Beijing: day 2 and 3 in review.

Sorry to drop the ball on the Sunday update, hopefully it wont happen again.

The last couple days have sure been exciting on the other side of the world. Day 2 saw the first day of competition for mens and womens gymnastics, the number 1 ladies team in the world in the sand and the oldest American to travel to China earn a Silver with the help of some youngsters in the pool. Day 3 saw Micheal Phelps' dream of 8 golds continue, along with the Koreans win their 4th straigh archery gold.

On day 2, we were treated to a dominant display by the Chinese mens gymnastics team. But don't count out the Japenese to contend for gold in the finals. The fight for bronze may be the most interesting, with 4 teams, being led by the United States, bunched together going into Tuesdays team final.
On the womens side, the United States didn't fair quite as well as the slightly surprising men. The women, lead by 2 world all-around champions, felt the sting of Samantha Peszak injured ankle, with only 4 athletes being able to compete in 3 events. Despite a couple of miscues they advance to the next round where all scores are erased and every team starts with a clean slate. So lets go girls.
In the sand the Womens team of Misty May-Treaner and Keri Walsh continued their dominance of the world by extending their record 101 match winning streak by destroying the over matched Japenese team in straight sets.
The golden boy of the Olympics, Micheal Phelps, continues his quest to become the greatest Olympic champion of all time. He won his first medal in the 4x100 meter individual medley, besting his own world record by over a second in the process. Phelps sure needed some help to get his second gold medal of these games though. Leading off the 4x100 freestyle relay, Phelps kept the U.S. in the hunt, but was not the leader after his split. Garret Weber-Gale and Cullen Johnson kept the U.S. in second, behind the favored French, going into the anchor leg. Thats where history was made, Jason Lezak came back from a full body length in the final 50 meters to cap of the greatest swimming race, quite possibly in history. Their female counterparts also had quite the showing as well. The women posted a time of 3:34.33, good enough for the silver medal. It was the 10th carreer medal for Dara Torres, who at 41 is the oldest U.S. competitor.
On the Court the U.S. mens squad bested China 101-70, while the team consisting of the fairer sex dominated the host nation 108-63.
Tennis saw the Americans bested in all but 2 matches, with the Williams sisters easily winning their opening round matches.
The number one mens beach vollyball team, Rogers and Dalhouser, rebounded from a shocking loss on day one to beat the Swiss handily on day 3.

A couple of side notes to wrap this up: What are the limits of human performance? The top 5 teams in the 4x100 freestyle relay, won by the US, broke the old world record, at one point in the race, all 8 finalists were ahead of WR time.
How, do people get involved in some of these obscure sports? Handball for instance, the US didn't even field a team. Its a combonation of basketball and soccer, two sports our women dominate in international competition. Why can't we get a bunch of ladies together and bring home the gold in 2012?

In the medal count the Chinese continue to blow the field out of the water with 9 gold medals, more than twice the second place country. But only hold a 2 medal advantage to the US in the over all medal count.

China 9 gold, 3 silver, 2 bronze 14 total
USA 3 gold, 4 silver, 5 bronze 12 total
S. Korea 4 gold, 4 silver, 0 bronze 8 total
Italy 3 gold, 3 silver, 2 bronze 8 total