LindavG;4161645 said:
I'm not talking about the medal table. What's frustrating is watching athletes that you know can do much better underperform due to pressure or injuries or exhaustion or bad luck or whatever. There are always some surprises at the Olympics but I don't think we've ever "lost" so many medals like this before. I wrote that post last night after the hockey final in which we completely dominated GB the entire game yet concede the equalising goal in the last few minutes and then inexplicably lose the shoot out by missing four times in a row.
Trust me it is the same with everyone. You win some, you lose one. We had the same story at the women's waterpolo Bronze match. We were leading most of the match. Last second (no exaggeration, last second!) the Russians scored an equalizer then won the match on the penalty shoot-out.
We had some frustrating fights in wrestling and judo with very questionable referee interventions. One especially that I won't hesitate calling straight up deliberate cheating at a Bronze match. The wrestling competitions were marred with questionable referee decisions overall, anyway. So much so that I think the sports needs to be either totally reformed or thrown out of the Olympics altogether. It's a mockery of sports the way it is.
Same at a judo Bronze match where a referee gave a warning to our athlete 10 seconds before the end of the fight. That means he had no time left to react and his opponent won the match by that one warning. That was a very questionable decision because as a referee you just don't do that 10 seconds before end. It normally doesn't happen. Basically the referee gave himself the freedom to intervene and decide the result.
We weren't involved in those matches but I heard there were cheatings in boxing as well. Referee corruption must end.
Well you're not allowed to win any more golds because then you'll surpass us on the medal table :beee:
:beee:
I've noticed that Hungary always does exceptionally well in the Summer Olympics. Winning 7-8 golds on average in incredible for such a small country. Why do you think that is? Is it the culture? Investments? Niche sports? Those Magyar genes?
irate:
Yes, the consistent good results at the Summer Olympics put as pretty high on the All Time Medal table.
In turn our All Time medal count in winter olympics is a humble 0-2-4. All the medals won in figure skating. We have no big mountains and no big, consistent snow in winter.
The reason is, I think, tradition and and being very strong at certain sports. These 8 Golds come from three sports: swimming, fencing and canoeing. When you look at it those are our traditional strongholds as well.
Some actually say it is not all rosy, because although those 8 Golds look nice but there seems to be a problem with the next line - like in many sports there aren't really upcoming young talents. Also 3 of those 8 Golds came through one swimmer (Katinka Hosszú) and also in canoing the same athlete, Danuta Kozák, was involved in all 3 of our Gold medals (women's K1 500, women's K2 500, women's K4 500) - although, of course in K2 and K4 she had partners. So the worry is that it is a very much focused on a couple of big talents and not really a result of being good at many sports or having many great athletes. We won 8 Gold medals in London as well but our medal collection came from a more varied spectrum of sports: besides our golden trio, fencing, swimming and canoeing also gymnastics (pommel horse), athletics (hammer throwing) and we had other medals in judo, wrestling, penthatlon.
These sports are also very traditional in Hungary.
I wish we would be better in some team sports. Handball was pretty good, the women won a silver in Sydney, but they did not make it to the Olympics now. Traditionally our strongest team sport is water polo, but we didn't win a medal this time. I like basketball and volleyball, but we suck at both.
Here is an interview with Katinka Hosszú on CNN.
[video=youtube;eMKYaGXf4Gk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMKYaGXf4Gk[/video]
My all time favourite swimmer is Krisztina Egerszegi. It was so amazing how at the age of 14 she won in Seoul in 1988. She was so much smaller than everyone else. LOL. She participated in three Olympics (1988, 1992, 1996) and altogether won 5 Gold medals, 1 Silver, 1 Bronze.
Here is her swimming in Seoul at the age of 14. She was one of the best backtrokers of all time. Her world record was only recently beaten. It was so amazing how this tiny little girl beat those huge East Germans.
[video=youtube;ynEa22k2qiQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynEa22k2qiQ[/video]
[SIZE=+5]GO CANADA!!![/SIZE]
