I am waiting to watch the men's semifinal, but before that happens bravo is showing this equestrian sport called the dressage...my word, this is the most ridiculous thing I have ever see...this even beat curling as the most unimpressive sport I have ever seen. Come on this must be the most stuck up event ever, were not only the rider looks snobby, but also the horse. I mean I don't mind horses jumping or racing, but prancing around like some fairys...this takes the cake...I going to change the channel now as I think I am dreaming. I can't believe these judges are going to see the same routine like 20 times or so, because all the competitors do the same thing...unbelievable...if this is in the olympics, then DARTS, MOTORCYCLE RACING should also be included...i am in shock right now!!!
Most sports have a ridiculously high number of disciplins (individual, team, different weights etc...) The number of swimming disciplins is completely ridiculous for example. And one single guy competing in 8 disciplins... Some olympic medals just lose their value! I think we could easily divide the total number of medals by two!
TOTALLY AGREE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! nothing to say...so ridiculous even in france they prefer see a horse walking than a good badminton match ...
I agree. I think swimming should introduce a clause that "states" that one single athlete can only enter a certain number of events.
I'm no fan of the horsey stuff, but I think it should stay in. If I had to choose what should be in or out of the Olympics, I would have to get rid of badminton amongst others. It depends whether you want a modern or traditional type of Olympics. I think I would prefer traditional Traditional would include tests of individual physical prowess, warfare/fighting, hunting. So you keep Archery Athletics (running,jumping,throwing, [I would get rid of the walking events]) Boxing Equestrian Fencing Judo Shooting Swiming (but not synchronised) Taekwondo Triathlon and Modern Pentathlon Weightlifting Wrestling maybe something from Gymnastics maybe something from Rowing/Canoeing/Sailing maybe Cycling get rid of Badminton Baseball Basketball Beach volleyball Diving Football Handball Hockey Softball Table tennis Tennis Volleyball Water Polo
The Olympics is about global unity and transcends sports in general. Therefore, it will be watched by billions. Sports that are generally less popular to the general public should be first to be axed if anything. But really, why not just add new sports on the Olympics "waiting list" to the Olympics instead of axing old ones. Make the Olympics even bigger.....
Hey..to be able to compete in 8 disciplines and winning 5 gold medals so far is phenomenal!! michael phelps is really a wonder boy although we r all fans of badminton..we should not degrade other ppl's achievements in other sports..although i agree dat equestrian is kinda stupid n boring..
neil, i kinda disagree. Time dont stand still, incorporating today's sport into the olympic is fine by me, as long as that sport event demand mental and physical skills, strength, and all of other human ability. Testing one skill isn't enough to set a sport as being olympic category. Tradition doesn't or shouldnt be use as a criteria. events i view that shouldnt be in the olympic is Equestrian(steering skill) skeet shooting(one skill, reaction time) air rifle/pistal( one skill, steadiness) diving(coordination only) beach volleyball ( we have indoor volleyball already) softball/baseball ( since players scratch their bums 90% of their time) fencing (reaction time) curling (body coordination) bobsled/loo ( just steering/body coordination) maybe hockey (since a player involve 1/3 - 1/2 of game and sit out the rest) NUmber of event in swimming and rowing/canoeing/kayaking/ be reduced. where in badminton, one require : full body coordination, stamina, power, mental game plan strategizing, jumping, bending, etc.
But why is okay for the Americans (Michale Phelps, Amanda Beard, and company) to dominate swimming but everybody says it's not good or becomes angered when the Chinese dominate women's badminton?? That's why only 3 teams are allowed from each country in Olympics badminton or else according to the rankings China could have sent all 5 men's singles players. That's why weightlifting only allows one nation to send in athletes in a max of 4 lifting events. There's so many more such rules. Swimming needs to change too.
Most sport saturate our TV coverage already and should not be included along with beach volleyball, it's just there for a bit of glamour. Why is football and tennis included if the football season has started and the best players will be playing for their clubs which pay their wages! Why don't we include golf
also for tracks. countries who do well in swimming and tracks can easily dominate the medal count as there are so many of them! i think we should introduce more events in badminton. firstly, we need to add the men/women team events (gymnastics has it...), and then we should have variation of the other events. then we should have 3x7 scoring version of each of the event to test the ultra offensive. and then an extra long 5x21 for endurance, and then of coursea the regular 3x15 for the all-around players.
LOL...that hella funny...lets also add only clear/smash version and half court singles, and ultra crazy half court doubles...lets give everyone a chance to get medal so china korean indonesia denmark, etc can have like 5 golds each I would really like to see competitive darts than archery...so much more exciting...archery is like machine hit the same target all the time...in darts the scoring emphasizes that you have to be able to hit anywhere in the board...I say it requires 3 times more skill than shooting or archery...archery cuz you hit the same kind of target and area repetitively, and shooting because the gun has to much precision, only error is committed by user, as for darts you have to hit different areas to win, you use ur hand and arm to throw, less precision than a gun.but at the world class level not that much less. Plus the way it is setup it is so intense and to win you have to hit an ultra precise area of the board...no amatuer would stand a chance against a seasoned pro, almost no lucky crap you see in archery or air shooting.
i took a glance at the atlethic program,excluding walking,decathlon, just on running: Men & Women 100m 110m hurdle 200m 400m 800m 1500m 10,000m 4x100m 4x400m 9 events just on running for each gender badminton has 2.5
well, yeah, good point, we need to have a one-person all around as well. who can play the best in singles, doubles, mixed will win. Ra and Gao Ling will be head to head on this one!
Ya, there were talks on another forum about increasing medal events for some sports... namely table tennis. Imagine this: have beach(or another environment) variations, have different score variations, have multiball (ie. use 2 table tennis ball or two shuttles at the same time) variations, have 3 vs 3 (or other combos)...... The list is endless... then we will see how everybody likes it when China takes 34 of 50 medals!!!!!
if they put events using nylon shuttles, canada can do quite well LOL so far canada has only 2 medals, silver in trampoline and bronze in diving. both aren't olympic grade sports in my eyes. there was a talk of bringing horseshoe throwing into the game I think all games which required subjective judging should be removed or exclude the artistic element out grading process.
OK so here should be the new badminton events : MS under 1,70m MS under 1,75m MS under 1,80m MS under 1,85m etc... (same for WS and so on) + team events (men,women,mixed) + beach events (hey they've got beach volley, why not beach badminton) any other ideas so that everyone gets medals? (I just have a feeling IOC will not agree however...)
We could change the height incraments to every other cm so at least if there are a group of the same height they'd all get something
