OlympicsFan

1) So the meet she competed in wasnt certified? 2) Of course i know that not everyone who makes the cut automatically qualified, but you were only taking about those who made the cut, so ... ?

1) I think one of the Campbell sisters swam 24.41 yesterday. 2) Crazy to think that 14 year old Claire Curzan swam 24.89 yesterday and almost made the cut.

Good to know. Now i know why i never noticed him. Usually when i see a race with irregular conditions i stop watching. Apparently he never did anything of note under regular conditions (maybe apart from the bronze last year).

Not everyone has the time to follow every race, especially those in the US/Canada that take place at weird times for european viewers, i am not surprised you wouldnt know anything about that (See, i can write bullshit about you too, without having any proof. I guess thats what happens when you cant finish a single comment without a personal attack. I guess you need that to feel superior. Pretty sad when a grown man needs to brag about his biathlon knowledge on an online forum to feel good about himself). I remember the relay at the olympics last year, the conditions were irregular so i stopped watching after the 2nd exchange or so. Good for you that you dont have any more important things to remember, some of us do, so dont blame them for not learning all the biathlon results of the last 20 years by heart. What would you say? Did it help our discussion that i made unfounded claims about you or would you say that this will probably distract us from the actual topic?

Good decision, a guy like him shouldnt retire in such a sad state. He should do a Björndalen and peak at the next olympics out of nowhere and then retire at 45 or so. If a guy like Pidrushni can win a gold medal, then a 45 year old Fourcade should be able to do that as well.

I wouldnt count Canmore, probably a lot of top guys werent competing. Already completely forgot the results from the last olympics. When i learnt yesterday that Belarus won gold in the womens relay last year i couldnt believe it as well.

Once in a century day for Italy. On the womens side Italy deserved a gold, although as a german fan i am sad that Herrmann threw away the gold. On the mens side this must be the most surprising top 3 ever. Windish should retire now, it cant get better than that for him. Did he ever make a podium before? Impressive that Fourcade is out of shape and even when Desthieux messes up, some other random french comes out of nowhere and wins a medal. Boe must be very disappointed, only 1 individual gold for him is far less than anyone expected ... Edit: I have never been a fan of Fourcade, but this is not how he should retire. With the weak overall level behind Boe this season i still think that Fourcade could get a lot of top 3 finishes the next couple of season.

I think Davis played for the US in 2012? Barrett would definitely be a good addition to their team. Even without him and Wiggins they still have Murray, SGA, Lyles, Olynyk, Thompson. They are probably the second most athletic team only behind the US. Not sure if Australia is good enough to win a medal. Baynes, Exum, Maker or Ingles are nice players, but none of them really makes a difference at this level. On the other hand guys like Ingles or Broekhoff give them spacing, which is exactly what Simmons needs. With Broekhoff and Simmons they also will be great at defending their opponents bigmen. I think Giannis wont have a much weaker supporting cast and he is quite clearly a better player than Simmons, so if you would consider Australia a medal contender, you have to say the same about Greece. Serbia probably has a better supporting cast than those 2 + Jokic is better than any spanish/french player, so Serbia should be favorite for silver. Bronze should be between Greece (if Giannis plays), France, Spain and Australia (if Simmons plays).

I see, we have a Slovenia/Slovakia situation here. I looked it up here https://basketball.realgm.com/national/teams/19/Dominican-Republic/nba_players and still got it wrong ...

Not related to the world championships, but this is probably still the best place to ask this: Does anyone have any idea what happened with Maren Hammerschmidt and Luise Kummer?

1) Herrmann for sure doesnt regret it. When she made the switch she wasnt world class anymore and biathlon is far more popular in Germany. Even if she would dominate cross-country skiing like Johaug, she would probably earn less money than she does now. 2) Dont know what will happen with Schempp, i am sure he will want to get back to the top. Lesser and Rees are indeed pretty slow currently, Peiffer & Doll & Nawrath are much better in cross-country.

Insane world championships for Norway, the certainly dont have the most talented athletes, but the way all of their womens athletes are peaking here is very impressive, lets hope that this is just a fluke like Germany in 2017 (which is of course very likely). Another shameful relay performance for Germany on the womens side, of course we all saw it coming, the german coaches just seem to be too stupid to ever pick the correct lineup. On the mens side silver is probably the best possible outcome for Germany, Rees instead of Schempp was just too much of a handicap. You cant blame Rees, he knows that he doesnt belong there.

If both Australia and Canada compete with their best possible teams, then they should be favorites ahead of Lithuania. Canada (Barrett, Murry, Wiggins) and Australia (Simmons, Baynes, Ingles) have both more individual quality. I think Brazil also has more individual quality than New Zealand, but their team has gotten old, lets see if all of their best players will compete. I think group F is the most interesting overall. Montenegro, Brazil and New Zealand all could finish second in that group. In group G Germany and France are favorites, but you cant underestimate Puerto Rico, they have 2 great NBA players in Towns and Horford. I think semifinals will be: Spain or Italy vs. USA Serbia vs. Greece/Lithuania/France/Canada/Australia/Germany/Turkey Should be a crazy fight between Greece/Lithuania/France/Canada/Australia/Germany/Turkey to avoid USA in the quarterfinal.

Why? 1) He doesnt even speak the language of his home country ... 2) Someone who has nothing better to do than to entertain his girlfriend doesnt seem very intimidating, would be completely different if he would have written: Hobbies: Getting entertained by my girlfriend Then i would have been impressed, a guy like that must have figured life out.

Maybe they are or maybe not, but what exactly is that article supposed to tell us? I also remember a while ago that some Dortmund official claimed that Dortmund had 10 million fans in Germany alone, which of course is complete bullshit. Often those numbers are based on facebook followers or something like that ... United and Real are clearly the 2 most popular clubs, then Barcelona and after that there are 8 clubs on about the same level in my opinion (AC Milan, Juventus, PSG, Bayern, Arsenal, City, Liverpool, Chelsea). Ronaldo makes Juventus interesting, but he is probably their only world class player right now and overall the football City plays is much more entertaining.

Agree, only problem might be that relays normally arent decided before the last leg and its hard to see Fourcade beating any half way decent opponent man to man in his current shape. On paper France has the strongest relay. What a shame that Schempp didnt make it, him in normal shape + Doll, Lesser and Peiffer would have made Germany the favorite for gold in my opinion. Nawrath, Kühn and Rees are completely unpredictable.

Why Herrmann-Gontier-Eckhoff show? Surprised that Germany starts with their 2 weakest athletes, there is a good chance that Italy, Norway and maybe some other relays will already be out of reach when Herrmann takes over. Based on what i saw so far my favorites are Norway and Sweden.

Juventus isnt particulary popular anywhere outside of Italy and City is a lot more fun to watch + with City vs. Barca you would have Pep vs. his old team.

Never understood why there is a need for that. If you dont care about a users opinion, then just ignore him (its not like any of you guys has anything more important to do with his time, so i am sure taking 0,1 seconds to recognize that a comment was made by a certain user and that you therefore dont have to bother reading it wont stop you from achieving anything important in your lives). The sad thing is that most guys constantly feel the need to point out that certain users should be ignored, but then they still go on and reply to them (for example like our czech friend did in the biathlon thread after the mens individual race or how our dutch friend keeps answering to comments of mine without actually replying, because he thinks that way he can tell himself that he is actually ignoring me).

Why was that expected? I think Liverpool is more popular than Juventus, maybe City too.

Pretty much the expected draw. City, Juventus and Barca are by far the 3 best teams and UEFA wants them all in the semifinal (alongside Liverpool). Would be a huge surprise if the final wont be between 2 out of City, Juventus and Barca. I dont like any of those teams, but Barca winning the title would be the least bad of those 3 bad options for me.

You also went skating today?

Thanks, but ZDF (german channel that broadcasted the race this afternoon) also just uploaded it, so i will watch it there. Since there wont be any races the next 2 days i will have enough time to catch up until the action resumes on saturday. Very happy for Peiffer, he is my favorite german biathlete because he is always very humble and pragmatic. Quite remarkable that he is olympic and world champion in two different disciplines despite not being very successful in the world cup, probably most guys (except for Fourcade and J. Boe) would love to trade places with him.

Fuuuuark ... Thought that this would be another boring race, so i went skating instead. Now i come home to find out that Peiffer won gold and of course there is no way to rewatch the whole race ...

Lol ... Sweden, Italy and France it is ...