A6

by BILL CLARKE

Stumble Upon

del.icio.us

Digg

Facebook

Print

Email

Speak Up

Have you been watching the Olympics? Of course, you have. Even if you didn't want to, anyone with a television set had to be exposed to at least some of it.

Actually, I rather wish that I had missed parts of the 2006 games. There were a couple of days which weren't anything for Canada to be proud of. Imagine, our hockey team, replete with NHLers, lost to Switzerland and then went on to do the same thing against Finland. Our curlers lost to Japan and Italy. I betcha they won't be telling their grandchildren about those games.

I think there should be some changes in some of these sports. Wouldn't you think there should be some relationship between shots on goal and the actual score? Apparently not. We watched our beloved team out-shoot the opposition rather emphatically, only to end up scoreless.

There are a couple of things we could do to correct that anomaly. We could do away with the goaltender. That one makes some sort of sense. Why should one guy be able to make all that difference in what's supposed to be a team sport?

Another possibility is to make the goal larger. I think it should be at least twice as large. We could even copy another major international sport: soccer. Look at the goal that poor goalie has to cover. If we put something like that at each end of the ice, it would be a challenge for the guy with the big pads. Defend that, you Swiss masked wonder!

I've been scratching my head about what to do about curling. It's hard to see that any basic rule changes would make a lot of difference. We could do away with those itty-bitty push brooms. Bring back the corn broom. The game became a lot less exciting when these guys and gals started taking to the ice carrying Swiffers.

There's one other thing that would help Canada win more international titles. Have you been to a local curling rinks and watched one of those club-against-club bonspeils? They stack brooms. For non-curlers, this is a break in the middle of the game (or after the fourth and eighth ends in a 12-end game). The curlers all head off the ice for a bit of refreshment. I have fond memories of this tradition. Unfortunately, my doctor told me to give up curling. He figured it was too hard on my liver.

In Olympic competition, it would be appropriate to stack brooms after every second end. Otherwise, there'd be less challenge. By the sixth end, the Canadians would have a definite advantage, unless of course they were playing a team from the Czech Republic or perhaps the German rink was made up of four Bavarians. Fat chance!

All sorts of new sports are being introduced. This year, there's that madness known as Snowboard Cross. Apparently, the in-group calls it boarder-cross. (Not border cross, which is what smugglers do.)

There was a time when the UNB ski club held an event called the "Sugar Derby" every spring. "Sugar" is a term for that coarse spring snow that every skier loves. It involved skiing and beer drinking. There's an event at which Canadians should excel.

Meanwhile, Canadians were picking up all sorts of medals in sports that most people only watch every four years. This suggests that (a) we should be paying more attention to some of the lower profile sports and that (b) we should be encouraging kids to get into things that they don't see as all that glamourous.

Who's up for a snowball fight?