It was a race in yet another messy, sloppy foggy day on the mountains surrounding Vancouver. All of the quarterfinals were decided when there was a fall by one of the two racers.

The silver went to Austria’s Benjamin Karl, and the bronze went to Mathieu Bozzetto of France.

Razzoli delivered, beating Kostelic by .16 seconds.  Tomba roared with delight and hugged Razzoli tightly. I wonder if Razzoli takes after Tomba in his social side?  There are still stories floating around about the wild nights he spent celebrating in Calgary.

Andre Myhrer of Sweden is bringing home the bronze, also a milepost for Sweden.  This is the first medal for the country in Alpine skiing in 22 years.

Bode Miller missed a gate in his first run, disqualifying him from the competition.  Ted Ligety also skied out, leaving the US with no contenders.

That nasty fog and wet snow continued for the women trying to compete in the slalom. The fog cut visibility so much it was tough for us to see the skiers, let alone them the narrow poles they had to navigate. The comment was made that they were almost forced to ski by feel and memory alone. The wet snow and warmer weather made the course rough and very difficult to navigate.

Maria Reisch of Germany got her second gold of the games, handling the tough conditions with great control. It was bittersweet for the skier, as her sister was unable to finish the course and join her in victory. Marlies Schild of Austria finished second, Sarka Zahrobska of the Czech Republic, third.

US favorite Lindsey Vonn was unable to finish, but didn’t seem too upset since she’s still bringing home two medals this year.

Tina Maze of Slovenia finished a close second for silver. Elizabeth Gorgl of Austria, who had the fastest time on the 1^st run, won bronze.

American Julia Mancuzo, the defending champ, had a bad run yesterday, finishing 18^th.  She had the 3^rd fastest run today, but she would have had to fly down the mountain in order to make up for her poor 1^st run, so she came in 10^th.

I wonder what the results would have been without that fog? It’s a roll of the dice when there’s bad weather, you never know who will be up and how it will affect them. Sometimes it doesn’t seem “fair” but that is the risk you run with an outdoor sport.

 There was a feeling of deja vu when you saw Jaret “Speedy” Peterson at the top of the hill preparing for his final run in men’s aerials.  4 years ago he was in position for the bronze when he attempted his signature jump the hurricane.  But that time, he blew the landing and didn’t get on the podium.  The tried the hurricane during practice today, falling at the landing. It would have been easy to take the advice of others and not attempt the difficult jump.  But this year, he needed the difficulty to get the points needed to finish high. He made the jump, triumphantly sticking the landing.

 Liu Zonyang won bronze.  The 18-yr-old from China had very compact form during his jump, but wheelied a little on the landing. He’s so young, I’m sure we’ll see him in 4 years.

The Americans were definitely helped by the weather today. I’m beginning to learn a bit more about ski jumping. A tiny bit. Enough to know that a tail wind is not a good thing. You see, I’ve been recently told that ski jumping is not about falling, it’s about flying. You need a head wind for that. Some of the strongest skiers received tail winds that meant they were pretty much out of it before the skiing ever started.

So, going into the cross country portion, Johnny Spillane was second, and Bill Demong was sixth. By the end of the third lap, the front group included Spillane, Demong and Austria’s Bernhard Gruber. This allowed Spillane and Demong to work together to an extent. But when it comes down to it, it’s an individual sport.

And when everything was said and done, the Americans had a gold and silver. Bill Demong won the gold, Johnny Spillane took the silver. The bronze went to Bernhard Gruber.

Johnny Spillane almost ended up in third after falling briefly in the final lap. Coming into the stadium these were the only three really in the race. You couldn’t even see any of the other facers.

I hope that this is a great step forward for this program for the United States. This is a desperately underfunded/unfunded sport America. Many of these athletes end up pretty much on their own for covering their costs. And there aren’t exactly endorsements lined up around the block for the athletes. So, maybe a gold and three silvers will change all of that.

German took the silver, and Finland took the bronze. The Americans were in 12th.

Women’s aerials also awarded medals tonight. The Chinese are coming on strong as aerialists, coming in second and third. But the gold was reserved for Australia’s Lydia Lassila.

Hopefully, Lindsey will be okay and hopefully Mancuso will be able to make a comeback tomorrow.

 Canada’s Ashleigh McIvor came out on top with her strategy of “start out in front, then stay out of the way.” Hedda Berntsen of Norway came in second and Marion Josserand of France finished third.

Though new to the Olympics, McIvor feel skicross has been around forever.  “It’s racing your friends from the top of the mountain to the bottom.”

The day went to Carlo Janka of Switzerland.  The “Ice Man,” as the even-keeled skier is known in his home country, coolly navigated the course for mistake-free gold in 2:37.83. Silver and bronze were both won by Norwegians. Kjetil Jansrud’s combined time of 2:38.22 earned him the second spot on the podium. Aksel Lund Svindal enhanced his Alpine stud status, adding bronze to his collection (gold in Super G, silver in Downhill) with a combined time just .61 seconds behind Janka

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.

The win was so strong the last Austrian jumper, Gregor Schlierenzauer, went for showboat broke and landed at an incredible 146.5 meters.  A little shaky, but the points taken from the landing made no difference whatsoever.

The men’s individual sprint was also today. Russia took the top two positions, with Nikita Kriukov taking the gold and Alexander Panzhinskiy taking silver. Norway’s Petter Northug took bronze. The best American finish was 29th.

So, here are the basics about Julia. 25 year old Julia is a native of Lake Tahoe, California, she’s always been quite the athlete. She has two sisters. She has a blog. You can read it here. Once the Olympics are over, you can also check out her line of lingerie on the site.

You can watch a short interview with her below.

The Silver medal went to Ivica Kostelic of Croatia, the bronze to Switzerland’s Silvan Zurbriggen.

Michael Schmid, of Switzerland, took the inaugural gold. Silver and bronze went to Austria’s Andreas Matt and Norway’s Audun Groenvold.

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.

I’m really trying hard to figure out ski jumping. There are some obvious parts. Jump far, land well—walk away with a medal. There are various heats, and you have to continue to qualify to continue moving on. But I don’t really understand yet how the judge’s scoring works. And even the qualifying is a bit confusing.

As I’ve reported earlier, American ski jumpers do not have a lot of financial support. One reason is because it’s simply not very popular here in the United States. But I’m trying to figure out why that is, and I think one reason is because most viewers are nor unlike me. They just don’t necessarily get it. And it’s hard to enjoy what you just don’t understand.

 Cross Country is one of those sports where I tune in for a bit, then check in on other events.  Even in the long distances there is always something exciting going on. So don’t forget to tune in for the sprints, relays, and women’s 30km later in the games.

 Still, bronze at the Olympics is pretty darn good, so I suppose I shouldn’t complain.  Andrea Fischbacher from Austria won gold with a time of 1:20.14. Tina Maze of Slovenia was the surprise silver medallist; she’s never won a Super G world cup race.  She is, however, the highest medal winner for Slovenia, ever.  The best has always been bronze up until now.  So congrats to Maze for setting the bar a notch higher!

Now THAT’S a race, folks.