Games thoughts after 10 days

After 10 days of these Tokyo games I am amazed how well the athletes can compete without big crowds. Although I saw swimming events with lots of USA swimmers and worldwide media in attendance some evenings. 

I really enjoyed the Opening Ceremony which NBC televised live at 6;55 am on July 23. The evening showing of the Opening Ceremony had more commercials than the live morning version. I was watching the opening ceremony as I blogged my "book  report" of the opening ceremony.

The USA has done fairly well so far after 10 days, leading the medal count over China 60-51. However, the USA is behind China in the gold medal count 24-20. The USA is not winning as many gold medals and may be short of 43 gold medals I predicted before the games. I think now my predictions for the USA  medal count will be between 100 and 110 medals won after seeing their haul for 10 days with 37 gold. I will stick with the original predictions I made. however. The USA won 30 medals in swimming, a bit short of the 33 medals won I had predicted but Katie Ledecky and Caeleb Dressel did not disappoint. Track and field is off to a show start with no gold medals after 2 days of competition. 6 shooting medals are something good to see. Also USA medals in fencing are great too. Diving medals compliment USA medal haul as well. It was tough to see 3 USA volleyball teams(1 indoor and 2 beach teams) be eliminated in a 24 hour period(July 31- August 1). Also sweating out USA soccer matches. the loss to Sweden 3-0, which I watched and the Netherlands match which ended in penalty kicks, which the USA won!

Some of my predictions for USA women's gymnastics and USA softball winning gold were not accurate. Also predictions for Trayvon Bromell winning gold, Simone Biles winning gold in team final, all around finals and event finals were not accurate, 

The Simone Biles withdrawal from the team competition, and most event finals due to mental health is the biggest story of these games so far. I saw Simone's first vault in the team competition and Biles truly looked lost in the air. her vault landing was not sharp and her reaction after landing the vault said something was wrong. I was quite surprised that Simone would withdraw knowing the competitor she is but I've been in mental health funks before and competition would be too dangerous for Simone. I've seen Simone compete on June, 6, 2021 at the USA Gymnastics Championships in Fort Worth, Texas. She was incredible! Simone Biles is the GOAT of women's gymnastics and not performing at the Tokyo games wont change that. Now Suni Lee is the next GOAT, having won a silver in the team competition,  Gold in the All Around and bronze on the Uneven Bars. 

NBC's coverage of these games is a first for me. Never have I ever stressed to watch the 8 sports I follow so much. NBC has decided to show events live, which is great but if indoor volleyball, beach volleyball, swimming and gymnastics are all on in prime time on different networks or some sports are not shown at all until the next day. I DVR the USA beach volleyball and indoor volleyball matches along with USA women's soccer matches but didn't watch them all so now I will DVR only the NBC prime time coverage. I did not record any gymnastics team finals or all around competition these games. Olympic sports are shown on 4 NBC networks now, not including the Olympic Channel. NBC, NBCSN, USA Network are the main networks for the Olympics and CNBC shows nighttime and weekend Olympic sports programming. Something new: USA network showing live track and field events from 8-11pm each night at the same time that NBC has their prime time coverage, which today(August 1) included some track and field events too. I have to flip back and forth. Some early USA beach volleyball matches were shown on USA network at the same time (8pm) as NBC's prime time coverage. 

Then there's the times of these events. USA women's soccer times are 4 am eastern time and 7 am.. I'm up watching USA men's and women's basketball games that start at 12:40am eastern time and then diving is shown at 2 am live or a soccer match at 6 am on USA network, gymnastics and track events are shown live. I have waken up twice around 6:45 am for the women's gymnastics team final and yesterday(Sunday August 1) for the men's 100 finals and women's gymnastics event finals on Peacock. The only times I will take a break is in the afternoon's if I've already seen an event live earlier in the day or between 5 pm and 8 pm weekdays and 6pm to 7pm on weekends. These are the 24 hour Olympics. Events are at midnight, 2 am, 4 am, 6 am, track finals are at 8:45 am, Indoor volleyball matches start at 8:45am. There is no time to watch anything on DVR.. The first Saturday of these games I watched from 7:30 am to midnight with about a 3 hour break so that's about 14 hours a day. On Saturday/July 31 I stayed up all night to watch diving and NBC's late night coverage and was up at 6 am to watch women's gymnastics and track and field finals on Peacock, then watched the USA men's volleyball team play at 9:30 am to about 11:30 am before taking a nap until late afternoon. Its 3 am and I've been up since. 

My conclusion is that I will miss events and will sleep over some events like the USA women's soccer team vs Australia at 7 am a few days ago. I cant watch everything I'm used to watching due to the time of the events. I'm having trouble keeping up with programming and its frustrating. No Olympics I've watched has had multiple sports I follow and watch on at the same time on different networks where one has to choose which to watch, even with a DVR. Also I spend 2 times a day blogging the games. The first is in late afternoon, the second is between 11:30pm and midnight eastern time. Blog days are published at about 11:45 pm eastern time every day. Why? the last swimming medal events weren't until 11:30pm eastern time. Track and field events go to 11 pm eastern time most evenings.

NBC's coverage is another story. quick pre-emptions of live action to commercials are normal and lots of commercials, even on videos on twitter i think twitter . I'm watching a USA beach volleyball match and it goes immediately to commercial. Sometimes NBC shows the commercial in one box and the beach volleyball on another box. That's usually in prime time only. NBC is up to its miss several volleyball points each time due to commercials. If the score of a beach volleyball match is 9-9 before the commercial, after the commercial the score is 11-10, therefore I missed 3 points. Also NBC starts airing matches with a 1-1 or 2-1 score in beach volleyball. Its never 0-0.  Sometimes commercials are so long 4-5 points are missed. I may be the only one who notices that NBC might only show 70 percent of a volleyball match. Also NBC shows a set of volleyball only, like parts of matches. Nothing NBC shows viewers in its entirety except USA women's soccer matches and USA men's and women's basketball games. They are broadcast with "limited commercial interruption". Overall, minus the excessive commercials, NBC is doing a decent job covering the games, adding Maria Taylor as host from ESPN. Extra sports analysts add to the broadcasts. Mike Tirico is doing a good job as evening host for NBC.