Midway through the 10^th end when the score was 6-3 Canada, the crowd spontaneously broke into their national anthem. It was a pretty stirring moment. Norway’s skip, Thomas Ulsrud, was behind Canada’s Kevin Martin; you could tell he was saying something nice about the crowd reaction. 

One thing I like about curling is everyone seems incredibly sportsmanlike.  No huge arguments, no ill will. A good sport, I think.

Earlier today, Switzerland beat Sweden 5-4 to earn bronze.

 The level of play was amazing; I didn’t think rocks were capable of sliding that way.  It was one difficult shot after another.  Double take-outs, stealing points, the whole gamut of plays occurred over and over.  By the 6^th end the score was 4-2 and it looked like Sweden might be able to take it away. Canada came back with some skillful strategy tilting the scales so that it was 5-4 by the beginning of the 8^th. The 8^th was scoreless, and Sweden tried to keep the 9^th the same, so they could try and score with the final rock, but they missed a key slide and Canada took advantage for 1 more.  The crowd was so excited in the 10^th I don’t know if any of the players could hear each other call across the ice for directions.

 Just when it looked like Canada had it closed out, they made a bad shot, setting Sweden up to take 2.  The Swedes pulled it off and the match went into an extra end. It all came down to the final slide by Canadian skip Cheryl Bernard.  Sweden had 2 rocks in the house, on fairly close to the button.  Bernard managed to knock one rock and it just kissed the other, pushing it into the button. Sweden had it won.

 One of the interesting things about curling, the players are “regular” people. Canadian skip Cheryl Bernard is a stay-at-home mom.  I’ve heard the commentators refer to players on various teams as bartenders, part-timers at hardware stores, just regular folks who play this game for the love of it. Unlike, say, a cross country skier, conditioning isn’t that big a part of the game, so you can have a job.  Plus, let’s face it, how many huge curling endorsement deals have you heard of? These folks have to work to put food on the table.

Men’s Giant Slalom, even though I already know something that I didn’t want to know. Ugh. It’s really difficult to avoid spoilers. Anyway, men’s giant slalom provides another golden opportunity for Ted Ligety and Bode Miller.

Ladies figure skating short program. American women are kind of a long shot here, but they’ve defied that label before in the Olympics. Of course, this year there are only two women representing the United States in figure skating in Vancouver: Rachael Flatt and Mirai Nagasu. Dominant skaters World Champion Kim Yu-Na, of South Korea, and 2008 World title-holder Mao Asada, of Japan, should provide an exciting show.

I’m torn on women’s ski cross. I find it to be a theoretically exciting sport, but I have a hard time not having an American to cheer for. We’ll see whether it holds my attention.

I’m going to have to see if Nordic Combined Team Large Hill is on television, since it looks like the United States has a shot at a medal. Really. Two medals in Nordic Combined in one Olympics. Wow.

I will probably skip the women’s biathlon relay. Again, exciting in theory. Hard to see the Americans get trounced.

I may also skip men’s speedskating 10,000m. That’s a lot of skating in circles. Maybe if I were from the Netherlands and cheering for national hero Sven Kramer. The power company in the Netherlands is even offering a discount for every medal he wins. I’d definitely watch with more enthusiasm if it was going to save me about $70 per year. On the other hand, Americans Jonathan Kuck and Ryan Bedford are not expected to medal.

The ever present hockey and curling will probably also be skipped, even though I do generally enjoy curling. There are only so many hours in the day.

Women’s bobsled has two runs today, but I’ll probably wait until the medal rounds tomorrow to take a look at that.

In alpine skiing, you can watch Men’s Super Combined, which combines one downhill run with one slalom run. American Ted Ligety is the defending Olympic champion, but look for Americans Bode Miller and Andrew Weibrecht to give him a run for his money.

Biathlon will award medals for a men’s and women’s mass start event today.

Two man bobsled wraps up today. Team U.S. 1 was in a good position going into today’s runs.

Men’s ski cross runs qualifying and final rounds today. If you like snowboard cross, you’re going to love this new event. Former Alpine skiers Casey Puckett and Daron Rahlves lead the Americans. You may recognize both these names as Rahlves represented the United States at the Olympics three times in alpine racing, and Puckett was a four time Olympian in the alpine disciplines.

The women’s speedskating 1500m will be raced today, as well.

In addition to medal rounds, you can check out curling and hockey (yes, I know some of you have had enough of curling and hockey). Or if you want something a bit lighter, ice dancers will be performing their free dance today.

Figure skating moves on to ice dancing today. Torino silver medalists Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto hope to upgrade that medal to gold, but they have stiff competition in fellow Americans Meryl Davis and Charlie White who won the national championship in January. Traditionally, ice dancing has not been an American strong suit. Will this year change that?

Skeleton awards medals today in the men’s and women’s individual competition. Noelle Pikus-Pace, currently in fifth, is in decent position to compete for a medal. Teammate Katie Uhlaender is slightly farther back in ninth place. A couple of the American men also stand a chance to reach the podium. Zach Lund is currently in eight place. Eric Bernotas and John Daly are in 14th and 18th place at the beginning of today’s runs.

Curling has been a pretty big disappointment for the Americans this year. The men need to go undefeated to reach the podium. Today’s challenge? France. The women are looking for their first win as they face Russia.

Ski jumping continues today with the qualifying round for the 125m hill event. The U.S. has a very young team and is not favored to end the 86 year drought since they last medaled in ski jumping. Two time Olympian Anders Johnson is only 20. His teammates, Nick Alexander and Peter Frenette, are making their first trips to the Olympics. You have to really feel for these young guys. They essentially pay their own way to the Olympics. I’ll be writing more about this in the coming week.

Women’s cross country pursuit races today. America has never won a medal in women’s cross-country skiing, and that probably won’t change today. Americans Liz Stephen and Morgan Arritola make their Olympic debut here.

Women’s Super Combined— potentially more medals for Julia Mancuso and Lindsey Vonn.

Biathlon— Could there be a medal for American Tim Burke? Will Norway be happier with their results today?

Men’s Figure Skating—Who’s getting the gold? Evan Lysacek, Evgeni Plushenko, or someone else entirely?

Snowboarding— More halfpipe today. It’s the women’s turn. Will the American women exceed the American men’s medal count from last night?

Hockey— The men and the women compete today. The men take on Norway. The women take on Finland.

Speed skating— The women take on the 1000m. Don’t expect the same medal count for the American women as the American men.

Skeleton— Competition starts today for the men and women. Americans stand a much better chance at medaling here than in the luge.

Curling— both the men and women take on Denmark today. You can catch this live if you have CNBC. No, really, live coverage of an event.

That’s it. Check back throughout the afternoon and evening for coverage of events.

The US Men’s curling team just can’t seem to get over the barrier of winning.  They get so close, then fall apart at the end (no pun intended.)  Extra ends, near misses, it looks like our guys just choke when it looks like they might win.  Today’s 7-6 loss to Denmark has left the team pretty down.

In order to make it to the medal round, the men’s team will now have to will all 5 of their next matches, something none of them expect to happen.  It’s a shame, they’ve played pretty well throughout. Skip John Shuster talks like all is lost, “I’ve let my teammates and USA Curling down.” When your leader says stuff like that, I think the problem may be attitude and fear, not a lack of skill.

Here’s what’s going on so far:

Canada, Switzerland, and Sweden have 2 wins no losses for the men, Canada, Germany and Sweden have the same for the women.  The US men have 3 losses and US women 2.  But all is not lost!  This is a round-robin competition and while the Americans have been losing, the scoring has been close.  I’ll try to keep you updated.

First up, after days of delays, women’s downhill will finally get to race. Who should you be looking for? Well, unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll know to look for American Lindsey Vonn. The U.S. women have never won an Olympic gold medal in downhill, but Vonn is expected to change that. Vonn may be joined on the podium by any one of her teammates: Julia Mancuso, Stacey Cook, or Alice McKennis.

Snowboarding halfpipe is today, if the halfpipe doesn’t melt in the 40+ degree temperatures. For the U.S., this should be a medal treasure trove, since six out of nine Olympic medals awarded in men’s halfpipe have gone to Americans. That’s not expected to change this year, as reigning Olympic champion Shaun White competes. You should also keep an eye out for Dancing with the Stars alum Louie Vito, an newcomer to the Olympics. The other talented rookies are Scotty Lago and Greg Bretz.

Women’s 500m short track has a medal round today. Additionally, there will be heats in the men’s 1000m, and the semifinals of the men’s 5000m relay. Even though the U.S. hasn’t won a medal in this event since 1994, that could change this year as three-time national champion Katherine Reutter has an outside shot at a medal. Fellow American competitor Alyson Dudek is not expected to medal in the event.

Speed skating will award a medal for the 1000m today, hopefully to American Shani Davis who won this event in Torino and is favored to win gold in Vancouver. The race will also include Americans Chad Hedrick, Trevor Marsicano and Nick Pearson.

Medals will be awarded in men’s doubles luge today. Americans Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin, who have appeared in four Olympics are the best shot for a medal, having already won Olympic silver and bronze. They’ll be joined by teammates Dan Joye and Christian Niccum.

Both men’s and women’s curling compete today— the women take on German; the men take on Switzerland.

And last but not least, cross-country skiing will race the men’s and women’s 1.5km individual sprint. This is a relatively new event to the Olympics, having made it’s debut in 2002. Like most cross-country type events, this is not an American strength. There is some hope that American female Kikkan Randall might finish in the top 15. American male Andy Newell stands a slightly better, though still outside, chance of ending up on the podium.

Now you may all join me until trying to avoid the results until tonight, although I already glimpsed partial results for the women’s downhill. I hope you ever better luck.

Today was supposed to be Super Combined in men’s downhill, but due to poor weather conditions (blowing now and low visibility), that event has been pushed to Friday. At this rate, Alpine skiing will finish up sometime in March or April.

Presumably, the snow won’t stop biathlon (it’s still on the schedule, as of this writing). For today’s women’s 10 km pursuit and men’s 12.5 km pursuit, the athletes qualify by placing in the top 60 in a sprint competition. No American women are expected to qualify. For the men, Tim Burke and Lowell Bailey stand a decent chance of qualifying, even though this is not the best event for either of them.

CURLING Curling, a favorite in the Manty household, starts today. The American men are scheduled for two matches vs. Germany and Norway, and the American women are scheduled for one match vs. Japan. The American men won bronze in Torino. Will they be able to match or better that in Vancouver?

Men’s figure skating starts tonight with the short program. All three of the American men are strong contenders for a medal. Evan Lysacek is the reigning world champion and finished fourth in Torino after battling the flu. Jeremy Abbott is a relative newcomer but has won two U.S. titles. And then there’s Johnny Weir. Hopefully, the only drama surrounding his performances will be the performances, themselves. American men haven’t won gold since Brian Boitano in 1988. They’re hoping to change that this year.

Both the men’s and women’s hockey teams will be competing today. The men will be taking on Switzerland. The women will be playing Russia.

Women’s luge will be awarding a medal today. Americans Erin Hamlin and Julia Clukey are currently in 15th and 16th place after two runs—long shots for a medal but not out of contention. American Megan Sweeney is currently in 27th.

More snowboard cross today, as Lindsey Jacobellis tries to win the gold that eluded her in Turin, when she fell practically at the finish line. She is joined on the team by Olympic newcomers Callan Chythlook-Sifsof and Faye Gulini.

Finally, women’s speed skating races the 500m— hopefully with fewer problems with the ice than the men experienced yesterday. Elli Ochowicz, Jennifer Rodriguez, Heather Richardson and Lauren Cholewinski represent the United States. None are favorites to medal.

Curling is an old game, originating sometime in the 16^th century.  There is some debate as to whether it began in Scotland, the Netherlands, or Belgium, but the earliest record is a Scottish match from around 1540. Basically, two teams play on a 145 to 150 ft long area of ice.  One teammate slides, or “delivers” a 42lb stone toward a 12 ft diameter round target, called a “house.” The object is to get as close to the center, or “button,” as possible. Two team members armed with brooms sweep in front of the stone to momentarily melt the ice, reducing friction, and to clear any debris that might impede the stone. Careful sweeping can speed up or slow down the stone as needed, and keep it going in a straight line.

Each match consists of ten “ends” during which each team member delivers two stones, alternating between teams. The team with the most points at the conclusion of the ten ends, wins.  Interestingly, it is perfectly acceptable to concede your match before the final end. If the team leader, known as the “skip” decides they are just too far behind to catch up, they’ll graciously call it quits.

The US is not a favorite to win gold in this year’s Olympics, but you should check out this sport anyway. It’s more than just shuffleboard on ice; it’s an age-old game of strategy and precision that just might capture your interest.