Phase II End

Got an e-mail from VANOC yesterday stating that they'd be closing down Phase II Ticket Sales on Friday (July 31st). That means of course that they're going to be doing the Seat Assignment over the next month of so.

Surprisingly, I think my biggest worry is about having seats that are 'Too Good'. We splurged on a number of events, picking up 'A' level seating, especially Hockey games. My issue is that at hockey games I don't like being in probably the first 10 rows or so....you get no perspective on what is going on. Now, because those would be the really high-falutin' seats, hopefully thats where they're sticking they are putting the 'Olympic Family'.

Either way, I'm really hoping for a bit of luck on this one, hopefully we can get some pretty bitching seats.

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Olympic Curling Schedule

Yesterday VANOC published the Olympic Curling Schedule. Although not as bad as when the Hockey schedule was released, we still took a bit of a hit on it. As you might recall, we have tickets to three preliminary round games: Two Women's and One Men's. Unfortuneatly, Canada is on a bye during the Men's session that we have.

The draws that we currently have tickets to during the Preliminary Round are:


What I might want to do is sell off the CU021 session and pick up CU019 instead, where there is a CAN-USA matchup. I don't want to jump on that right away however, because I'm not 100% sure we'd actually be able to find a buyer for the CU021 session, and also I'm not sure how many tickets we'd need for the CU019 session. We'll worry about that at a later date.

Again, it kinda sucks that we won't get to see the Men's team in the Preliminary Round right now. There is a saving grace however....the fact that we have tickets to BOTH Gold Medal Games!!! So as long as Canada does what it *bleeping* should, we'll still get to see them.

The full Curling Draw is here:

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Order Up

Got our copy of the Olympic Poster yesterday, and I must say that its actually pretty cool 'in-person'. The online pictures don't really do the colours and size of it justice. We've got it framed and hanging on the wall of the condo right now!


Couple of other quick items:

- Linked the twitter sidebar application to my cell phone, so I can do mobile updates. Should be pretty useful when I'm away from a computer in Vancouver.

- I've been asked at work to come up with our promotional brochure for the Sochi 2014 Winter Games. Its neat to see all the work that IBI has done on not only the Vancouver Games, but on the Olympics in general.

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Order In

Ordered myself a copy of the Olympic Poster today. Should be here in about a week.

Probably going to frame it for now, but once the olympics are over, I think its gonna form the centrepeice of the big wall display I'm planning.

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Venue Preview: Richmond Olympic Oval

Name: Richmond Olympic Oval
Sports: Long-Track Speed-Skating
Sessions: SS012 (Team Pursuit Finals)
Days: Day 16
Location: 6111 River Road, Richmond, British Columbia
Capacity: 8,000
Opened: 2008
Costs: $178 million CAD

Of all the venues that we're going to see, the Richmond Olympic Oval is the one I'm looking forward to most on a pure 'I just want to see the Facility' level. During the Phase II ticketing sale, Pam and I were lucky enough to score the Team Pursuit Finals on Day 16. We have 'A Level' tickets for that event, but as you can see from the seating chart below, all that really means is that we won't be tucked way up into one of the corners.



The Oval itself is situated in Richmond on the Fraser River (WooHoo!), about a kilometre off the Canada Line from Lansdowne Station. Games-Time seating capacity will be about 8,000 people.

The primary architectural feature is of course the 'Wood Wave' roof, built from reclaimed BC wood. I'm sure that its an increadibly impressive sight when you keep in mind the shear size of the facility. I sometimes think of a Long-Track Speed-Skating facility as being fairly analogus to a hockey arena, when in fact...its like putting a roof over an outdoor 400m running track.

From where we're staying in Downtown Vancouver, I think its about a 20-30 minute ride along the new LRT Line, plus about 10 minutes in walking time. On the day that we're going to be there, we actually will have to leave pretty quickly after the event. The Team Pursuit Finals run 12:30 to 2:25 PM, with the Men's Gold Medal Curling Game following at 3:00. Hopefully those 35 minutes will be enough time to get over to the Vancouver Olympic Centre!!

Since we won't have much of a chance to linger at the facility, I'm hoping to get out there really early on Day 16 so that we have a good chance to tour the facility before event time. Judging from the pictures below, I'm gonna want as much time there as possible! Its too bad that we won't get a chance to see the facility at night, as it looks amazing lit-up.

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Venue Previews

Over the next little while, I'm going to be doing a series of previews for each of the Olympic venues. We're going to be lucky enough to see just about all of the venues during the games, with the only exceptions being the Whister Olympic Park (Nordic Sports).

I'm going to start off with what is being called the 'Crown Jewel' of the Games....the Richmond Olympic Oval.

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Thought Experiment

I’ve always felt that here in Canada we get a little screwed in the way that the Winter Olympics are set up. Our primier sports are generally considered to be Curling and Hockey….in which we’re limited to one entry. By contrast, sports the eurpoean countries are best at like bobsled and skiing, they are allowed 3-5 entries into each event. Take the Germans, they’re great skiers and rack up tonnes of medals on the slopes because a) there are four skiing disciplines (Downhill, Slalom, Giant slalom, Super-G) and b) because they can have multiplie entries in each of those events.

I’ve always been a little cheesed that the best we can do is 2 medals in hockey, whereas other countries could get say 24 medals if their top event is skiing.

So, as a fun exercise, I wanted to see what Canada’s ‘Second’ Hockey team would look like, and whether it would be able to challenge for a medal. But first, I’ll block out who I think would be on my ‘Canada 1’:

Forwards
Crosby-Getzlaf-Iginla
Gagne- Lecavalier-Nash
Richards-Toews-Carter
Perry-E. Staal-Doan
Thornton

Defence
Pronger-Neidermayer
Bouwmeester-Weber
Regehr-Phaneuf
Greeen

Goalies
Broduer
Luongo
Ward

You can pick and choose around the edges of that roster, but in general that would leave something like this:

Forwards
Heatley-Marleau-St.Louis
Lucic-J.Staal-Morrow
Roy-Savard-Sharp
Smyth-Spezza-Cleary
McDonald

Defence
Boyle-Keith
Beauchamin-Burns
Doughty-Seabrook
Hamhuis

Goal
Fleury
Mason
Osgood

Again, mix-and-match how you see fit. But right there is a team that I think could very well win a medal. They’re probably not up to the task of handling the Russians, but could they knock off the Swedes/States/Czechs in Bronze Medal Game…I’d say so. We’re especially solid on D and in Net with that squad.

Guess I just consider it a rip that we get so shortchanged when it comes to the puck. Its even worse in Curling, where I think literally the Top 5 teams on both the Men’s and Women’s teams in the world are Canadian. The ‘Roar of the Rings’ is probably going to be tougher to win than the Olympics themselves.

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2010 Team Canada Orientation Camp Invites

The list just dropped today for the Team Canada Orientation Camp that happens in August:

Goal
Martin Brodeur, Roberto Luongo, Marc-André Fleury, Steve Mason, Cam Ward

Defence
Jay Bouwmeester, Dan Boyle, Scott Niedermayer, Chris Pronger, Robyn Regehr, Dion Phaneuf, Marc Staal, Shea Weber, François Beauchemin, Brent Burns, Drew Doughty, Stéphane Robidas, Mike Green, Dan Hamhuis, Duncan Keith, Brent Seabrook

Forwards
Sidney Crosby, Shane Doan, Simon Gagné, Dany Heatley, Jarome Iginla, Rick Nash, Joe Sakic, Martin St-Louis, Eric Staal, Joe Thornton, Vincent Lecavalier, Jeff Carter, Ryan Getzlaf, Milan Lucic, Patrick Marleau, Andy McDonald, Brenden Morrow, Corey Perry, Michael Richards, Derek Roy, Patrick Sharp, Ryan Smyth, Jordan Staal, Jonathan Toews, Dan Cleary


Some notable players left off here are Chris Osgood, Jason Spezza and Stamkos. I like Osgood, but really he's not one of the Top 3 Canadian goalies and was probably a long-shot to make it at best. Stamkos I like as well, its just his age and the depth at centre that is a factor here. I probably would have liked to have seen him at the camp however, maybe over someone like Dan Cleary or Andy McDonald, just because he has the chance to light the league on fire coming out of training camp.

In terms of Spezza, I'd say I'm a little surprised that he didn't get an invite to the camp at least. Even though I'm surprised...lets not confuse that for dissapointment...as I wan't him nowhere near my 2010 team!

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Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day! I can't wait to see if this will be the year we have a new 'Canadian Moment'. If Canada were to win the Men's Gold in Vancouver, especially in dramatic fashion, would that moment be bigger than the '72 Henderson Goal?

Methinks so....

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