
COLIN HILDING: Jarrod.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, Jarrod.
JARROD LOOBEEK: I'm not showing up to commentating, leaving early, I don't know.
BEN WATERWORTH: 25 events are being decided tomorrow in terms of medals. We've got our first rowing medals tomorrow. We've got a few Canadians and Australians in those, more swimming medals. The rugby sevens, men's will be handed out tomorrow as well. Some more equestrian. We've got the time trial. So where's Richie tomorrow? I believe he's more of a chance. And the women's and men's X3X3 happening tomorrow. No Off The Podium guests competing tomorrow, unfortunately. But Colin, what are you looking forward to watching tomorrow? I guess you're on the 3X3 bandwagon probably.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah, that's going to be every second of my day, hopefully. I honestly don't think I've missed a single one of the games yet.
BEN WATERWORTH: Jarrod, for yourself, anything that you're looking to keep an eye on tomorrow?
JARROD LOOBEEK: I think anything but the swimming. A little bit over it. I mean, probably back into the tennis. Are our girls playing doubles tomorrow?
BEN WATERWORTH: I would assume so.
JARROD LOOBEEK: Surely, right?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah.
JARROD LOOBEEK: So I think that must be getting close to about quarterfinals, semifinals. So important rounds to get through.
BEN WATERWORTH: Get ready for the swimming tomorrow. You know, Arnie's up against Kaylee again, and Penny's in the 200s. I'm sure we'll have a replay no matter how she goes. And the 4x2, I'm excited for that one as well. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. And the first ever time women's 1500 metres is contested at the Olympics. And I raised the question to Jarrod off air yesterday. I'm like, why do they have the women's 1500? They don't have the men's 800. Well, guess what? They've included the men's 800 at these Olympics as well. So I quickly jumped to a conclusion that didn't need to be concluded there. I want to give a special shout out before we go to people listening to this to check out the Colin McEnroe show on Connecticut Public Radio. I was a guest on their show last night with Colin. It was a lot of fun. I'm surrounded by Colin radio hosts. I got to talk a little bit about gymnastics. I got to rub it in their face at Katie Ledecky. Didn't win a gold. It was fantastic. But he gave us a great shout out over there. He said he's been listening. So, Colin, if you're listening, thanks for tuning in. As I said to you on air, I swear a lot more on this. So in the great words of Kaylee McKeown, fuck yeah, thanks for listening to the show. Colin, ha ha, you didn't get your way today with a gold or a, well, you did the gold and weightlifting, but I meant the... Good on Kyle. Round of applause for Kyle. I will say good on her. Well done. But thank you for joining us, Colin.
COLIN HILDING: And she will never perform that way again now that you have snubbed her.
BEN WATERWORTH: She's not coming on the show again, clearly.
COLIN HILDING: Yeah. And Jarrod...
BEN WATERWORTH: Jess is back tomorrow. So she's in the heats tomorrow. So maybe this whole... You know, let's inflate her chances a little bit more. Might have another chance. But appreciate you joining us once again as well.
JARROD LOOBEEK: No problem. I'm sure we'll get an hour of lead up before she goes for a run.
BEN WATERWORTH: I look forward to them not only interviewing Olympians saying how good she is. I'm sure they will get all of Channel 7's personality. Let's look at Koshi talking about how great Jess is for another hour. Everyone likes us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, Instagram, hashtag OTP. We're loving the messages and everything we're getting on there. Thank you for tuning in for that. Subscribe on all the relevant channels, leave us some feedback, and we will be back tomorrow for Day 5 review on a golden day for Australia and Canada. Thanks for tuning in to Off The Podium, and we will speak to you tomorrow. Good night.
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