BY KEVIN FRIEDENBERG

In print | September 4, 2008

As a sports fan I experienced something this summer for the first time: watching the Olympics. Though finished for more than a week, the Beijing Olympics provided me the opportunity to cheer for a country instead of just my favorite teams.

Watching America dominate the prime time sports made me forget about the little ones we get smoked in. Though I have been alive for many Olympics both summer and winter, I have never watched the events more closely than I did this year. The opening ceremonies were tremendous even though the Chinese made that one little girl lip synch because they thought the other one wasn’t pretty enough to be seen representing her nation on worldwide television. To me that’s like kicking a dog, you just don’t do it. Regardless, anyone who watched the Beijing Olympics watched history being written and the experience is something I will never forget.

Of the most enjoyable aspects of this summer’s games, I would have to say watching Michael Phelps dominate the sport of swimming after being hyped up non-stop for months really made me proud to be an American. After observing the much-anticipated lead-up to Bode Miller’s performance (read: debacle) in the last winter games, I was just hoping that this kid barely older than myself could deal with the pressure. Equally as amazing was the emotion displayed by the kid’s mother with every race he demolished. Can’t really blame her though, if I was in the Olympics like he was I would hope my mother would do the same. Phelps had more gold around his neck than Mr. T, though I wonder who would rather shank him more right now, Mark Spitz or all the other swimmers who had to listen to the national anthem constantly. His performance is the kind of thing I want to tell my kids I watched, even though they probably would pay less attention to me than Mike Tyson to his money.

In addition, Usain Bolt’s ridiculous medal wins in the 100-meter and 200-meter dash were unbelievable. That kid just took off and never looked back. Bolt was so fast that I thought he was about to lift off down the stretch, totally unbeatable. You know you’re a badass when you have enough time to look around and celebrate before you even cross the finish line. I mean this guy is such a beast that on ESPN they said his 40-yard dash time would be absurd, like sub-4.0-seconds fast, so fast that the wind ripping past you blows your clothes off. Also there were rumors that he wanted to try playing in the NFL. I would draft him. You can’t coach that, and even if he couldn’t catch I would give him a pair of those new-age football gloves that are basically so tacky you couldn’t drop a pass if you wanted to.

I’m certainly not the first to comment on it but those Chinese gymnasts look like they couldn’t even get into a PG-13 movie. There is no way any of those girls would be able to get a drivers license in this country. The only thing more suspect than their age was the training camp where these young kids train that was shown on TV. I can’t believe that thing hasn’t been shut down. I’m not sure who talks poorly upon male gymnasts but any one of those guys looks like he could rip my arms off and beat me to death with them. I’d like to see one of the gymnasts go toe-to-toe with a certain Cuban Tae Kwon Do competitor – now that guy is a lunatic.

Not that the Olympics are over and we have to wait until London 2012 for the next summer games I guess I’ll need to find other reasons to be proud about my country other than just the medal count. Interestingly enough while surfing through the internet tonight I saw that the unbeatable American women’s beach volleyball leviathans Misty May-Treanor and Kerry Walsh were in fact beaten. Also, after his disappointing medal-less finish in this year’s games, Tyson Gay rebound into top form with a solid race at the British Grand Prix this Sunday. America topping this performance in the Olympics will be tough, especially Phelps’ records, but who knows, that’s what makes the Olympics great.

Kevin Friedenberg is a senior. He can be reached at kfriede1@swarthmore.edu.

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