Swimming vs. gymnastics

Michael Phelps is going for his third gold tonight, which would tie him with a few others for most lifetime Olympic golds (9). And, the U.S. men's team is essentially hoping to do better than bronze in gymnastics, facing an almost-sure-to-win Chinese team and a tough Japanese team.

Until then, some women's beach volleyball--Misty May-Treanor/Carrie Walsh vs. the Cubans, it should be an easy win for the Americans; they've already won the first set.

It's amazing how much ground just two people can cover; NBC should show all the songs that are being played in between points, I think the players get to choose the music.

Second set is tighter, but it seems the Americans just keep getting easy points whereas the Cubans are having trouble stringing anything together. They talk about May sprinkling her mom's ashes on the volleyball sand after winning gold in Athens, planning to do the same here if she wins.

Hmm, NBC is not only missing points going to commercials, but also during the coverage as well. Too busy running replays--sloppy. And now some issues even with that. Wow--and they go to break with the Americans nearing game point--we come back, and they're just 2 away; no clue how they got there.

And the top team in the world wins its 103rd straight match; 21-15, 21-16; just 36 minutes.

Next up is Mary Carillo, one of my favorite sports journalists from her tennis work. Takes a look at some of China's biggest structures--Great Wall, Tibet railway, Three Gorges dam, Shanhai's mag-lev which hits 300 mph on its way to the airport, Chongqing's world's-largest-bathroom, Beijing's new Olympics structures. Carillo even gets to try out some Chinese on one of the world's tallest people. She has good chemistry with Bob Costas, they genuinely like each other and seem to have similarly earnest personalities--unlike her and John McEnroe, who have an at-times testy but generally invigorating relationship.

Al Trautwig says that the men's gymnastics competition is the biggest one in the Olympics for the Chinese; well, who knows, although I'd say winning more gold medals overall than the U.S. is more important an outcome.

China's up first, floor exercises. Hmm, guy screws up right on the last part of his routine. It's taking forever to post the score; and it's not bad, but his teammate has been waiting forever. Wow, his routine is excellent so far; fast and high with good landings--really great performance by their leader, Yang Wei. Third guy rocks it too; announcers not even mentioning the U.S. as a threat, painting it as China vs. Japan.

And now, the main event--Phelps swimming in the 200M freestyle, which he's owned. Another profile, I wonder how many they have for him--20? They list the other Olympians with nine golds--Carl Lewis, Mark Spitz, Paavo Nurmi and Larissa Latynina.

And they're off, he's already way out in front, got a great jump. Almost a length ahead after the first turn; he's on his own WR pace, now ahead of it--it's really crazy, actually, just blowing everyone away. Here he comes for the last 50M, he's going to win this easily and beat his own world record! American in third, as well.

Wow, that was almost anti-climatic, broke his record by almost a full second. No crazy celebration, very matter of fact--just a big smile.

Back quickly, more swimming; 100M backstroke, Natalie Coughlin, who's trying to become the first woman to defend gold in this event; and another American, Margaret Hoelzer. Wow, they really get right to it; Coughlin out front coming down the last 50M, Rowdy is saying she needs to swim straight. Rowdy says she's fading, but I think she'll win--and yes, wins, new WR too! Hoelzer takes the bronze, another 1-3 U.S. finish. Wow!

Man, next up--Men's 100M backstroke. This is just boom, boom, boom, one right after another. Aaron Peirsol trying to defend his gold here in his third Olympics. Thanks god for the swimmers, they're keeping our overal medals hope alive. Matt Grevers in the final as well. I think the huge relay win last night is carrying over, maybe giving the Americans an extra little boost tonight.

He's been having bad starts, says Rowdy, and again it's happened, he's kindof a ways behind. But Peirsol doing better now, in second coming down the last 50. And now he's pulling out, really turning it on. Reaching his own WR time, and--yeah baby, a new WR, with Grevers taking silver!

Oh man, that is awesome. Rowdy's laughing, says he always delivers when it counts in the finals. Peirsol says after he couldn't see anyone else, just did his own thing, thought Grevers had won, tried to swim through his little doubts. Grevers, who's huge and whose parents are Dutch, says he was pumped by the relay, if you want it bad enough it can happen.

Now Phelps' medal ceremony, Rusty saying he wants this to move quick since he needs to 'swim down' his lactic acid, less than an hour total between his last race and the semis for the 200 butterfly, his signature event. Silver went to a Korean, who won a gold in the 400M free.

It's amazing that with his next gold he'll have more than any other Olympian, ever. Anthem, now photos--let's go quickly!

Wow, turns out Ian Thorpe's in the stands, he's pooh-pahhed Phelps' quest. Women's 100M breastroke finals, an Aussie owns this even aparently--except in the last two Olympics.

Megan Jendrick who won gold 8 years ago, missed the team in Athens, barely made it this year. Leisel Jones the Aussie, 6 of the 8 fastest times in history. Young Rebecca Soni the other American, this not considered her strength.

This will be a good test of how much of a roll the American swim team is on. Aussies are out front earlier, Jones by quite a bit already. Jones is gonna win, way out in front; fight is for second, here comes an American--and yeah, Soni wins silver!

Nice outcome; 7 medals for the U.S. swim team tonight, 3 gold, 2 silvers, and 2 bronzes.

Back to gymnastics, apparently China's had some problems--hmm, stuck in 5th, U.S. in 2nd, with France leading and Japan in 6th. They replay a U.S. vault, the guy nailed it. But announcers also say the teams on top have already vaulted, which is by far the highest-scoring event.

So maybe the U.S. will sneak into silver. Rings, China up; Yang Wei comes through again, announcers says he's the world's dominant gymnast, just not affected by pressure. Again with the judging delays, announcers really ripping the judging--they're apparently looking at stuff in slow motion, which seems contrary to the idea of judging. You either catch it, or you don't--wow, 16.3 for him! 17 being perfect, of course.

Chen Yebing, one of the analysts says the first time he saw him he thought it was impossible. My, he's lieterally stopping on a dime--it's astonishing to watch; man, and he nails his dismount! There's a huge roar from the crowd, this guy's going to even beat his teammate. 16.575, wow; their first score was 16, so they just blew everyone else away.

Swimming again, Phelps in his 200M butterfly semi. Hasn't lost in this race for a long time, 2 seconds ahead of everyone else this year. 50 minutes since he won the gold in the free. 8th of 17 swims. He jumps into the lead off the blocks, hmm, not actually first at the turn. Halfway through now, like in second--he's not trying to blow everyone away, which is good, cause he's not.

Last 50M, in the lead suddenly after the turn; just blowing everyone away, wins easily and happens to tie the Olympic record.

Weird, they keep missing the U.S. men in gymnastics, have shown more Chinese actually. An American on parallel bars, announcer says they've been doing great and others have screwed up, no mistakes. Nails the routine, announcers starting to say who knows, maybe the U.S. can make this a real competition even without the Hamm brothers.

Raj Bhavsar now, one of the many gymnasts out of Houston. Announcers praising his big game ability, say his personality is picking everyone else up. Hmm, a bobble on the parallel, and a little hop on the dismount, but a good score overall. It's cool the way they're talking about Raj, like they would about any other team leader. Hop on the dismount, but another good routine for the U.S.

Only team error-free says the announcers; that's awesome. And halfway through the 6 events, U.S. is in good shape.

It's really hard to top the tension that builds during a gymnastics competition--it's like baseball, just keeps mounting, until at the end of a close competition it's almost unbearable. First small error on the high bar, says the announcer, which is an event where the U.S. is doing the hardest routines.

Japanese look tired, says the announcers. Wow, and a big mistake, their leader falls off the padding on the vault. Reigning gold medalists are not going to defend here. Announcers just ripping the guy, he was laughing afterwards, beforehand they were apparently video taping each other.

U.S. back on high bars, it's a big, scary routine--announcers say don't go too fast. He's nailing it so far, and absolutely nails the dismount! Awesome. Fairy tale good, says the announcer, everyone on the team is pumped, the guy is like oh my goodness afterwards--huuuuuge grin on his face on the slo-mo replay as he stands up on the landing.

Oh man, last guy is nailing it too; crowd is oohing, and he's doing all these crazy one-handed things. Totally nails the landing too! The crowd is super-into it, the team is just celebrating like crazy.

"No regrets" is what the gymnasts chant while waiting for the scores, and China's about to get up on the vault.

China picks up a 16.6 in the vault, after their first guy stepped out of bounds (and still got a high score on the strength of his height/rest of the routine). Last guy gets a 16.775, and it's all enough to put them in the lead over the U.S.

Amazing, nobody on the U.S. team has been in the Olympics before! Two events left, they really have no pressure, have done way better than what everyone else thought they could do after their top two gymnasts, the Hamm brothers, got injured.

Back to swimming for a sec, some good questions from Andrea Kramer for Phelps about what don't people understand about how hard what he's trying to do is--the whole time management and lack of rest between races is the main thing.

Like a 1.75 lead for the Chinese; the U.S. is about 3 in front of the Japanese--they're doing their two best events next though. China's weakest event is their last one, on the high bar; next up for them though is parallel bars, where they're very good. U.S. doing floor exercise, then finish on their worst event, pommel horse.

Interesting, they show how the Chinese team is calibrating the bars, they have someone do a test routine, they use pieces of wood to make sure the bars are far enough apart. Ha, reminds me of in Sydney, when curvy Russian Svetlana Khorkina said the horse was a few centimeters too low, the officials didn't believe her, turned out after she was right, they had to let everyone who wanted to redo their routine.

Meanwhile, here China's first guy just rocked the parallel bars--16.475. Yang Wei next, the one who made the childish mistake in prelims on this. He has a few bobbles, but nothing major; 16.1. Last guy, whose routine looks so easy but is super hard; he totally floats as the announcers say, pretty good landing too, huge roar from the crowd. Hmmm, he's totally bleeding on the elbow--16.45.

U.S. in floor exercises now, the floor is less forgiving than the ones the U.S. is used to. Which begs the question, why are they practicing on a floor that's not like the one they'll be competing on?! He's fine so far, doubling his landings; doing really well now, doesn't stick his final landing but not bad.

Just looked it up, it's Elfi Schlegel and Tim Daggett again doing the announcing with Al. I liked them 4 years ago too. Elfi's the weakest member of the team, sometimes talks just to talk. Tim is really straightforward, and adds an appropriate amount of excitement. Second guy screws up on his first pass, looks like his feet touch out of bounds. This could cost them the silver, they're saying his a bit rattled--Elfi calls them silly errors, Tim says the first bad routine for the team--a bad score, 14.625, very uncharacteristic screwup they say.

Japan's over on the parallel bars, they're smoking here--oops, not a great landing though. Back to U.S., Jonathan Horton's last time up. Wow, he looks so determined. He's nailing it, really picking up the slack here. Oh man, a great event--awesome, big smile, Tim calls it MVP times ten.

Wow, three gymnasts on pommel horse for the U.S. are all non-white; hope these guys can pull it out! U.S. has 1.7 point lead over Japan--hmm, thought it'd be smaller. That's good, some cushion at least. Wow, China's lead is now more than 5 points.

Trautwig points out the ever-changing face of America leading the way here. Indian American guy, Chinese American guy, Russian American guy--or, three typical American guys. Kevin Tan up first--oh no, and he totally screws up, Tim calls it disasterous, stops his routine halfway through and messes up his dismount--wow, gets like a 12.

Now to the Japanese, it's essentially mano-a-mano. Guy does well, but a big step on the landing. The lead is pretty much gone. Raj Bhavsar now, Tim likes him a lot. But he makes a mistake right before his dismount, the nerves definitely beginning to take its toll. Japan moves up to second; their second guy just nails his high bar routine, the U.S. is gonna get bronze.

Oh well, I'm sure they'd have taken it at the beginning of the competition. Too bad they were so close. Alexander Artemev last; like Kevin, he only got in cause of injury to the Hamms. Tim says he thinks Raj's number is gonna be low, we're still waiting for it--oh man, it's a 13.75. Sheesh.

Alex starts off looking pretty good--wow, his routine was unbelievable! So darn exciting, out of nowhere. His teammates are totally happy. The alternate, in the stands, is crying with emotion, it's great. Team USA hugs; they're all waiting for the results. 15.35, a good score; looks like the Germans still have a shot at this still.

Germans apparently pretty good at this; first guy got through it. They need to average a 15.3 to take bronze--I don't think they're going to do it, Tim doesn't either.

China's just putting the icing on the cake, on the high bars. First guy nails it, crowd goes crazy. Second German guy, first guy got a low score; U.S. will take bronze for sure, Tim says the U.S. can start celebrating.

Second Chinese guy just going for it, not holding back at all--they wanna totally win this thing. Huge applause when he's done. Second German score not great, Tim says it's over, the U.S. has taken the bronze.

And now, the last Chinese gymnast goes up on high bar. The youngest member of the team, the 'little kid'. Oh wow, and he nails it--Al says there's a new China syndrome, it's called China gold. The crowd is just going nuts, the gymnasts are beginning to celebrate and cry; what a great moment for China.

And now the U.S. is going crazy, they've won the bronze.