Obama-lama

I caught about half of Obama's acceptance speech last night, which was held in a football stadium in Denver. Like many things in politics, where the stakes are so high, things are planned and planned and planned.

Spontaneity isn't permitted because a politician could find themselves in a George Allen moment spewing out obscure invectives on a Indian-American ("macaca") and having it taped and YouTubed. Being a politician where the media follows you 24-7 is like being in Big Brother. At some point, you let your guard down, you forget the camera is on you, and you say things you'd normally say, but which would be far too offensive for the delicate ears of Americans.

We're always looking for the one negative thing to hang out hats on, to give us some reason to dislike someone.

On the flip side, with preparation, one needs to hit a laundry list of points. Obama had to show he was tough ("kill bin Laden"), that he'd go after terrorists, that he was worried about the economic future. These were the substance points. He then wanted a classy way to go after McCain, who accused Obama of being less than patriotic, which compelled Obama to wear a, sigh, flag pin (why not a Uncle Sam tophat).

The outdoor venue was made to feel like indoors, with a near presidential setup, as if he were addressing the nation from, if not the White House, then at least some place of stature. The only evidence that this was outdoors, other than the frequent pannings to the throngs of people scattered throughout, looking at Obama, the gladiator, was the wind, that cooperatively blew the flag from time to time.

The Daily Show filmed hours before the speech made fun of this in a prescient way by saying "Obama brought out the sun", which itself was a joke about when the segment was taped, but also the kind of magic Obama was expected to elicit.

A few days ago, I heard a woman exclaim on radio, that she had not been a support of Obama until she heard Michelle Obama, and that her speech felt genuine to her. Let's face it, speechmakers have had a long time to practice their talking. This isn't to say it isn't genuine, only that public figures going to sound a lot better than the average Joe, Jose, or Josephina.

It's why you watch a movie with good actors. They're so good, you forget they are acting, but you realize they are acting, because if you put a camera in front of regular people living their lives, you'd be bored senseless, and wonder why these folks "couldn't act". Actors give an amped up version of reality, pushing the emotion buttons to 11 or more.

Politicians do the same. Obama, in this respect, is old school. Once upon a time, our best orators inspired us with elevated rhetoric. We knew they knew more words than we did. After a while, we ceded (did we ever have it?) the mantle to the Brits who have always been much more polished at extemporaneous speaking than us poor schlubs.

Speakers like McCain and Dole and even Shrub prefer a more folksy style fraught with verbal gaffes that make them seem like one of us, despite the immense wealth each of these guys (Dole possibly excepting) have.

We get the politics we deserve because most of us, frankly, don't understand the complexity of politics, nor care. This is the kind of populace China wants--docile, unaware, only there to serve the greater glory of the main government. Were the public more knowledgeable, the debates might be more substantive. But realize that even the more intelligent amongst us prefer watching movies that move us, rather than those that merely tickle the intellect, but leave us feeling empty.

Americans look at politicians and try to imagine them as people. They don't look at them like they might a doctor. A doctor with bad bedside manners might be perfectly acceptable if he can save your life. A president with bad manners, well, he'd never be president in the first place, at least, not now, because the public watches his every move.

People harken back to days of Lincoln and Douglas when both ran for the Senate (Douglas won, by the way) and criss-crossed the Illinois landscape, giving half hour speeches on many a different topic, speeches thought out in length. Was the average American more knowledgeable then? Or perhaps the politicians didn't care, their level of discourse was high enough to satisfy themselves, public be d*mned.

Ultimately, though, the proof is in the pudding. The actions of a leader matter, rather than the speech making. Yet, this is why Clinton was so popular. Great speech writers combined with humor, a bit of anger, enough to show this guy wasn't going to put up with Republican shenanigans even as he was involved in his own.

To that end, Obama gave a speech that tried to be noble, above board, respectful, and hopefully, the sound of that, the weight of that, will offset the typical Republican playbook who would find reasons to slander Jesus if He were anti-American.

Perhaps the Republicans will sound trite and petty, and people will heed the words of Dennis Kucinich, relegated to a mid-afternoon speech, when he urged attendees to "Wake Up, America".

Obama's speech that looked forward drew inspiration by looking back, by taking the sentiment of Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and showing us the words and people that influenced Obama.

Understated, elegant, authoritative.

More Matthew Mitcham

I've read some comments about Matthew Mitcham's gold medal. There's been complaints that NBC did not choose to mention Mitcham's orientation in the broadcast. They did say that he had quit diving for a while due to depression.

Many people say what does his sexual orientation have to do with his diving as justification for not mentioning it. However, it seems obvious many things are mentioned that have very little to do with athletic prowess. The most obvious, and it's obvious it's simply organized this way, is the nationality of the athlete. Does Bolt being Jamaican have anything to do with his running? What about Phelps being American? Or that he's from Baltimore? Or that his mother is divorced? Or that he had ADD as a kid?

To be fair, Mitcham may not have been the favorite, but there's one undeniable fact. With over 11,000 athletes, he was the only out male, and one of ten gay athletes (the rest were women). Statistics would say that there are far more gay athletes competing in the Olympics, and yet no one is willing to admit it out of fear, either fear because their home country is too repressive, or at the very least, fear that they will lose endorsement money.

This is still a real fact of life. Martina Navratilova, perhaps the most famous of gay athletes, had a tough time getting endorsements after she admitted she was gay. Greg Louganis, who only came out after he retired, had similar issues, especially considering how decorated he was as a diver.

It might be fair to point out that Mitcham is Australian, and had he been American, there would have been more press about it. I suspect that is true indeed. Then, he would have announced he was out in the US. I think it was occasionally mentioned that Rudy Galindo was an out gay male figure skater.

It's funny because I suspect people think that one of David Boudia or Thomas Finchum or both American divers were gay, but again, they've never mentioned it.

The point is that people try to trivialize these matters saying it has nothing to do with athletics, but if that's the case, then why bother talking about girlfriends and spouses during the Olympics? What do they have to do with anything? They have to do with the emotional support of the athlete.

Mitcham credits many people with helping him get through a difficult time in his life, including his partner, Lachlan Fletcher. They needed sponsors to help fly both his mother (his mum) and his partner out to the Olympics, and they needed to get him there as an assistant of sorts. At the very least, it was mentioned in Australian press, so rare it is for a diver to get gold in Australia.

Indeed, Mitcham's past is fascinating outside his orientation. In particular, he used to be compete in trampoline before he was apparently discovered by an Australian diving coach of Chinese origin. (Coincidentally, trampoline is now an Olympic event). Matthew competed in both as a teen before focusing on diving.

There was a focus on Usain Bolt from Jamaica. However, the 100m and 200m is something Americans have traditionally done well and so there's interest in watching a Jamaican do well. The kind of exuberance that Bolt showed is not so different from what an American might do either, and with plenty of Jamaicans living in the US, it's perhaps not surprising that Americans might adopt Bolt as one of their own.

Contrast this with the Kenyan and the Ethiopian and Moroccan trying to win the marathon. The marathon is not typically filled with name American athletes, who often fare poorly at the longer distances. Americans, even African Americans, don't relate well to Africans from Africa, probably imagining them to be some weird running freak that speaks in clicks. Usain, on the other hand, seems like a nice T.O., a bit of a showboat.

This goes to show that a guy like Mitcham can be appreciated, given how much time NBC spent on Boudia and Finchum who both had relatively poor Olympics for the Americans. However, to celebrate Mitcham too much would be to delve into topics that NBC didn't feel comfortable dealing with.

And so it's sad that they had to ignore something and that there are people who back this decision up.

Mitcham's orientation was worth mentioning because so few other athletes would step up and do the same, and to at least acknowledge this would go a little way to saying that this social problem should be a thing of the past.

Bill Walton

Bill Walton seems like a blowhard making obvious points during basketball games.

However, it seems, his life as an undergraduate basketball player as part of the John Wooden dynasty at UCLA seems fascinating.

Walton grew up in a family that was taught to fight in what they believed in. He joined protests, spoke his mind, and argued with his own coach. Wooden was an old-fashioned coach who believed the team needed discipline from the littlest thing such as putting on socks, tying shoes, and making sure their hair was cut close to the head and there was no facial hair. He believe discipline in day to day life translated to discipline on court.

It seems quaint, but people still make their players do the same thing today (Manny Rodriguez, formerly of the Red Sox, joined the Dodgers and was told by the coach to cut his hair--he did so, but only a touch, and certainly not in the spirit of what was expected).

In any case, it's interesting how activism seems to have disappeared, mostly through taunting and a growing conservatism in politics, and perhaps the thought that mere protest was not enough, that anger wasn't efficient.

But during the day, even an athlete as prominent as Bill Walton who, these days, would be in line for huge contracts and would be told to stop raising ruffles, then joined protests because it was important to him just as it was important to many other people on campus.

What ever happened to that idealism?

Water Cube

One of the highlights of the Chinese Olympics was architectural. The "water cube" is basically built with an exo-skeleton that looks like honeycombs or molecular shapes. A bit question was what to put inside the exo-skeleton. Quickly ruled out was glass, which was simply too heavy.

The answer was ETFE, a plastic using technology based on teflon. This plastic is very thin, as thin as plastic that you might put photos in. Yet, it is also strong. There were two big fears: fire and earthquake. Turns out ETFE doesn't burn, it melts. You can put a blowtorch to it, and it begins to drip. Remove the blowtorch, and it stops melting. Thus, you wouldn't see the structure catch fire.

The other fear was earthquake, and they had to show that the structure could withstand that.

The Chinese looked to an Australian firm to help design the structure, while they built it.

The Chinese not only wanted to showcase their athletes but the architectural marvels. To be fair, they did it at a hefty price, but price seemed no object.

Still an interesting idea.

Matthew Mitcham wins gold

OK, so someone is going to win gold, right? Why pick Matthew Mitcham. He's not American. He's Australian.

The world of athletics, despite the closeness of competitors, is still rather homophobic. Out of the 11,028 competitors only 10 are out, and of those, only 1 is male. That male, as you might have guessed, is Matthew Mitcham.

There has been, for example, no out active male basketball, football, or baseball player. There are no out male tennis players that I know of. There have been several women: Martina Navratilova, Billie Jean King, Conchita Martinez, Gigi Fernandez, and Amelie Mauresmo. Still, there are likely many others that haven't come out.

Most people are scared of what happens to their advertising opportunities if they come out.

Although this is likely not to make huge news, the way Michael Phelps made news, the way Usain Bolt made news, the way the "Redeem Team" made news, such a trait, so incidental to the competition, but so fundamental to who Mitcham is should serve notice that it's OK to be out.

The Olympics claims to be the ideal of competition, but it should also allow competitors the freedom to be who they are too.

Phelps on SI

Sports Illustrated decided to reproduce a famous photo of Mark Spitz when he won 7 gold medals back in 1972. Spitz had a prototypical American hunk look. That is, he looked like Tom Selleck or Burt Reynolds back when a moustache meant virility rather than its modern perception as something out of an old porn movie, which now goes by the moniker, pornstache.

The picture has Phelps wearing all 8 medals giving a toothy grin, and people then realize, athletes, as much as their bodies reflect their extreme athletic prowess, may or may not be attractive in traditional poses. Phelps has been accused of being dorky in that photo, he does look pretty dorky.

At times, Phelps can look rather striking, mostly when he is looking intense in the pool, rather than when he's all smiles.

But the point is this, and it's interesting to point out.

Why do we care?

To be fair, the old adage, sex sells, works. It doesn't hurt that fit athletes are often attractive. Sure, things can compensate. Usain Bolt isn't particularly handsome, nor is he particularly ugly. He cuts a striking figure because he's tall and the guy showboats. He really enjoys his wins, and therefore, we enjoy his wins.

Women have a higher standard to achieve. Sometimes, women's good looks are enough to be the difference. A sexy javelin player might be the Anna Kournikova of her field, unable to win the big medals, but easy on the eyes.

Perhaps the commentary on how good Phelps looks is a matter of what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Women have been scrutinized for their looks for so long, so maybe a guy, as accomplished as Phelps was during this year's Olympics, has critical eyes that eye his physique, and the odd absence of swim trunks as if the photo was taken while he was in the buff.

We celebrate the accomplishments of athletes, but in the end, one reason they are so loved, beyond their physical prowess is their physical appearances. Due to rigorous training, outside of powerlifters and pre-teens, athletes are thin, strong, and yes, even attractive, even amongst themselves (thus, the need for prodigious condoms for the athletes discrete non-competitive activities).

The Thrill of Surprise

The reason sports needs to be live is the thrill of the unknown. Unfortunately, with the Olympics all the way around the world, many events that are being played out in China during the evening are happening in the morning in the US, when most fans are at work. NBC tries to hide this, even though, with the ubiquity of web news, you can find results as fast as they come available.

For many hours, sports websites said Usain Bolt of Jamaica had not only pulled off the rare 100m-200m double, winning both events, but did so both in world record time. The last time an athlete won both events was Carl Lewis in 1984. Bolt broke Michael Johnson's record in the 200m from 1996 which he ran in 19.32. Bolt ran it in 19.30 seconds.

Johnson ran then 200m and 400m, so the 200m is the common event between Johnson and Bolt. Johnson had not expected Bolt to run so fast. Unlike his grandstanding in the 100m, Bolt took this event seriously realizing only his fastest run would break the world record.

To keep the thrill for those who had otherwise managed to avoid the Internet, NBC did not refer to the race in the past tense until it was over.

NBC had tried to use its muscle to move events like swimming to the mornings so it could show those events live, at least on the east coast. There's a sense NBC delays the games even more for viewers throughout the US.

Although it lacks honesty, it does preserve some sense of surprise, so I'm not entirely upset that it happens.

On Relationships

I was talking to a friend who was taking a small vacation from his wife, or more properly, his wife was taking a small vacation from him (mutually agreed upon) and asked him to reflect on marriage.

I was thinking that many couples look forward to kids then to raising kids. Despite this, it seems to lack enough drama that movies are devoted to the hardships of raising kids. It's difficult to convey the joy a smiling baby gives to a parent, the simple progress that seem like major achievements to parents, the tantrums thrown that exasperate parents. So many couples go through it, and yet it's not something movie makers want to deal with. They prefer the romance of a male and female where love is the ideal and responsibility is given the short shrift as it changes a fairy tale to a harsh reality.

One issue brought up was the sharing of responsibility. It made me wonder whether such a thing was particular to "western" cultures. Of course, women make many decisions on the upbringing of a child, but there are other issues, often revolving around money and how its spent, or possibly the future of the child or whose job child-rearing belongs to.

Once upon a time, the wife was expected to raise the child by herself, the husband to busy with "important" work to deal with changing the baby, watching after the baby, and so forth. Maybe as the child grew older, the father would teach the boy to throw a ball, to catch a ball, and so forth. Husbands often issued decrees that they wanted their wives to obey. Given that some cultures gave no freedom to the wife--she could not get her own job, divorce was frowned upon or worse, the wife often had little choice. Even under such constraints, she experienced some joy in seeing the child grow up.

These days, the wife now contributes to many decisions that the husband might traditionally have had, even to the point that husbands sometimes defer to the wife on these decisions. Phrases like "I need to check with my wife" replace "I need to check with my husband" and shows the increasing importance of wives to modern relationships.

Because wives now have more power in the relationship, once dynamic has appeared that was perhaps less common before. When wives were subservient to their husbands, they were told, from youth, that their role was to keep their husbands happy. Their own happiness was secondary. He would provide for the family, and she would support him. In some jobs, this still happens. Husbands that coach sports find that their success depends on the team's success and that the team's success requires an inordinate amount of time spent preparing the team, time that is not spent with the wife. A coach's wife is expected to understand that this time is required, and to be patient, supporting the husband, and perhaps providing advice and food for the team. Coaches' wives often hang out with one another since only such wives understand each other's dilemma.

With the increased power of women, one change that has occurred is that women who once were asked to support the husband now can think more about themselves. They might expect their husbands to be their emotionally for them to stand by them even when it may not be wise to do so (I'm reminded that actress Delta Burke had said something negative about someone else, and her husband backed her up, even if there was some indication that maybe Burke wasn't telling the full truth).

This observation is purely anecdotal (as are most of my observations), but it's lead me to observe that American women are sometimes more likely to be emotionally fragile and thus more demanding of their male counterparts. This has lead to phrases like "high maintenance". This isn't to say that men can't be high maintenance too.

To be low maintenance means that you have to be self-assured and independent and thinking of others. Conservative cultures seem to tell women, essentially, to suck it up, and put aside their feelings for the sake of the relationship. Men tend to do that anyway, because despite the increasing balance between men and women, men are still expected to be "in charge" (but taking lots of opinions from wives).

I raise this issue because I am pondering whether conservative cultures, despite their downsides, have some redeeming features that aren't obvious, and this seems to be one of them.

Why Team Sports Are More Popular

The top sports in the US are football, basketball, and baseball. Why are team sports so popular? And I mean popular among sports pundits, who devote hours to talking sports.

Here's a recent example. Brett Favre was the disgruntled football player from Green Bay. Each year, he'd ponder whether he'd come back or not. He'd string the media and his team long. Most years, he came back and played yet another year. Why did people care?

Because people stay loyal to teams, not to the people on the team. When Brett Favre is wearing your uniform, he's your guy, supporting your city or supporting you because you chose that team, as many people liked the Bulls because Michael Jordan played on the Bulls.

Team sports aren't simply more popular because there are lots of players thus increasing the number of people to talk about, but because there's a relationship between the team, the coaches, and even management. Players can be picked to play on a team or not, so someone is making a decision. You can ask if that decision is wise or not.

You can debate whether a player is good in the clutch or not, whether he played a poor shot at a crucial moment, whether he's selfish, whether he's the best ever, whether he can beat your team or not. People often debate whether coaches should have total control over the team or not. Joe Torre wanted Manny Ramirez to cut his hair. It's amazing that baseball controls its players to this degree that they worry about their haircuts, but they do, and the funny thing is, most sports pundits say that's OK.

Indeed, many fans believe that coaches should have absolute power, and so do many sports pundits. Coaches, outside of Isiah Thomas, are often seen as the braintrust, and must reign in the team. If a player is not following rules, he's seen as a prima donna, someone disrupting the team, and told to shut up. Great players are told to toe the line because it's good for the team. They are cogs in a great machine and should be dispensed if they act up, act individually.

Indeed, sports commentators spend hours talking about misbehaving players and the effect all their own talk has on the team's psyche. It might have no effect if they didn't blah blah blah about it. Is Terrell Owens behavior hurting the team? Well, if the media didn't cover him, he would have no medium to pander to, and then he wouldn't have anything to say. But the sports pundits have to talk about something, so they love TO, or they love to hate him.

Individual sports?

Individual sports are personality based. Tiger Woods doesn't play for a team. He plays for himself. People watch because he's so good. The only personality I can recall that got attention for stuff outside the sport is Mike Tyson, whose jail time, ear biting, tattoo wearing all lead to a lot of coverage of Tyson's life outside of boxing.

As good as Tiger Woods is, the problem is that people have a hard time talking about him full time. They can say how great he is, and they do that a lot, but he doesn't get the kind of attention Brett Favre does because he doesn't play for a team. There isn't player-team dynamics. The closest equivalent might be to play for something like Ryder Cup, but because the average sports fan only cares about regular titles, even as prestigious an event as the Ryder Cup pales by comparison to the big individual events.

I suppose pundits could opine about how Tiger should play Ryder Cup (he does). The closest whining that goes on, and it goes on all the time, is Michelle Wie playing the women's tour. However, it leads invariably to the same comments again and again. Beat other women. Stop playing against men. It's a gimmick, and you aren't beating anyone this way. But people still talk about her.

Roger Federer, on track to being the best player ever has been derailed by himself and the Nadal machine, and heck, even Rafael Nadal are two players most people don't even know. Find a sports show and ask them to spend an hour talking about Rafa, and they're stuck. They can say how great he is, but that lasts five minutes.

Another thing that helps team sports in the US is a post-season. Other places in the world don't have a great notion of post-season. So if you can't talk about a player, you can talk about how a particular team will do, and whether they will make the post-season, and people will talk about who is going to make it.

The discussion for tennis is "Nadal is likely to win the US Open, with Djokovic and Murray as outside chances, and Federer, del Potro, and Blake as even further outside choices". That might be it, and that's if you even follow tennis. When it comes to actual team play, you can finally talk about all its players, whether this player being injured matters, how they can do when certain players are slumping or injured, how a returning player will help the team or not.

Now, there are things that resemble team sports but are effectively not team sports. Namely, cycling. For all the talk about Lance Armstrong and his seven wins, the fact of the matter is that cycling is a team sport, but it's the most individual of team sports. In effect, the rest of the team serves as a huge windshield and do various duties to fend off other teams attacks.

They are the offensive line to the main cyclist's quarterback which is why, as important as the offensive line is to a quarterback's success, they don't do enough to make their play interesting enough to talk about.

Indeed, in football, there's only a handful of player positions people talk about. Quarterback, running back, wide receiver, and occasionally a cornerback or some defensive player and the kicker. The offensive line, the punter, etc. don't get much talk.

So these are kinds of questions you can debate with team sports. How's the team doing? Are there players that they should get to replace the ones now? How are the star players playing? Is there an injury? How good is the strategy by the coach? Is some player acting up, trying to act defiant? Is some player going to retire? what's the chances of making the post-season? Can team X beat team Y? Is player X the best player ever? Is this team the best ever? Are the new rules affecting the sports adversely? Is the new owner too meddlesome? Is the new coach the answer to the team's problems? How well are they adjusting to this new player joining the team?

In other sports? You can't ask nearly this many questions. There isn't the same season long drama. Tennis and golf are one-off tournaments and are completely optional to players. If some player doesn't want to play a tournament, they don't have to. Team sports force players to play a schedule and there's question whether they should play hurt or not. In sports like golf or tennis, you can simply rest and not play, even if, in theory, you can play. In team sports, you are told you need to play, even if hurt, and then there's discussion about how tough you are to play with injury.

This is why it's hard for individual sports to be discussed. There's just less to talk about overall. Teams also tend to moderate any one great player where individual sports often have dominating individual players. In a team sport, you can often have seemingly weak teams do enough to create a huge upset.

It's sad but true.

NBC recaps

I'm watching USA network which is covering tennis. They are one of like five networks covering the Olympics including CNBC, MSNBC, the Oxygen network, and NBC itself. They re-televised the call for the 4 by 100 medley relay. What you see is that, after the third leg, the Americans are just ahead of the Japanese, with the Australians behind them, but then the Japanese guy is just fading, especially on the back half. The Japanese guy is, for about the first 25 m, ahead of Australia, but at 50m, he's in third, and is fading towards fourth at the end.

So the most successful group of four would have been Peirsol for backstroke, Kitajima in breaststroke, Phelps in the butterfly, and finally Eamon Sullivan in freestyle. This would have maybe cut the total time by a second overall.

Recap on the 4 by 100 team medley

Well, a little over four hours after I missed the live 4 by 100 medley, NBC finally has it up, and I was able to watch the relay. As it turns out, the medley, despite the US never losing this event before, was much, much closer than I'd expected.

The event started off with Peirsol, a backstroker. He was a touch slow, perhaps due to an injury, but nonetheless had the lead leg on both ends (at 50m then at 100m). In the second leg, Brendan Hansen swam breaststroke. Actually, the Japanese swimmer, Kitajima, managed to take the lead.

At this point, as the best butterfly swimmer, Phelps swam the third leg. While Phelps is good at 200m, he is weaker on the 100m, and at 50m, the Australian, Lauderstein actually outtouched Phelps. But Phelps moved ahead and touched ahead of Australia.

That left the last leg to Jason Lezak who anchored the 4 by 100 freestyle medal to barely edge out France by 0.04 seconds, catching up to Alain Bernard at the very end squeaking out a victory for the United States, and at the time, giving Phelps his second gold medal (the 4 by 200m freestyle relay was far more comfortable, the US being stronger at the longer distances). He had to fight off Eamon Sullivan of Australia, with a half a body length lead, and kept this lead all the way to the end.

Let's take stock of how it actually happened to the second.

The United States lead off with Aaron Peirsol, who lead the leg with backstroke at 53.16 seconds. This was apparently half a second off his record. At this point, the Russians were closest, with Arkady Vyatachanin at 53.36 seconds or just two-tenths behind.

The next leg was Brendan Hansen, who was the slow leg for the Americans, in breaststroke. He had a time of 59.27 seconds for his leg. Meanwhile, Kosuke Kitajima won this leg at 58.07 or more than a full second ahead. He was clearly the class of the field for this stroke, and actually touched ahead of Hansen. The Australians, at this point, were just 0.03 seconds behind. The Japanese had actually gotten half a second ahead of the Americans, but most felt they didn't have the back two swimmers to mount a serious challenge.

The next leg was Michael Phelps, swimming butterfly. At the split, the Australians were ahead, lead by Andrew Lauterstein, who had a great start. Phelps, however, regained the lead, and finished his leg at 50.15 seconds, to Lauterstein's 51.03 seconds, thus gaining back that strong lead. Indeed, by being nearly a second back, the Japanese also managed to make up time, with Takuro Fujii swimming at 50.89, or about a tenth of a second ahead.

At this point, the Americans had a total time, over three legs at 162.58 seconds, the Japanese had 162.83 seconds, and the Australians had 163.39. Indeed, because Lauterstein had faded badly in the butterfly, it allowed the Japanese butterfly swimmer, Fujii, to finish with a better time then Australia, and because Japan had the overall lead after the breaststroke in the second leg, they would still have the lead over Australia in the third.

Finally, Jason Lezak anchored the last leg. He swam in 46.76 which was actually a tenth of a second slower than Eamonn Sullivan at 46.65 seconds. However, as I just noted, Australia about 0.8 seconds slower after the third leg and had to make up 0.8 seconds, and only made up 0.1 seconds.

Japan was the team that really suffered on the freestyle. At 48.35 seconds, Sato was not only slower than Australia's Sullivan and American Lezak, he was also slower than everyone else swimming the freestyle that didn't disqualify (Italy was disqualified). Even so, that means he only swam less than 2 seconds slower than Sullivan. Because of the strong three legs swam by the first three Japanese swimmers, even this dismal swim meant a reasonably comfortable bronze.

To be honest, if the Japanese had a decent freestylist, even someone that swam two or three tenths seconds slower than Lezak, they could have won silver (alas, that would be pretty quick, as only Cam Gibson of New Zealand had that kind of time).

The final time was Americans at 3:29.24, followed closely by the Australians at 3:30.04, and the Japanese team that faded badly at 3:31.18, which still had nearly a second cushion over Russia.

The margin of victory was just under a second, and while that looks very close, at this distance (400m), it's still a pretty comfortable lead (800 m can stretch those leads out even further).

Surprisingly, there is no 4 by 200m medley relay nor an 800m individual medley, which would probably favor the Americans and Phelps in both cases, as he's a stronger swimmer in longer distances.

Congrats to the American team for making a world record, and helping Phelps win his eighth gold (in the two close team events, Lezak anchored the last leg to help secure the win).

Although the video should have been up as quick as possible, a few hours, while painful, is reasonably quick. Obviously, in this age of instant gratification, they could have put something together quickly in 10-20 minutes, but preferred to stitch together everything (the swim, the interviews, the medals) and publish that instead.

Eight is Enough

I had been planning to watch Phelps win his eighth medal, presumably gold, in the 4 by 100 team medley. But the problem was that I didn't know exactly when he'd be swimming. I thought it was close to midnight. Had I remembered accurately, I would have known it was close to 11 PM. I arrived at my place around 11:20 PM some 10 minutes after the event had concluded. I should have simply left what I was doing before 11 and watched it.

Silly me.

So I watched, I think, 6 of the 8 medal swims live or nearly so.

But here's the painful part. NBC could have it at the video site the minute it was over. Instead, I'll have to wait several hours, most likely into tomorrow morning, before I can view it in full. Sad that events like this which can be easily missed aren't ready the instant it is concluded. People who barely miss it like me could watch it.

I'm disappointed I didn't know when it was and couldn't watch it live.

Seven and Counting

Michael Phelps, Baltimore native, is still on his quest for eight gold medals. There were two events that Michael Phelps was dicey on actually getting gold. There was the 3 by 100 freestyle relay. The French were expected to be quite competitive. Indeed, they were leading with scant meters to go, before Jason Lezak caught up to Alain Bernard, one of the fastest freestylists in the world.

The other event that Michael wasn't favored was the 100m butterfly where he doesn't hold the world record. Indeed at 50m, he wasn't in the lead. But at the last instant, while Cavic was coasting to try to touch, Phelps swam another stroke and as he reached out, he hit the pad ahead of Cavic by 0.01 seconds

This gets him to seven golds, and leave the 4 by 100 team relay, where each competitor swims a different stroke (breaststroke, butterfly, freestyle, and backstroke). The traditional order is butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle.

It seems unreal how good Phelps is and that he is marching to destiny. He's tied Mark Spitz's record of seven gold medals, and has a chance for eight.

Let's see if it happens.

Searching for Roger

James Blake is good player. He's top ten. He plays an aggressive baseline game where he takes chances. He beats opponents because he can hit a bit harder than they can, but if his game is off, then he runs into trouble.

In eight tries against Roger Federer, Blake had only ever won one set. He couldn't figure out how to beat Roger Federer. Typically, this means one player has confidence in his play and the other feels frustration.

But even Blake knew that people were whispering about Federer. He was no longer the same player. He had uncharacteristic losses early in the year, compounded by mono, and then got decimate in the French final. Even when he appeared to have his game together, he needed rain delays, and some great shots to force a fifth set with Nadal, and even then, he lost during the waning daylight.

He then lost to Gilles Simon with errors a plenty, then to the hard serving Ivo Karlovic. Still, Federer assured us, that he was fine, that the only thing that mattered was the Olympics and the US Open.

I saw a few points of Blake playing Simon. Blake had already beaten Simon in a match last week in Cincinnati. Simon is a very steady, quick player that can fetch enough balls, and make enough shots that he can beat most average players. Blake wins because he pressures Simon, making forcing shots setting himself up. And Blake appeared to be crisp. He was making those shots.

Although Roger managed to eke out a win over Berdych, he had a tough time with Berdych's serve. He looked like he was struggling more than he had to, which made me think that Blake, despite a dismal record, would feel he had a chance. And indeed, he played aggressive off the ground, and Federer looked very shaky chasing shots down.

While Federer has a good serve, he's never been the kind of ace machine Sampras was. Indeed, that made him a more interesting player to watch. But this creates problems. More likely than not, when Federer is in trouble, he can't serve an ace to get out of it. He did it at Wimbledon (somewhat), but it's important to get a few free points.

This meant Blake had chances in many games to stay in the point. Federer also doesn't like really long points. If he feels pressure, and Blake was applying it, then he goes on the offensive. However, once he does that, he begins to miss, tick the top of the net, as if he's waiting for the stars to align and he goes into a zone.

It's a peculiar tactic to say the least. One that says that it's better to have lots of errors than play tentatively. You would think, with practice, he'd aim more safer, make sure he wasn't getting so close to the lines. In other words, either be more accurate, or take fewer chances.

Rather than let Blake beat himself, Federer would give him points. To be fair, Blake was hitting well, and Federer probably felt a conservative playing style would cause Blake to make winners even more easily.

This isn't to say that Federer might not come around and win the US Open. He now has a few days to prepare (the bad news, in that respect, is that he's still playing doubles with Wawrinka, so he can't take a flight out of China right away) for the US Open that he wouldn't otherwise. He can certainly still practice in China (I guess) and see how that works for him.

Federer's practice routine was severely impacted when he got sick at the beginning of the year, and it seems to have hurt his game ever since. Now that he makes errors with 5-6 shots off the ground, a steady player can, in principle, just wait until this happens.

I think people want him to play better, to be competitive with Djokovic and especially Nadal. Part of the problem is how stubbornly he sticks to this style of play. You would think his manager and coach would simply tell him to look at the unforced errors and ask him if that's the way he should play. I suspect Federer is a stubborn man. He has been winning for so long by himself that he may take anyone else's advice with a grain of salt.

By the way, his manager is his girlfriend.

So what happens to Roger? No one expected his game to deteriorate like this, competitive enough to make finals, but then struggling as well. It's more instructive looking at the way he loses. It would be one thing if it were someone like Michael Chang where players simply learned to outhit him. But it feels like Roger is helping players out by missing so much, more than even average players miss.

Finding Phelps

You know what it's incredibly hard to do? You'd think with all the fuss NBC makes about Phelps they might actually put it up on their website. When Michael Phelps swims.

I want to know when the heats are, when the semifinals are, and when it's on TV.

Oh I know. NBC would prefer I sit in front of the television waiting all day to find when it is rather than tell me exactly when I should watch. It's sad, but true.

But you would think it would be so easy to do this. I have found a site, but it suggests that the heat I saw televised at noon was not live, which is fine. It doesn't have to be live.

One of these days, some site is going to figure it out, and let you know exactly when your favorite athlete is on, and then get that to you. In the meanwhile, we have to deal with this mess.

Which, by the way, a ton of sites that spew spam and such are perfectly willing to hijack whenever you try to locate the schedule of when Michael Phelps swims.

Stop being idiots and do the right thing.

Lessons

When I was 13 or so, my mother enrolled in me in local tennis lessons. They were held for two weeks, five days a week, for an hour each. In those days, it was probably quite cheap to get lessons. I'm sure it was about 20 dollars each for my brother and me to get lessons.

They were group lessons. The first year we were taught by some guy named Jay, I think. He had learned tennis at the Dennis Van der Meer camp. He was the guy who gained some notoriety coaching Billie Jean during her match against Bobby Riggs and became a contributor to Tennis Magazine. He thought he had boiled down playing tennis to a certain few key steps and if only you'd practice that, you'd get good.

In hindsight, he taught in something of a classic style. My first racquet for that class was an old wooden racquet that my dad had bought used, and we had another one that seemed like a cheap K-mart brand.

At the time, the two-hander was still something of a novelty. Despite some very high profile two-handers, Chris Evert, Jimmy Connors, Bjorn Borg, and some lesser players like Harold Solomon, it was still slowly making its way to tennis instruction. So I was taught to hit a one-handed shot. My brother read an article on Gene Mayer and how he hit his two-hander on both sides, and adopted that style for some time.

The following summer, we took lessons from Dave and Arnel. They were, at one point, on the tennis team, but had recently gone to college, and saw this as a summer job, teaching kids to play tennis. Dave was a good looking guy sort of the Mark Hamill type and Arnel seemed Filipino, and was there to assist and hang out.

I don't recall if we took lessons after that. Basically, after the first year, I was pretty much self-taught, which turned out OK in hindsight, but not great.

Although I learned tennis in the early 80s, I was trying to learn what was termed then and now as "modern" tennis, which meant a loopy forehand, open-stance shots, and so forth. I remember playing videotapes of Mats Wilander and Bjorn Borg (in an exhibition, no less) trying to imitate their shots, and later on, trying to imitate early Agassi. I tried the Lendl forehand.

What I didn't realize then was how faithful I was to their shots, which was, in hindsight, not very. Early on, I learned to hit pretty good topspin on my forehand, but switched to a two-hander, and could never get good topspin on that shot. I would hit a slice backhand too.

One thing that was a little unusual was that I liked coming to net and hitting drop shots, even early on. It didn't hurt that John McEnroe was on top, and had deft shots.

For many years afterwards, I took no more lessons. I wasn't sure who I'd take them from, and they would have been pricey had I looked.

A coworker of mine whose wife had just joined him after finishing her degree wanted to learn tennis with his wife, and they had signed up for lessons in DC at the site of the Legg Mason Tennis Classic where they have a semi-public court, where there's no membership, but you pay for the use of the courts.

I took lessons with Dale who looked a bit like Ron Paul. Dale taught a kind of tennis as exercise style for advanced players. He offered very little instruction. The idea was to go and do drills and essentially get in shape to play tennis. My tennis only improved incidentally, mostly through just playing.

Around Thanksgiving of last year, I took a lesson from Joel. He taught in this holistic manner. Throw the racquet at the ball he would opine. He would suggest that the racquet wanted to move in a certain way, and you had to be free and relaxed.

I didn't take another private lesson until January when I decided to take one at Cabin John with a guy named Mike. Mike was a youngish Asian dude in his early 20s. He was a bit more technical about what he wanted me to do, rotating my shoulders more, etc. He seemed a touch dispassionate, I seem to recall.

Then I didn't take lessons for a while, a few months. I heard about these high schoolers that would teach lessons at about half the cost of normal lessons at public courts. So I took three or so lessons from a guy named Sharat, who was finishing up his junior year in high school.

He was a pretty chatty dude, talking about how to hit the ball. He favored teaching you to play mini-tennis, suggesting that good technique comes from being able to hit the ball well when you are hitting in slow motion. If you have bad technique hitting slowly, you'd have bad technique hitting quickly. He was reasonably good, but still I felt something missing.

By this point, I was reading Fuzzy Yellow Balls and Essential Tennis. I knew Ian said, on his website, that he had private lessons. Although he was a bit of a hike from where I lived, it was still under an hour to get there. I wasn't sure what to expect, but so far, he's given the best lessons so far.

He's able to offer advice in the "modern style" dealing mostly with using the core more to his shots. He's able to observe strokes then offer a simple idea here or there to focus on one problem at a time. I've tried teaching tennis, and I find that I get nitpicky on all sorts of things. In the end, the person doesn't listen so much. Some of the advice I've heard before, but I didn't know to apply it to my own game.

A lot of tennis is surprisingly non-intuitive. For example, most people think of tennis as an arm sport. Apparently, if you play other sports like baseball or if you box, you find that you need to use more of your body if you want to get good power. The arm can get pretty strong on its own, but it can do even more if you coordinate it with your body.

There's plenty of players that don't turn their bodies when hitting shots. This turn helps add power to shots, but it takes a bit of coordination to do. I've been working on that more, since I used to not do it. I'm sure there are still issues with how I hit shots.

With volleys, I used to never cross-step to reach a volley nor turn sideways to hit. I'd frame the ball but never knew how I was doing it. I'd use too much hand motion trying to hit a ball and get no pace when I hit shots.

I understand these aren't intellectual endeavors but physical ones. And they're costly to learn these lessons, but they are rewarding too. Intellectual tasks require discovering the unknown often with little assistance except your own intellect. Learning tennis is trying to solve a problem to which some people have solutions to (at a price, to be fair).

Few things in life have answers as pat as tennis. Although it's taken some work to find someone to offer good lessons, it's been worth it so far!

Nicknames?

Nicknames were given to people to make their names easier to pronounce and to create a familiarity with them. Thus, David is Dave, Robert is Bob or Rob, and so forth. All of a sudden, people seem to prefer the lengthy names.

I know a guy named Anthony who prefers to go by Anthony, not Tony. A guy who prefers David over Dave. A guy who prefers Michael over Mike. Indeed, as Michael Phelps's mother was cheering him on, it wasn't with exhortations of Mike, but Michael.

Why the trend? I couldn't say, but it's something I've noticed.

Phelps

Michael Phelps is in his second Olympics. This is the time that people pay attention to sports like swimming and gymnastics and all sorts of other sports they would otherwise not pay attention too in the intervening four years.

People in this area pay some attention to Phelps because he's a Baltimore boy, and so his name has had some resonance, even before his success in the previous Olympics. Indeed, his name was more popular than his face. For a long time, I had no idea what he looked like.

Phelps is going for a Mark Spitz like record of some 8 gold medals. He's already won one gold medal in the 400 individual medley.

What's unknown to most people, me included, is the kind of person he is. Turns out, like many an American, he is the son of divorced parents when he was 9 years old. His mother is a principal at a middle school.

But it's difficult to determine what drives an individual. This is not Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan, where fans follow his every accomplishment. They only pay attention at the Olympics, and Phelps gears himself to perform at his absolute best during the Olympics, as do many other swimmers.

While people discuss the lives of Brett Favre to death (and really, only his professional life), there's little known (to me) about one of the most accomplished American swimmer ever.

Admittedly, there are so many people out there, and we can hardly know them all, so why should Phelps be any different from anyone else. Why should we spend any more time figuring out who Phelps is? Perhaps like anything else, the answer is, why not?

Of course, the people who telecast the Olympics realize the games are for casual observers, and do as much to promote personalities as possible, realizing you have neither the time or inclination to do the research yourself, and then hope you have a long memory and remember them the next time the Olympics run.

Thus, this is Phelps's second Olympics at 23, and he was merely 19 the previous time in Athens. He could have an outside shot of competing at 27. I don't following swimming enough to know how long careers last (the odd exception is Dara Torres, who at 41, is swimming as fast as she ever has).

Cincy Semis: Djokovic vs Nadal

The Wimbledon men's final, arguably the best played men's final in history, lead many a commentator to say it was a transition from Federer who had long dominated men's tennis to Nadal, the heir apparent. Nadal has had an incredible two months, winning several of the clay court tournaments leading to the French, then powering his way to a French title without a drop of a set, then winning a grass court tournament for the first time ever (Queen's) and taking Wimbledon.

Everyone figured that hard courts would be Nadal's last hurdle. It's rare for a clay court player like Nadal to find his second best surface to be grass. Nearly every great clay court player, except Borg, played much better on hard courts than grass. The high bouncing ball typically favors a clay courter's style. Nadal, however, has managed to tame the low bounces at Wimbledon, partly because Wimbledon has altered the surface to make it play more like a slower surface.

In Toronto, at the Roger's Cup, Federer hoped to recover and play a good tournament, but found himself knocked out by Gilles Simon. Djokovic was also looking to come back, but played a game Andy Murray, who beat Djokovic. Murray had chances against Nadal, but Nadal won and then had an easy final.

In Cincy, Federer managed to win against Robby Ginepri, but it took three sets, then he lost to Ivo Karlovic, losing two tiebreaks to the 6'10" Croatian. Again, it looked like Nadal might roll on.

While everyone was claiming Federer was sliding a slippery slope, his long dominance coming to an end. Throughout, Djokovic was the forgotten man. He'd play Nadal tough on clay, but lose. He played him tough on grass, but lost there too. He had an early loss to Marat Safin at Wimbledon. Then, he lost to an aggressive Andy Murray, whose Wimbledon semifinals seemed to rejuvenate his attitude.

Still, Novak is way too good a player to stay down for too long, and as he made his way to meet Nadal, the key was how Djokovic would play against the soon-to-be number 1 player, Rafa Nadal. Hard courts is Djokovic's best surface and Rafa's worst surface, and only worst because other players can use their power on hard courts and give Rafa trouble.

Djokovic prefers the high bouncing balls on the hard courts. With his superior serve, he can win cheap points on hard courts, and then power his shots. Djokovic clearly hits harder than Rafa, and the hard courts rewards his power. Rafa is steadier, can create more angles.

So this match would be a bellwether letting fans know how far Djokovic had fallen. Commentators had said his serve had been off, but the last two matches, he was back to serving the way he was used to. This is the one area Nadal has a weakness. He has a good serve, but it's not a huge weapon.

Still, it was a surprise when Djokovic came out of the gates roaring. Novak took a page out of Federer's playbook, hitting down the line forehands for winners. Nadal is vulnerable to hard hit shots to his forehand, often rushing the shot and unable to get it back in play. Djokovic then began attacking Nadal, and even when Nadal could push Djokovic around, Novak would dig balls and put it in play, before striking with a hard shot. Novak punished Nadal's second serve like no other player.

Despite one close game where Nadal nearly went up 0-40 on Djokovic's serve, only to push an awkward volley a little deep instead, Djokovic rolled, He powered to two breaks of serve and it looked as if Nadal wasn't covering the court well nor dictating play.

Nadal finally held serve, but Djokovic held for the 6-1 win.

Despite the competitive nature of their matches, few of Nadal and Djokovic's matches have gone three sets. Usually, one wins in straight sets. The one recent exception was Hamburg where Djokovic lost in three sets to Nadal. In Queen's, it was a straight set win. The French was straight sets too. So it boded well for Novak that he won the first set.

The second set saw Nadal fighting tougher. The winners Novak hit in the first set were being replaced by errors. Nadal was fighting more and winning his serves more easily. However, at 5-all, Djokovic began playing more aggressively, and eventually broke. He followed it up with a good service game and won the match, 6-1, 7-5.

Nadal may appear to be the next great player, but when Djokovic is on, he can give Nadal as much trouble as anyone. Djokovic can hit flatter shots and harder serves and be aggressive on returns. He's also less likely than Federer to his wild shots.

Recall that Nadal was in danger of dropping his number 2 ranking to Djokovic several times, and nearly did so. Djokovic seems undeterred feeling it's only a matter of time before he can give Nadal trouble on surfaces that aren't clay (and he gave Nadal all he could handle at Hamburg).

The next round will be interesting because Djokovic recently lost to Murray. Murray has been playing a lot better lately. Unlike Henman, the prototypical serve and volleyer whose groundstrokes were good enough to compete against modern players, Murray is more of a groundstroker. He's got a great backhand, and is learning to play more aggressively instead of hanging way back. Like Djokovic, Murray has great touch hitting drop shots.

So the final should be a statement game for Djokovic showing whether he's back to the form that lead him to a win at the Australian Open.