123 replies to this topic

[mabrowndog]

A couple of days ago I was quite convinced it was synchronized swimming. Another poster mentioned rhythmic gymnastics, certainly a worthy nominee.

Today for the first time I'm seeing another contender that may well vault to the top slot: Euqestrian Individual Dressage. I was aware of the contests where horses are run through an obstacle course of jumps and water hazards, and another where horses' gaits and postures are silently judged (like compulsory figures in skating). But I had no earthly idea there was another competition where the rider literally dances his horse to musical accompaniment. MSNBC is airing this atrocity right now.

I mean, Jesus fuck. The commentator is repeating ridiculous crap like "it's very important that the horse's gait matches the tempo of the music" and "the judges will be looking for artistic expression from the horse". Seriously, this might be the holy grail of moronic Olympic events. Utter nonsense.

If we get enough nominations, I'll throw a poll up.

[DLew On Roids]

I'd appreciate a Bollywood routine from one of these horses.

[bsj]

This is pretty bad.

I also have a fundamental problem with handball. Lacrosse minus sticks. Soccer using hands not feet. Water polo minus the water. The most fundamentally basic sport ever. I honestly thought for years it was the sport I played as a kid....which was essentially racquetball without a racquet. But when I saw it? Understood why Americans do not bother with it.

Edited by bsj, 09 August 2012 - 09:29 AM.

[Hendu's Gait]

Dressage by a mile

Ping Pong, Badminton, Synchro Swimming, Handgun shooting, and indoor Cycling (especially pursuit I think) round out the Bad Half Dozen.

Edited by Hendu's Gait, 09 August 2012 - 09:31 AM.

[bsj]

Dressage by a mile

Ping Pong, Badminton, Synchro Swimming, Handgun shooting, and indoor Cycling (especially pursuit I think) round out the Bad Half Dozen.

I like this sport in theory, but they should just make it a single lap. The first few laps they are basically just staring each other down...utter waste of time.

Edited by bsj, 09 August 2012 - 09:35 AM.

[DLew On Roids]

I also have a fundamental problem with handball. Lacrosse minus sticks. Soccer using hands not feet. Water polo minus the water. The most fundamentally basic sport ever.

Wouldn't this make it, you know, a non-stupid, non-idiotic event?

It tests physical fitness, coordination, teamwork, and has an objective scoring system. It's fast-paced. It is not set to music. Pituitary issues are not a prerequisite to play. What's the problem, other than that we suck at it?

[bsj]

Wouldn't this make it, you know, a non-stupid, non-idiotic event?

It tests physical fitness, coordination, teamwork, and has an objective scoring system. It's fast-paced. It is not set to music. Pituitary issues are not a prerequisite to play. What's the problem, other than that we suck at it?

I just think that soccer, hockey, lacrosse, and even water polo (though not a huge fan of it either) all add additional elements that make what is essentially the same game far more interesting.

I will agree though that any sport that has objective scoring isn't all bad though.

[DLew On Roids]

Trampoline needs to be getting more hate.

My personal top five:

1. Dressage
2. Rhythmic gymnastics
3. Trampoline
4. Synchronized swimming
5. Modern pentathlon

The pentathlon is objectively scored, but it was designed for 19th-Century European aristocrats. Fuck those inbred freaks.

Edited by DLew On Roids, 09 August 2012 - 09:43 AM.

[bowiac]

Any event you compete in wearing formalwear and a tophat probably fails to qualify as a sport for me.

I'd also throwing boxing in there, but that's just because of the unique awfulness of Olympic boxing.

[bowiac]

SBNation did a piece sort of similar to this already: 12 Olympic Events You Didn't Know Were Olympic Events

Modern pentathlon is the debauched fever dream of the Mid-Atlantic, foreign-educated idle rich. The sort of thing George Plimpton would have been competing in, had his heart not been captured by the low shenanigans of middle-class American sport. This is an event that Jay Gatsby thought of while in the throes of a mescaline bender.

[ChinaCat2]

I was pretty amazed at how bad women's judo was to watch. The men's was okay, but the women just seemed to grab at each other and go nowhere.

Ping pong. Fun to play. Horrible to watch.

[DLew On Roids]

Jesus, there's more crying in dressage than in women's figure skating.

[Hendu's Gait]

Jesus, there's more crying in dressage than in women's figure skating men's soccer.

fixed

[Seabass177]

Dressage. Especially when I heard it pronounced for the first time.

If it's DRESS-age than I can probably deal with it; it's something extremely rich people do to have a type of fun that I can't understand. There's a lot of shit like that. But dress-SAHJ? Fuck that noise.

[cjdmadcow]

Gold for GBR in the individual dressage, so we like it over here

[DLew On Roids]

fixed

Look, a soccer hater found time to make a hackneyed joke showing off his own ignorance.

Jim Rome must be in commercial, huh?

[MentalDisabldLst]

1. Dressage (Colbert has been doing a bunch on this, because Ann Romney actually owns a horse competing in dressage in the olympics)
2. Synchronized swimming
3. Rhythmic gymnastics (if you're waving a ribbon around, it's not a sport)

I'm cool with table tennis and trampoline. Any sport with competitors named Dong Dong and Ding Ding can't be all bad.

[mabrowndog]

Shit, I forgot all about racewalking. Pathetic and pointless.

And I view Modern Pentathlon as arbitrarily awesome as the Biathlon (cross-country skiing plus target shooting).

Steeplechase is another one. It's basically a simplistic obstacle course. Great, a fucking 3-foot hurdle. Ooooh, look out!! An ankle-deep water hazard!! If they wanted to make it truly interesting, they'd emulate ABC's The Superstars in the 70s, with tunnels, climbing walls, rope bridges and swings, monkey bars, trapeezes, etc. But add real hazards -- barbed razor wire, crocodile- and piranha-filled moats, tethered lions and tigers like in Gladiator, poison darts like the ones Indy faced when he ran the gauntlet in Raiders of the Lost Ark, etc. Assign 30 specific obstacles that all competitors would have to prepare for. One day prior to the event, hold a lottery (aired live in Prime Time, with David Stern presiding) to select 10 or 15 of them in order and construct the course accordingly. Then let the mayhem and carnage ensue.

[DLew On Roids]

Surprisingly not crappy: men's field hockey.

[Kremlin Watcher]

It is amusing to observe a bunch of overweight, out of shape armchair jockeys mock athletes that have spent a lifetime working to reach levels of athletic achievement that we mere mortals will only ever watch on TV.

Steeplechase as a simplistic obstacle course? Athletes crying for joy because they have reached a goal they have been chasing their entire lives? Doing something that none of us will ever be able to do? I think none of you can imagine how hard it is to do what you are watching.

You lot seem to have a lot of anger stored up for other people to shit on their achievements.

[collings94]

Dressage has to be number one. I didn't even know what it was until I read a blurb in the Globe about Ann Romney's horse being in it.

Honestly, I don't really like any sport that involves judging or judges. Not only is it often corrupt, but it seems like you have to really know the sport to even know what's going on. Take Gymnastics for instance, unless someone falls right on their face, I can't tell why Gaby Douglas did better then that Russian girl. Douglas will do a cartwheel into a backhandspring into two backflips and sticks the landing. Then the Russian girl will do what appears to be the exact same thing, yet Douglas is compared the winner.

[bowiac]

It is amusing to observe a bunch of overweight, out of shape armchair jockeys mock athletes that have spent a lifetime working to reach levels of athletic achievement that we mere mortals will only ever watch on TV.

Steeplechase as a simplistic obstacle course? Athletes crying for joy because they have reached a goal they have been chasing their entire lives? Doing something that none of us will ever be able to do? I think none of you can imagine how hard it is to do what you are watching.

You lot seem to have a lot of anger stored up for other people to shit on their achievements.

I don't think I've seen a single person doubt how hard something is. However, just cause something is hard doesn't mean it's worthy of being an olympic sport. Chess is hard, and yet I don't see a lot of clamoring for it to be made an olympic event.

How about beer pong? Or Competitive eating?

[Mr. Wednesday]

I like this sport in theory, but they should just make it a single lap. The first few laps they are basically just staring each other down...utter waste of time.

That's the sprint, not the pursuit. The pursuit is teams going all out for the entire distance. The sprint is two riders engaging in a waiting competition until ~1.5 lap left, then going all out the rest of the way. Personally, I like the craziness at the end. Keirin is even better, with multiple riders (six, I think) engaging in a battle royale at the end and the pacesetting done by a non-competitor.

[mabrowndog]

It is amusing to observe a bunch of overweight, out of shape armchair jockeys mock athletes that have spent a lifetime working to reach levels of athletic achievement that we mere mortals will only ever watch on TV.

Steeplechase as a simplistic obstacle course? Athletes crying for joy because they have reached a goal they have been chasing their entire lives? Doing something that none of us will ever be able to do? I think none of you can imagine how hard it is to do what you are watching.

You lot seem to have a lot of anger stored up for other people to shit on their achievements.

Oh, come on. It's the randomness and absurdity in the design and selection of these so-called "sports", often coupled with the massive subjectivity of the judged criteria, that's prompted this light-hearted thread. You're actually taking serious offense to having the temerity to ridicule rhythmic gymnastics? Something that essentially amounts to a women's floor exercise, but with a ribbon, ball or hula hoop added?

As I noted in yesterday's game thread, yes, these events are hard. We get it. But why is synchronized swimming an Olympic sport and not, say, some of the firefighter academy training regimens, like climbing 5 flights of stairs with 120 lbs of gear in 500-degree heat? Or Coast Guard rescue diving from helicopters hovering 10 stories in the air into frigid waters and 50-foot seas? Hell, why not endurance Alaskan king crab fishing? Or skyscraper window cleaning? Or jalapeno pepper eating? Or scaling 500-foot steel-lattice radio antennas to change the light bulbs in the blinking aviation beacons? Are those not difficult? Do they not require years of training to master? Do participants not incur dangerous physical risks?

And please, explain to me why steeplechase is not exactly what I termed it as. I'm perfectly willing to embrace a passionate defense of it. Until then, it's a simplistic obstacle course. A distance run coupled with 28 fairly short hurdles and 7 water hazards. There's really no other way to describe it.

Edited by mabrowndog, 09 August 2012 - 11:13 AM.

[johnmd20]

I think Rhythmic Gymnastics is actually pretty cool. That doesn't look easy, that's for sure. Looks sporting enough to me and not that different from figure skating.

I think most of the events are pretty good, I don't really have too many complaints about any of them. That said, I haven't seen the Dressage Horse Dancing thing. That sounds pretty weak. BUT it really is important to keep the horse in step. I am unsure how anyone can argue that fact!

[johnmd20]

And please, explain to me why steeplechase is not exactly what I termed it as. I'm perfectly willing to embrace a passionate defense of it. Until then, it's a simplistic obstacle course. A distance run coupled with 28 fairly short hurdles and 7 water hazards. There's really no other way to describe it.

I can't believe you hate the Steeplechase so much. Yeah, the racers aren't fighting off gators and piranhas, but it's pretty fun to watch and how is that race, basically an obstacle course, any less athletic than the 100m dash?

I can see the complaints about Rhythmic, Dressage, and even synchronized swimming, but to hate on the Steeplechase is to hate on human existence itself.

[Kremlin Watcher]

I'm not offended at all, just amused. All sports are made up. What I find compelling about watching sports is their difficulty. I guess you can pre-determine whether or not you think a sport is entertaining based on some arbitrary standards, but the fact is that competing at the Olympic level in any sport is incredibly difficult, takes years of dedication and training, and none of us will ever know what that is like. Training a horse to dance in time to music? Easily as difficult as running a marathon. That is what makes it interesting to me.

And I get the frustration of watching the arbitrary nature of judged sports, but that doesn't make them less compelling to watch. It's the degree of difficulty in competing at that level that I find so amazing.

Oh, and steeplechase? Running 3,000 meters at max effort while jumping over fences and running through water - you have no idea how hard that is at the speeds they run. The demands on your energy pathways and musculature on interrupting a max-effort run with jumps like that are extraordinary. Think about running on a treadmill at a very high effort level, then jumping off it and doing 2-3 squats with a heavy bar as fast as you can, then jumping back on the treadmill for a while, etc. Then add water - that obstacle is really, really hard. Steeplechase is super difficult and highly specialized.

Edited by Kremlin Watcher, 09 August 2012 - 11:23 AM.

[mabrowndog]

So you're basically saying "Just shut up and appreciate what the wonderful Olympic organizers have given us, even though a number of these sports are only slight variants of existing events, or are only recent creations with no historical roots, or that pander to a specific field of endeavor whose participants clamored for inclusion and recognition."

Sorry, I prefer to make fun of them with full-blown scorn and mockery. It's much more enjoyable.

Edited by mabrowndog, 09 August 2012 - 11:21 AM.

[jkempa]

This is pretty bad.

I also have a fundamental problem with handball. Lacrosse minus sticks. Soccer using hands not feet. Water polo minus the water. The most fundamentally basic sport ever. I honestly thought for years it was the sport I played as a kid....which was essentially racquetball without a racquet. But when I saw it? Understood why Americans do not bother with it.

Edited by jkempa, 09 August 2012 - 11:19 AM.

[bowiac]

I think most of the events are pretty good, I don't really have too many complaints about any of them. That said, I haven't seen the Dressage Horse Dancing thing. That sounds pretty weak. BUT it really is important to keep the horse in step. I am unsure how anyone can argue that fact!

1) It's performed in a top hat and formalwear. Seriously - this is pushing it.
2) They give the medal to the wrong athlete in that sport. Secretariat was a dumb inclusion on the ESPN list of the 50 greatest athletes, but the jockey would have been an even dumber inclusion.

The day they put the horse on the podium is the day I stop complaining.

[Kremlin Watcher]

So you're basically saying "Just shut up and appreciate what the wonderful Olympic organizers have given us, even though a number of these sports are only slight variants of existing events, or are only recent creations with no historical roots, or that pander to a specific field of endeavor whose participants clamored for inclusion and recognition."

Sorry, I prefer to make fun of them with full-blown scorn and mockery. It's much more enjoyable.

Lol. No, I'm saying that I enjoy watching elite athletes compete at the highest level pretty much regardless of the sport because I appreciate the degree of difficulty in their reaching that level of competitiveness. Some sports are more enjoyable to watch than others, but to me it's the competition that matters more than the aesthetic of a particular sport. Except race walking because they all violate the rules and never get sanctioned for it. That sport is kind of ridiculous, I'll give you that.

And Oscar Pistorius is one of the most awesome Olympians ever.

[Shelterdog]

One argument for steeplechase: it's the only race longer than 800 that always has an honest pace--the athletes don't want to get too bunched up around the obstacles so it's not like other events where athletes often dick around for 60% of the race in a big pack and hope they outkick everyone.

[Alcohol&Overcalls]

The equestrian events are pretty clearly the worst, and dressage clearly the worst of the lot - even if you're a "horse person" (Centaur ARod?), the jumping events aren't even a race, there's a maximum time, and only clearing matters within that limit. No tiebreaker for time, you just do it again until somebody fucks up.

Even worse, the announcing attempts to add gravity to the sporting moon - in the 10 min I watched, I heard both of these abominations:

-"You can see the concentration on both their faces: the rider's, and the horse's."
-"It's so important for the horse to have that drive, that will to win."

THE ONLY THING THE HORSE CARES ABOUT IS OATS. The horses aren't talking shit to each other in the stable - the horse isn't a "gamer." Obviously that's on NBC as much as the sport itself, but it's also an indictment of how crappy the sport is: the horse has to be clutch for a narrative to work.

[bowiac]

Maybe it's a bad sign for my relationship with my girlfriend, but she kicked me to the couch because I made fun of dressage too much. With that being said, I can't stop laughing at "THE ONLY THING THE HORSE CARES ABOUT IS OATS."

[Hendu's Gait]

2) They give the medal to the wrong athlete in that sport.

The day they put the horse on the podium is the day I stop complaining.

THE ONLY THING THE HORSE CARES ABOUT IS OATS. The horses aren't talking shit to each other in the stable - the horse isn't a "gamer." Obviously that's on NBC as much as the sport itself, but it's also an indictment of how crappy the sport is: the horse has to be clutch for a narrative to work.

Winner winner Basashi

Seriously, does the horse get better oats/hay/carrots/whathaveyou if it wins/does well, either in Equestrian or Horse Racing?

The horse is the athlete. Bowiac is 100% correct.

Edited by Hendu's Gait, 09 August 2012 - 12:01 PM.

[BroodsSexton]

THE ONLY THING THE HORSE CARES ABOUT IS OATS. The horses aren't talking shit to each other in the stable - the horse isn't a "gamer." Obviously that's on NBC as much as the sport itself, but it's also an indictment of how crappy the sport is: the horse has to be clutch for a narrative to work.

That's just pure speculation. You have no idea what goes on inside those horses' heads. You're a terrible poster.

Edited by BroodsSexton, 09 August 2012 - 12:32 PM.

[johnmd20]

That's just pure speculation. You have no idea what goes on inside those horse's heads. You're a terrible poster.

For one thing, I think horse's care about fucking as much as they care about oats. And I'm under the impression that horse's like carrots, too. On the care scale, carrots are probably in line with oats. Maybe even higher. And a horse might like to run and gallop in the Serengeti. Frankly, a horse cares about way more things than Oats. A&O really should be ashamed of himself.

[Dick Pole Upside]

1. Dressage (Colbert has been doing a bunch on this, because Ann Romney actually owns a horse competing in dressage in the olympics)
2. Synchronized swimming
3. Rhythmic gymnastics (if you're waving a ribbon around, it's not a sport)

I'm cool with table tennis and trampoline. Any sport with competitors named Dong Dong and Ding Ding can't be all bad.

This is where I stand.

Note that there have been many Olympic sports that have come and gone. Rugby and golf will be "back" in 2016.

A list of recent "demonstration sports" appearing with the sponsorship of the host countries (a practice discontinued recently):

• American football (1904 – St. Louis, USA, 1932)
• Australian rules football (1956 – Melbourne/Stockholm: equestrian events held in Stockholm due to foreign horse quarantine laws); similar to rugby
• Ballooning (1900 – Paris)
• Boules (1900 – Paris); like in bocce, players of this French game try to roll heavy balls close to a small 'jack'
• Bowling (1988 – Seoul)
• Budo (1964 – Tokyo); Japanese martial arts
• Field handball (1952 – Helsinki)
• Finnish baseball (1952 – Helsinki)
• Gliding (1936 – Berlin)
• Glima (1912 – Stockholm): Icelandic folk wrestling
• Kaatsen (1928 – Amsterdam); this Dutch game of handball may be one of the oldest ballgames
• Korfball (1920 – Antwerp, 1928 – Amsterdam); players score by throwing a ball into an elevated basket without a backboard in this mixed-gender game
• La canne (1924 – Paris); this French game is similar to fencing
• Longue paume (1900 – Paris); an outdoor precursor to modern tennis
• Motorsport (1900 – Paris)
• Roller hockey (1992 – Barcelona)
• Savate (1924 – Paris); a French version of kickboxing
• Surf lifesaving (1900 – Paris); this hybrid event, originating in Australia, requires skills as a surfer and lifeguard
• Swedish (Ling) gymnastics (1948 – London)
• Water skiing (1972 – Munich)
• Weight training with dumbbells (1904 – St. Louis, USA)

http://www.livescien...ts-history.html

As for handball, it's awesome.

We used to play in gym class in high school. Along with floor hockey, it was the sport the boys enjoyed the most because we could absolutely destroy each other without retribution as we competed on a hardwood basketball court. It was utter mayhem.

[mt8thsw9th]

Today for the first time I'm seeing another contender that may well vault to the top slot: Euqestrian Individual Dressage.

Worth a watch:

http://www.colbertna...-training-pt--1

http://www.colbertna...-training-pt--2

[DLew On Roids]

That's just pure speculation. You have no idea what goes on inside those horses' heads. You're a terrible poster.

I bet they're also interested in fucking.

Except for the geldings. They just go back to the paddock and sing in a foals' choir, then cry themselves to sleep.

[SumnerH]

Any event you compete in wearing formalwear and a tophat probably fails to qualify as a sport for me.

So much for my aristocratic biathlon of cigar-smoking and brandy snifting.

[Kremlin Watcher]

Yeah you guys know nothing about horses and equestrianism. The horses absolutely know what they are doing and love it. Spend any time around horses that compete and you can appreciate that the horses are fantastic athletes, and you can see them get excited when they know a competition is imminent. And the riders are pretty damn good athletes as well; the balance, coordination, core and leg strength and stamina required for the three-day event is pretty substantial, like elite-Olympic athlete-level. And both athletes, the horse and the rider, work tremendously hard in training. Think about it: for a three-day event, you have to train a horse and a rider for a long, max-effort cross-country run that includes dozens of obstacle jumps, then the next day do an intricate and hugely technically demanding dressage presentation, then the next day complete the show jumping with extremely high obstacles. Training for an executing that event places enormous training demands on both horse and rider. It's a very difficult sport. And in the equestrian world, the horses get their due - everyone involved in that sport understands the division of labor and they give the horses their fair share of the credit.

[MentalDisabldLst]

I, for one, can't wait to see sports where the monkeys do all the work, or the ostriches. You ever try to train an ostrich? Those are some real brave athletes who go into ostrich-wrangling. Everyone involved in that sport understands the division of labor and they give the ostriches their fair share of the credit. And flower seeds.

[mabrowndog]

Yeah you guys know nothing about horses and equestrianism. The horses absolutely know what they are doing and love it. Spend any time around horses that compete and you can appreciate that the horses are fantastic athletes, and you can see them get excited when they know a competition is imminent. And the riders are pretty damn good athletes as well; the balance, coordination, core and leg strength and stamina required for the three-day event is pretty substantial, like elite-Olympic athlete-level. And both athletes, the horse and the rider, work tremendously hard in training. Think about it: for a three-day event, you have to train a horse and a rider for a long, max-effort cross-country run that includes dozens of obstacle jumps, then the next day do an intricate and hugely technically demanding dressage presentation, then the next day complete the show jumping with extremely high obstacles. Training for an executing that event places enormous training demands on both horse and rider. It's a very difficult sport. And in the equestrian world, the horses get their due - everyone involved in that sport understands the division of labor and they give the horses their fair share of the credit.

Complete and utter horseshit on every conceivable front. No pun intended.

If the horses "absolutely know what they are doing and love it," why don't they prance and dance around and execute jumps over obstacles on their own? Why do they only do it whey they're fitted with a saddle and bridle, and mounted by a rider? Why are manipulations of the reins required to turn them right or left, or draws and slacks on both reins or digging of heels into their ribs needed to get them to speed up, slow down, or make jumps? Why, in yesterday's obstacle course event, did a British competitor's horse veer off to the side and miss a jump after a rein broke, rather than thinking to itself, "No worries, man. I got this," and making the jump as required. Something the horse has no doubt done hundreds upon hundreds of times over numerous years of training?

And to even attempt to compare the athleticism of Olympic equestrian riders to that of even non-elite track runners, swimmers, skiers, or players of tennis, soccer, basketball or water polo (just to name a smattering of sports) is the second most preposterous thing anyone's ever attempted to do on this board (the first being Eric Van's suggestion that his research directly won at least one game for the 2004 Sox and that he's partly responsible for the WS title that year.)

Your entire post is a load of manure.

[MentalDisabldLst]

I dunno, dog, I think there's some horse sense to his post. We're getting all these different sports televised for free to our TVs, no one's making us watch them, so let's not look a gift horse in the mouth. Now, rhythmic gymnastics, that's a horse of a different color.

[Kremlin Watcher]

Dog, did you grow up around horses? I grew up riding horses, played competitive polo in college and wrangled horses professionally when I was younger. Unless you have done the same, you are not qualified to talk about how a horse relates to these activities. They absolutely get excited for competition. You can see it in their behavior. Their eyes light up, they prance, they rear up - they absolutely know what is happening and they love it. I know because I have seen it hundreds of times. They don't do the jumping on their own because they are trained to do it with a rider. Why doesn't a triathlete ride his bike in the water? Because he doesn't train to do that. Why do they refuse a jump sometimes? Why do hurdlers hit the hurdles sometimes or why do tennis players hit it into the net sometimes? Shit happens and no athlete is perfect, but refusing an obstacle is the exception, not the rule. But again, unless you spend a lot of time around horses, you can't know this and you only get to judge the merits of the sport based on viewing it for a few minutes once every four years.

And to suggest that riders are not superb, elite-level Olympic athletes is also mistaken. They are, without a doubt, elite international athletes. But because they participate in a sport you don't like, you label them as otherwise. Put Usain Bolt on a horse and I guarantee you he wouldn't even finish one event. Put an equestrian rider on the track and he or she would clearly finish dead last in the qualifying heats. But because one athlete can't do what another athlete can, it doesn't make them non-elite. Fitness and athleticism isn't any one thing, and at that level they are so specialized that direct comparisons of athleticism aren't very useful. If you don't like the sport, fine. But denigrating its participants as non-athletes is the height of ignorance about athletics and fitness.

[slidingsideways]

Your dedication to declaring your ignorance is marginally impressive, 'Dog, but Kremlin Watcher's post was absolutely on target. The whole point of equestrian is the partnership between horse and rider. A horse who doesn't want to be ridden, doesn't want to jump, doesn't want to participate, will make that very clear. The ones who do enjoy training and competing, like human athletes, will rise to the top and possibly make the Olympics with their human partners. Riders know what jumps to take and in what order; horses don't. Riders use reins, heels, etc. as ways to communicate because we can't say, "Turn left and jump the red fence shaped like a bus." This is so elementary I can't believe you questioned it.

In the case of the rein breaking, it was actually a French rider named Simon Delestre, and his horse was indeed continuing to the next fence until Delestre turned him away. The rider knows exactly how many strides should be taken between each fence and where the horse should take off for the next jump. Because horses' eyes are on the sides of their heads, they can't see the fence by the time they jump it. They rely on the riders to indicate how high the jump is and when to leave the ground. Because of the unexpected confusion of the rein breaking, Delestre lost his precise striding and apparently decided it wasn't safe to continue, so he circled out, turned around, and approached the jump again. One broken rein makes the other ineffective, so he was controlling his horse entirely with his legs and his voice. You think the horse couldn't have quit if he wanted? (You can watch Delestre's ride here -- the rein breaks at roughly 1:52:45.)

As for the athleticism of riders, you're hilarious. Get back to me when you've actually ridden horses on something other than a nose-to-tail trail ride.

Edited by slidingsideways, 09 August 2012 - 04:06 PM.

[Fred not Lynn]

The pentathlon is objectively scored, but it was designed for 19th-Century European aristocrats. Fuck those inbred freaks.

The entire modern Olympic Games were designed for 19th Century European aristocrats. Where do you think the emphasis on amateurism came from - you can't have a gentleman competing with filthy working class folk after all, and certainly not against his instructors. We're lucky the Olympic Games have evolved as much as they have.

Oh, and everyone's list of what sports are unwatchable could be translated thusly "1-5; Sports that are foreign to me and that I don't understand".

Four years ago, if you asked this question outside of Asia and the Americas, baseball and softball would find their way onto a lot of people's lists. "What's the difference between baseball and softball, anyway? How come the girls play a different game?", "How come sometimes they just stop trying to get the chap to swing and miss and make bad throws on purpose?", Those who hate judged sports would cringe at the concept of an official calling balls and strikes -- if they could even get their heads around the concept of the called strike in the first place.

Edited by Fred not Lynn, 09 August 2012 - 06:02 PM.

[mpjc]

I think Rhythmic Gymnastics is actually pretty cool. That doesn't look easy, that's for sure. Looks sporting enough to me and not that different from figure skating.

i like it too. but it always reminds me of the scenes in 1950s technicolor historical epics, after the banquet, when the pasha/pharaoh/warlord claps his hands and the dancers come out.

also, i think artistic gymnastics is to rhythmic gymnastics as figure skating is to ice dancing.

[SumnerH]

Oh, and everyone's list of what sports are unwatchable could be translated thusly "1-5; Sports that are foreign to me and that I don't understand".

I don't buy this. Curling was pretty foreign to everyone when it was introduced in the 1990s and didn't get the kind of backlash that sports people have been exposed to for twice as long (rhythmic, synchro) or longer (dressage) still get. Luge/bobsled isn't any more a part of people's normal lives, either.