oddsnark | Olympico Finito

Olympics

Olympico Finito

By oddJoe ⋅ February 26, 2006 ⋅ Post a comment

Giorgio di Centa Confident that no one is waiting for tonight’s final NBC broadcast to find out who won the men’s 50 km freestyle cross-country skiing event (well, no one with a zip code outside Minnesota but still in the continental US), we present the final results and medal count for the 20th Winter Olympics. In men’s ice hockey it was Sweden taking the gold over their Nordic rivals Finland, who earned silver. The Czech Republic won bronze in yesterday’s match against Russia. And fittingly it was Italy winning the gold in that oh so important cross-country skiing event, as Giorgio di Centa barely edged out Eugeni Dementiev of Russia and Austria’s Mikhail Botwinov. Bella!

In the end it was Germany winning the most medals with 29, including 11 gold, 12 bronze, and six silver. The USA pulled in second with 25 medals, followed closely by Canada with 24. Austria won 23 and Russia completes the top five with 22. At the other end of the spectrum, Belarus, Bulgaria, Great Britain, Japan, Latvia, and Slovakia each won a single medal in these games; Shizuka Arakawa of Japan won gold in women’s figure skating, while Latvia’s M?rti?� Rubenis won bronze in men’s luge. In all, athletes from 26 different countries won medals in Torino, a record for the Winter Games, which is good for sport and the Olympic movement. The increasingly level playing field should also be a wakeup call to US organizers that they should bring to the games more athletes willing to put forth their best effort rather than headline-grabbing divas looking for a world stage to party on. (Looking at you, Bode.)

So to all the cross-country skiers from Kenya, the curlers from Bemidji, and the luge sliders from Argentina, thanks for competing and making it a great Olympics for everyone. We’ll see you all in Vancouver in 2010.