On Saturday the gorgeous sunny weather continued and we headed out for another day of enjoying the sun and warm weather at Cypress Mountain. We had general admission/standing room tickets for this event and were lucky that they weren't cancelled due to the warm conditions and the slushy snow. Some previous events held at Cypress Mountain had to have their general admission tickets cancelled due to the safety issues of deep slushy snow and possibly shifting hay bales, so we were quite fortunate.
Public Service Announcement: if you have a Baby, and you
choose to bring them and their enormous stroller, which will inevitably get stuck in the said foot deep slushy snow, and the baby will inevitably be surrounded by loud cheering fans with cowbells at the event, you are not not allowed to complain. Mountain events occur in the snow, not on the sidewalk outside your house. You are an idiot. Leave the Baby at home. Public Service Announcement is now over.
This day I decided to mix it up and have clam chowder with my sausage and o.j. for breakfast. The clam chowder was really quite good. I have actually been really impressed with the Olympic food fare at all the venues. Even though I have talked mainly about the junk food I had for breakfast, they did have healthy options at the venues such as bran and carrot muffins as wells as fresh fruit cups and fat-free yogurt. . . . I was the typical tourist and choose the fun food. . . . .With all the walking and dancing and the fact that it was vacation, I figured that calories don't count at the Olympics.
The Aerials is probably the least traditional Winter Olympic
event. While we waited for the jumping to start we learned a little about some of the history and the athletes. It's part of the freestyle skiing discipline like skiercross and moguls, where its not only about time, its more about getting big air and doing tricks. Most of the athletes in this particular portion aren't real skiers, they are ex-gymnasts, and a few of them don't even like winter (isn't it sacrilegious to be in the Winter Olympics and not like winter?!) I am completely amazed that people can possibly do multiple flips and rotations and land perfectly on the 25° slope, while wearing giant skis.
The ladies in this qualification round were all really solid. There were very few falls or even hand touches on the ground when they landed. Dina was very impressed, he had been a bit disappointed by all the falls in the halfpipe event, so he was happy to see clean runs and big scores. The Americans and Canadians aren't big leaders in this sport, so I had to find a new person to cheer for. My favorite turned out to be Alla Tsuper from the Ukraine but representing Belarus. I loved her for two reasons, first her name -it has the word 'Super' in it; how fun is that? And the second reason was that she lived up to the name, she was a super great jumper! She ended up receiving the top qualification score and was the leader going into the finals that are to be held a few day later (Dina and I were bummed it wasn't an all day event like snowboarding and moguls were, but I guess they need to spread out the wealth for the spectators).
The finals should be a great show to watch since everyone is jumping so strongly; hopefully the ladies keep up the confidence! Go Tsuper!
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