This Sunday marked the end of the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, as the roughly two weeks of the world’s largest winter sports competition came to a close.
As with every Olympics, dreams were achieved, tears were shed, and just about anyone who watched it was impressed. While the US didn’t go home in first, they still carved our a respectable fourth place victory- only behind Russia, Norway, and Canada. Considering these are some of the winter-iest countries on Earth, our far more temperate nation did quite well. We ended up with 28 medals total- putting us only behind Russia in terms of precious metals earned. Also respectable.
The US did very well in both Freestyle and Alpine skiing- taking 3 golds and 2 golds in both respectively, as well as a pile of silvers and bronzes. David Wise, Joss Christensen, and Maddie Bowman were the one with golds around their neck in Freestyle- and their performances are looking up, if you haven’t seen them already. Ted Ligety and Mikaela Shiffrin both cleaned up in their respective slalom events, taking home the medals we’re looking for.
The US also took home a number of medals in snowboarding, including 3 golds. Sage Kotsenburg and Jamie Anderson took home the gold for Men’s and Ladies’ Slopestyle (respectively), and Kaitlyn Farring came through with the gold for Ladie’s Halfpipe. Given that these courses had originally raised some concerns of various accomplished athletes such as Shaun White, it was great to see that things still went fairly smoothly all around.
One slight disappointment was the loss of the Men’s Hockey gold medal to our friends in the great white North, Canada. Both teams were hot enough this year that the temperature in the arena had to be turned down to compensate, and the US still ended up with the silver after the final game. Rumors are flying that the Canadians may have been rubbing maple syrup on their sticks to improve their control and stability, but we at the Salty Dog Boating News feel that it would be journalistically irresponsible to comment on such wild rumors and speculation.
And with last night, the book was closed on Sochi with its closing ceremony. While the opening ceremony had a few notable (or at least, amusing) gaffes, the closing ceremony had the good humor to look back on them with a wink and a smile. Seen above, the performers imitated the infamous non-opening of the fifth Olympic ring during the kickoff event’s starting moments. While not everything may have been perfect during the games (are they ever?), the quality was generally agreed to have exceeded most (if not all) expectations. Here’s looking forward to the 2016 Summer Olympics in Brazil, and the speedy recovery of Bob Costas!
