The Olympic Games can break down athletes, and also show the world that sometimes the pressure does not matter. U.S. figure skater Amber Glenn had the saddest reaction of the Games after her short-program mistake, while Alysa Liu says she is not feeling the pressure of holding America's medal hopes in the women's individual. Meanwhile, Ilia Malinin revealed he has received encouraging words from some athletes who are considered GOATs in their sport. Plus, there is one crazy stat that shows how dominant the U.S. women's hockey team has been. Let's get to the newsletter. |
Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated |
The 20-year-old heads into the free skate in third after medal favorite Amber Glenn missed a combination in her short program. |
By Michael Rosenberg Amber Glenn bailed and Alysa Liu gasped. Liu could talk for hours about Glenn—Liu could talk for hours about anything—but at that moment, in the media mixed zone at Milano MSK Competition rink, a gasp was worth a thousand words. Liu was watching her teammate on TV. Glenn was supposed to do a triple loop and didn't. Invalid element. Farewell, gold medal dreams. Figure skating is elegant and powerful, beautiful and precise, but mostly, on the Olympic level, it is tense. There is nothing quite like it in sports. The difference between extraordinary success and crushing disappointment is literally as thin as the blade of a skate—and when a program suddenly collapses, as Glenn's did, skaters have zero seconds to shake it off. They must keep going. "She's gone through so much, and, like, she works so freaking hard," Liu said. "She's overcome a lot, and I just want her to be happy." Happy will have to wait. Glenn, who entered the competition as a medal favorite, finished 13th in the short program. She can make up some ground in Thursday's free skate, but realistically, the medal math just doesn't work. In 2018, Nathan Chen finished 17th in the short program, and then posted the top score in the free skate to vault all the way to fifth, but that was an aberrational performance. Chen did an unprecedented six quadruple jumps that night. |
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In this episode of the Daily Rings podcast, Mitch Goldich and Dan Gartland break down a classic Big Air Skiing Final won by Norway's Tormod Frostad. |
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By Pat Forde Editor's note: If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide or is in emotional distress, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK(8255) or at suicidepreventionlifeline.org Action was a constant in the O'Brien household in Pewaukee, Wis. Seven kids, all athletic, always in motion, rarely a quiet moment. Amid the whirl and the racket, it was notable when Jadin, second-oldest of the brood, was standing stock-still one day in the backyard. Her siblings referred to the little blonde grade-schooler's odd moments as Jadin doing her weird stuff again. Her parents were more concerned. Something was deeply wrong. "She was afraid that if she moved," says Jadin's mom, Leslie, "the house would blow up." This was just one of the debilitating fears and behaviors that gripped Jadin from roughly the ages of 5 through 11. At times she struggled to brush her hair, dress herself or interact at school. At other times she was beset with catastrophic feelings—believing she was doomed to hell, she once tried to carve a cross on her forehead with a spike of a lawn sprinkler. Even at a tender age, she thought God wanted her to take her own life. Life was a daily exercise in terror. |
Marco Bertorello/AFP/Getty Images |
By Ben Steiner
It's the morning after a tumultuous polar storm in 2013 and Winter Vinecki, a future Olympic aerial skier, is tucked into the side of a small rubber motor boat approaching Antarctica's shores. She's 14, alongside her mother, Dawn Estelle, and is guided by naivety and love as she prepares for the third marathon in her journey to become the youngest person to run a marathon on every continent. The night prior, she passed through the perilous Drake Passage on a Russian research vessel, barreling from Argentina towards Antarctica through a body of water that has instilled centuries of fear in adventurers. "It has some of the most notoriously rough waters in the world, and we actually hit a hurricane which had 35-foot waves and 75-mile-an-hour winds that were rocking our boat," Vinecki says. "We just crossed our fingers that it would get better. ... We woke up to race in the morning, and the weather was beautiful." |
United States- 🥇6 🥈10 🥉5 (21) |
Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated |
Though Amber Glenn nailed a triple Axel on her first combination, a missed triple loop later in her program cost her roughly seven points. |
- 6:30 a.m. ET: Men's snowboard slopestyle final (USA Network at 6:45 a.m. ET; NBC coverage at 2:15 p.m. ET) MEDAL 🏅
- 7:20 a.m. ET: Women's alpine skiing slalom (Run 2; USA Network)
- 8:30 a.m ET: Men's and women's cross country team sprint free finals (USA Network; NBC coverage at 12:45 p.m ET) MEDAL 🏅
- 8:45 a.m. ET: Women's biathlon 4x6-km relay (NBC coverage at 12 p.m. ET) MEDAL 🏅
- 10:40 a.m. ET: Men's hockey quarterfinals: Finland vs. Switzerland (USA Network)
- 2:15 p.m. ET: Men's speedskating 500-meter final and women's short-track relay final (USA Network at 2:30 p.m. ET) MEDAL 🏅
- 3:10 p.m. ET: Men's hockey quarterfinals: U.S. vs. Sweden (NBC)
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