TEAMUSATRACKER: DAY 10 PREVIEW GOLD RUSH & SUPER BOWL EDITION
TeamUSA wins 6 Consecutive Gold Medals at a Winter Olympics... Setting a Record
GOLD RUSH UPDATE
Stat of the Day: For the first time in Winter Olympics history Team USA won 7 consecutive Gold Medals in every event they medaled. Previous record was 5 set twice (1932 Lake Placid, 2006 Torino).
As I was joking on Twitter today this has all come after the NYTimes wrote a piece Team USA had no zero Gold Medals. I think Team USA said HOLD MY BEER…
The Gold Rush started one day earlier than I thought when I wrote a pretty in depth piece about what Gold Medal predictions had told us Team USA might not get a Gold Medal until Day 6.
The last 6 medals Team USA have all been Gold and They all have been amazing you couldn’t have scripted them better stories… HOLLYWOOD & PEACOCK LETS MAKE SOME MOVIES AND DOCUMENTARIES QUICKLY
GOLD #1: Lindsey Jacobellis: 16 years between medals- despite being the best female snowboard cross snowboarder she only heard from the Olympic media about that Silver Medal run in Torino. WELL SHUT UP HATERS Lindsey Jacobellis you are the first American Woman to win Snowboard Cross Gold in Team USA history
GOLD #2 Chloe Kim: It is hard to repeat especially in Women’s Snowboard Halfpipe where Team USA had coming into Beijing won 66% of the Gold Medals but never a repeat Gold Medal winner including the great Kelly Clark. Also it is nerve wracking the entire world expected you to repeat because you never lose because you won every event since you took a nearly 2 year break to go to Princeton. Well Chloe Kim you are the first Back to Back Olympic Gold Medalist in Women’s Snowboard Halfpipe History.
GOLD #3 Nathan Chen: Speaking of exercising demons forget 2018 PyeongChang Short Program. Just Forget It. Nathan Chen is the Quad King and like all KINGS - and he got GOLD in Beijing setting a world record in the short program(REDEMPTION) and became the first American man since Scott Hamilton to win Gold outside of North America. . And if the ROCCheaters are disqualified from Team Competition - Well Nathan Chen you will become the first US Figure Skater ever to win 2 Golds at the same Olympics.
GOLD #4 Mixed Freestyle Aerials: The Olympics: Expect the Unexpected. Team USA Mixed Aerials never won Gold in a Mixed Freestyle Aerials competition or World Competition… PICKED A HELL OF A TIME FOR A FIRST GOLD MEDAL..
They also had a cool personal story as Justin Schoenefeld won Gold with his girlfriend Ashley Caldwell and “3rd wheel” Chris Lillis.
First Gold in Freestyle Aerials since 1998. Team USA beat heavily favored China on their home soil and for the first time ever beat China and Russia in the same competition. Well Team USA Mixed Aerials you are the first Olympics Gold Medalists in Olympics History in this event.
PS in terms of the dating - 25% of Team USA medals (Jaelin Kauf, Madison Chock/Evan Bates, Schoenefeld/Caldwell) have been won by someone dating a fellow Team USA member this according to @TeamUSATracker estimate. Since It is Valentine’s Day in Beijing just wanted to point that out. Drop me a comment if I missed a couple who won medals. There is no US Weekly for Team USA.
GOLD #5 Lindsey Jacobellis/Nick Baumgartner:
I wrote yesterday about this movie.
I ran a poll and more people liked the sequel better than the original. 36 year old Jacobellis 2nd Gold in 3 days alongside 40 year old Nick Baumgartner had everything even a catchy title “80s Babies”.
How do you top your own Gold Medal Lindsey- take along Nick Baumgartner ,a Yooper with a heart of Gold, who had just poured his out all emotions live on National TV after not advancing in the men’s competition and thinking he would have to wait 4 more years for a medal.
Well - Nick - 2 days later Nick Baumgartner was the Oldest Snowboard Champ in Olympics history and Lindsey Jacobellis you no longer that title as old pass that off to Nick - you were the first 2 time Gold Medalist for Team USA at Beijing Winter Olympics.
GOLD #6: Erin Jackson :
First US woman to win a individual medal in 20 years (2002)
First US Women to win the 500M and to win a GOLD medal outside of US since 1994 (Bonnie Blair)
The story goes on and on but let me stop it at Bonnie Blair
If you look at the numbers Bonnie Blair is the Greatest Winter Olympian of All Time
-The most medals (6)
-Tied for Most Gold Medals (5) and only one to do it over 3 Olympics
-The Only US Winter Olympian ever to win the same individual event 3 times in a row (500 Meters which Erin Jackson won).. this feat is impressive- (Shaun White couldn’t do this in the Snowboard Halfpipe and Jamie Anderson couldn’t do this in Snowboard Slopestyle. David Wise has a chance to match later at this Olympics) Blair had an advantage because she did 3 Gold Medals in 6 years.
-The Only US Winter Olympian ever won Back to Back Gold medasl in two different events-. Bill Mallon ran the following numbers- Americans trying to repeat their Gold Medals at the Winter Olympics had a 10% chance of doing it. Bonnie Blair completed this feat 75% of the time, the one time she missed she got a Bronze.
So Why is Erin Jackson run so memorable? There are so many layers that makes this story a movie script -
Brittany Bowe giving up her spot, believing in Jackson
Jackson switching from inline to Gold Medalist speed skater in just over 5 years,
The first black American woman ever to win an individual Gold Medal (third black athlete to win a medal per Bill Mallon & Nick Zaccardi) -
But I see it for something even bigger…something it means to US Speed Skating and the rebirth of US Speed Skating
Because of the success of Bonnie Blair and the remarkable tale of his perseverance by Dan Jansen -there is a huge expectation of excellency for US Speed Skating.
In 4 years I have been running @TeamUSATracker - I’m sick of all the haters on Twitter saying they suck like US Speed Skating sucks. And I don’t run the US Speed Skating Account or Team USA account. It must be worse for the young men and women who handle those accounts.
Well mark down the date February 13, 2022 as the date US Speed Skating said SHUT THE F*CK UP HATERS.. WE ARE BACK BABY….Men’s Team Pursuit made SF as #2 seed resting their best skater (That’s like the Bengals not playing Joe Burrow in the Playoffs) and then Erin Jackson won Gold
The #1 Speed Skater in 500 meters was Erin Jackson and she calmly went out in only Olympic race and won the 500 Meters like she did in 50% of the races this year.
I tried to put all in everything I felt when Erin Jackson won Gold in this thread
Updated February 20
GOLD #7: Kaillie Humphries
After the Super Bowl Kaillie Humphries won her First Gold for Team USA and the First Gold ever in the Women’s Monobob in a dominant fashion and finished 1-2 with US Teammate Elana Meyers Taylor. Every other sliding sport a German driver won except Women’s Monobob where Humphries, Meyers Taylor both overcame a lot of obstacles (worthy of a movie script) including the final setback - COVID that interrupted their training, forced them to have fewer practice runs on the track (95% less than the drivers from China). We would find out later that Humphries was dealing with a nagging calf injury and we knew previously Humphries almost couldn’t compete at Winter Olympics for Team USA because of a citizenship delay.
The interest in Monobob and Bobsled made it the sport of 2022 (Curling & Cross Country Skiing (Jessie Diggins) really gained interest more popularity after 2018) but I think Bobsled interest will boom post 2022 and I am interested to see the crossover athletes in Bobsled over the next 4 years plus USA Bobsled catching up with the German technology.
GOLD 8: Alex Hall
This Gold was about Legacy and Redemption.
Alex Hall took the GOLD based on his first run down the course that no one cold match. Hall went 1-2 with Nick Goepper and preserved an American legacy in Men’s Slopestyle where Team USA has 6 of 9 medals in 3 Olympics that Men’s Freeski Slopestyle has been a part of the Winter Olympics. For Alex Hall a big redemption from Big Air where he missed his final attempt at a 2160 (which he hit at XGames and likely would have given him Gold in Big Air)
GOLD 9*: 9 Figure Skaters will leave Beijing without a Silver Medal and they it might take them years to get it. Hopefully it gets upgraded to GOLD when they do get it and it would be the first ever Gold for Team USA in the Team Figure Skating Competition.
TEAM DAY 10 PREVIEW
58 US Athletes in 11 events….weather permitting (Weather caused 2 Women’s Freestyle Skiing events to be postponed & Women’s Downhill Training Run #2 to be cancelled on Day 9 and really screwed up everyone’s schedule but Nick Goepper)
There only 4 medal events and 1 medal clinching event (USA Women’s Hockey’s SF game vs Finland) on the docket.
2 Events that Team USA is expected to medal in MONOBOB & ICE DANCING will come on with their finals runs or routine right after the Super Bowl.. NBC could not have scripted it better.
but first…. let’s talk about the GOLD RUSH by TEAM USA
DAY 10 PREVIEW: 4 MEDAL EVENTS
As discussed 4 Medal Events tonight. The schedule has changed from original schedule I have updated here.
This is an important PSA: There will be Olympic Events during the Super Bowl. Most will be on Peacock. Follow the Google Doc here
USA Network will have the Ice Dancing Free Dance starting at 8:15 PMET (the first American couple Kaitlin Hawayek /Jean-Luc Baker is slated to go at 9:49 PMET)
The 3rd run of the Monobob where Kaillie Humphries sits in 1st place and Elana Meyers Taylor sits in 4th place starts at 8:30 PMET on PEACOCK. 4th Run starts at 10:00 PMET.
Reminder since Monobob was by far my most favorited tweets last night and everyone wanted more Monobob > Ice Dancing (Memo to NBC you didn’t show me enough Live Monobob) Humphries (1) and Elana Meyers Taylor (4) will go by their position in Run 3 and be up first and then in Run 4 it goes in reverse order of your position (kinda like last at bats in Baseball). Run 4 should be on NBC unless the Bengals and Rams go into OT where Monobob has more fair rules than NFL OT rules because everyone gets a 4th run. Remember it is the best 4 cumulative runs a crash will take you out of the race (We learned that from Cool Runnings - same rules apply). So we want 4 clean runs tonight from 🤞EMT and Kaillie🤞
Monobob was a consensus Gold Medal Pick from the experts but the experts differed on which American would win. A bit of bad luck when both picks were out Kaillie Humprhies (2021 World Champ in Monobob, Ranked #2 in the World)) and Elana Meyers Taylor (Ranked #1 in the World in Monobob) both revealed they contracted COVID and had to stop their training and were delayed getting to Beijing for track prep. Also COVID almost stopped Kaillie Humphries from getting her US Passport time in time so I did enjoy this interview of Humphries discussing what it means to represent Team USA. That is only tip of the iceberg that both have overcome to get here
Team USA is trying to get 2 medals in the same sport for the first time at this Winter Olympics game - they missed a chance in Freestyle Skiing Big Air when Alex Hall went for Gold and didn’t land his 2160. They are also trying to get their🤞 4th and possible 5th medal🤞 in the 7 new events at the 2022 Bejiing Games (They are only entered in 6 of them and missed out on a possible Gold Medal in Mixed Relay Short Track when they were DQ’ed and stop me if you heard this one before Ted Robinson by a controversial call that favored China who won Gold )
The other Medal possibilities are in Ice Dancing where Zachary Donohue and Madison Hubbell are in 3rd place and Madison Chock and Evan Bates are in 4th place. Both have medals in the Team Event and likely only one will get a medal tonight barring a collapse or failed drug test from the Russian team in Silver and
3rd medal possibility is Women’s Freestyle Aerials where TeamUSA have 4 athletes making who have podiumed in the last year and they are coming off a Gold Medal is another good chance- Megan Nick, Winter Vinecki , Kalia Kuhn, Ashley Caldwell will all compete and yes Winter’s debut in the Olympics was delayed by a Winter Storm
Now the Aerials competition will take place in one Day
2 AMET Qualification (Top 6 advance, then Top 6 advance again)
6AMET, USA Network Finals (Two rounds 12 to 6).
Ashley Caldwell (won Silver at 2021 World Championships) and was in the Team Event because she has highest degree of difficulty among the Americans. This sport is brutal and it is about landing clean there will be a lot of falls in the competition.
The final event to keep an eye is Women’s Hockey playing their Semifinal vs Finland (8:10 AMET, USA Network). After a shaky QF final vs Czech Republic - Team USA plays Finland. Team USA Is 9-0 vs Finland in the Olympics and have won every game by at least 2 goals (42-9 goal differential). Team USA beat Finland in the first game of the tournament 5-2. Team USA is 19-1-1 vs Finland at a World Championships but that makes Finland the only team besides Canada to ever beat the US Women’s Hockey Team at a World Championships. A win clinches a medal for Team USA - the consensus prediction for Team USA Women’s Hockey was a Silver except @TeamUSA Tracker who went with Gold because I never pick against America when GOLD is on the line.
IS GOD A BENGAL FAN?
IN TODAY’S SIGN - GOD MUST BE A BENGAL FAN - Nick Goepper who just wore an OchoCinco Jersey to the XGames can watch the Super Bowl without worrying about Slopestyle Qualification because of the weather delay in Women’s Slopestyle on Day 9.
MAGIC BABY BLUE JERSEYS
TEAM PETERSON (USA Women’s Curling Team) called me out today on Twitter saying about my Curling Record Book. That’s never a good thing when your pick for a historic medal in Curling (Team USA has never won a medal in Women’s Curling) and who already set a historic record for best ever start by a USA Women’s 3-0 called me out for yelling at Team USA Curling to wear the Baby Blues.
So I ran the numbers for real with their help and there is something comforting about the Baby Blue Uniforms for Curling. I would wear them every time if I was John Shuster. Shuster is on a 7 game winning streak when he wears the Baby Blue Jerseys and Chris Plys is 1-8 in the Navy Blue Uniforms at Beijing.
CURRENT MEDAL COUNT
Finally I’m revising my prediction for Team USA medal count from 26 to 30 medals. This would be the best ever performance by Team USA outside of North America. Added winners included 3 team events 2 Woman Bobsled, Alpine Skiing Team Event, Men’s Hockey, and Short Track 1500M (Kristen Santos). Santos 4th in 1000M was heart-breaking- one of 3 4 place finishes in the last 3 days.
I put this already out in a thread here addressed to Steve Kornacki as always. I’m not Steve Kornacki but damn he has a really cool job.