Great Progress

I’ve bitched before (or is it laughed at) about the Canadian men’s hockey “performance” at the olympics and it still holds true. However, I’m am extremely surprised and pleased at the performance of the Canadian team as a whole.

With a total of 24 medals, good for 3rd or 5th overall (depending how you count) it brings “us” within a couple more performances of the Americans and Germans. It’s also more than the Austrians, Norwegians and Swedes, smaller countries but who usually kick ass at the games.

Of course, you have to take into account the number of medals handed out when comparing with previous games but even then, there’s impressive progress, as Darren shows. Not as big an increase as some would have us believe but excellent nonetheless.

Something that bodes very well for the future is the number of 4th places, 13 of those. I don’t have the numbers at hand but taking 1 through 5th into account and adjusting for those young enough to be there in Vancouver, there are already more potential medals for 2010. Since there were also a number of good, lower, showings by very young athletes who haven’t peaked yet, it looks like chances of reaching the Olympic committee’s goal of first place are pretty good.

Oh, and a completely useless thing to add; there are some cute olympians with great smiles in Canada.