Comments on: Hands On A Hard Body

Hands On A Hard Body

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 19:58:46 -0800

Sex at the Olympics. "I am often asked if the Olympic village . . . is the sex-fest it is cracked up to be. My answer is always the same: too right it is." Table tennis Olympian Matthew Syed dishes the dirt. (possibly NSFW, TimesOnline).

By: djgh

djgh — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:02:11 -0800

Lots of single young people, crammed together for long periods of time under intense pressure, with a fixed end date and very small likelihood of seeing each other again? Sounds like college after exams, so no one should be surprised if the results are the same.

By: Alvy Ampersand

Alvy Ampersand — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:06:06 -0800

"Where the world comes, together." "World's fastest man indeed." "Officer I swear, her country said she was 16!"

By: danb

danb — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:09:07 -0800

Fencer? I barely know 'er!

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:16:16 -0800

Hey nola -- I hate the Olympics almost as much as you do. No offense taken. That's why I posted this. It's mockery, not hero worship.

By: Astro Zombie

Astro Zombie — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:16:35 -0800

I remember a study where they found if you put two strangers in a room for a while with the lights out, they tend to start touching each other. And here, with the lights on, are young people in the prime of physical perfection with east access to each other. So this isn't really news, is it? Of course, I conducted that study, and got slapped a lot.

By: jonmc

jonmc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:18:04 -0800

I just hate the Olympics. I don't hate them. I just think that from here on out Michael Phelps should be forced to swim with his medals on.

By: Science!

Science! — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:19:31 -0800

"No I didn't medal in the heptathlon, I couldn't, Monaco only sent five athletes this year."

By: micayetoca

micayetoca — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:22:30 -0800

It's mockery, not hero worship Well, I'll help you by pointing out that the guy who wrote the article looks like an accidented John Turturro.

By: jonmc

jonmc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:26:59 -0800

young people in the prime of physical perfection with east access to each other. Call me crazy, but among consenting adults does it really matter which direction they approach from?

By: ThePinkSuperhero

ThePinkSuperhero — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:27:17 -0800

possibly NSFW It wasn't NSFW at all! Booooooooooooooo!

By: ericb

ericb — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:27:35 -0800

Olympic Sport of 'Hooking up' Gains Popularity as Games in Final Week. Olympics and Safe Sex ... What's the Harm in That?^*

By: Liosliath

Liosliath — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:28:58 -0800

I think nola might like the Olympics better if there were gators in the pool.

By: acoutu

acoutu — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:33:15 -0800

Hmmm...I hate to make accusations, but that Fox article came out at the end of the day in which the Globe and Mail first wrote up the Romance and the Rings story (August 14). Was the Globe the first out of the blocks or is there any earlier article (for this Olympics)?

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:33:20 -0800

It wasn't NSFW at all! I was mostly referring to the photo near the top. I'm sure there are bosses who would not appreciate seeing that on an employee's monitor, so I thought I'd give fair warning.

By: onlyconnect

onlyconnect — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:35:02 -0800

But - and this is the thing - success does not work both ways. Gold-medal winning female athletes are not looked upon by male athletes with any more desire than those who flunked out in the first round. It is sometimes even considered a defect, as if there is something downright unfeminine about all that striving, fist pumping and incontinent sweating. Sport, in this respect, is a reflection of wider society, where male success is a universal desirable whereas female success is sexually ambiguous. Aw geez, there is even a glass ceiling for women when it comes to sex in the Olympic village? This is a crushing blow.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:36:52 -0800

From the Bangkok Post article: "And if there are free condoms going around, people will feel like using them." If only it were that easy, we'd have HIV on its heels globally. I love how the emphasis is on "free." As if paying 50 cents for a condom were a real obstacle to anyone.

By: Sailormom

Sailormom — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:45:18 -0800

A man went over to his girl's place for a little bit of nookie between the sheets. He presented her with three choices of condom -- gold, silver, or bronze. "Silver," she said. "Why not gold?" he asked. "Because I want you to come second for once!" But seriously, you might enjoy reading about The World's First Summons To A Sexual Olympics by Alexander Gross.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:45:36 -0800

*anyone as well off as an Olympic athlete -- I'm sure there are places where fifty cents for a condom is a bit of a . . . . stretch.

By: jonmc

jonmc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:52:27 -0800

Y'know, everytime I turned on the Olympics this year, it was nothing but swimming and beach volleyball. Chicks in bikinis and dudes in grape smugglers, that'd make anybody horny. (and to return to Phelps, remember the last American swimmer to win a lot of medals? Mark Spitz? He's a damn dentist now. A few years later Bruce Jenner won the decathalon and made a fortune in endorsements. I don't even know if we had anybody in the decathalon this year. It's a weird world. )

By: jamesonandwater

jamesonandwater — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:56:23 -0800

Hey if it could do it for Syed, who according to google images is a balding brit ping pong player, it could work for anyone I guess. I do think his little factoid about the medal-winning men being the hawt stuff, but nobody caring where the women placed, was interesting.

By: ofthestrait

ofthestrait — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:56:36 -0800

I'm excited the Olympics will be over as well. I've had a raging hard-on for almost two weeks.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:56:37 -0800

This sex fest was not limited to Barcelona: the same thing happened in Sydney in 2000, my second Olympics as an athlete This guy's a table tennis player! I'm sure that women, men, and small animals alike swooned at the sight of his toned forearms.

By: cjorgensen

cjorgensen — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:58:04 -0800

Ok, dude plays table tennis. I'm surprised he even gets laid there. Or well, surprised his chances are better there than say the YMCA camp where he learned to play.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 20:59:37 -0800

The Year of the Sex Olympics (1968): the play depicts a world of the future where a small elite control the media, keeping the lower classes docile by serving them an endless diet of lowest common denominator programming and pornography. Thank God that didn't happen!

By: not_on_display

not_on_display — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:07:45 -0800

The 26-year-old Russian pole-vaulter - “the chick with the stick” - takes the women's silver medal. I'm totally ordering that calendar when it comes out!

By: netbros

netbros — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:14:07 -0800

The diving competition in recent days reminded me of one of my more dubious athletic exploits. When I was a teen, I wasn't a half bad diver, although not half good either. While on family vacation one summer I was fooling around on the three meter springboard, practicing flips and twists. I got a little carried away on one dive though, trying two and a half somersaults in the tuck position. When the back of my head contacted the water first, I was still fully in that tuck, slamming my face directly into both knees. Carried around two black eyes for a couple weeks after that. No sex for me.

By: ericb

ericb — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:21:57 -0800

I don't even know if we had anybody in the decathalon this year. Yep. The U.S. did. Bryan Clay. He won the gold medal yesterday!

By: Pinback

Pinback — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:23:19 -0800

I think it's worth noting that the Times Online has a "Post To Fark" button at the bottom of every story...

By: KokuRyu

KokuRyu — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:31:20 -0800

Hey nola -- I hate the Olympics almost as much as you do. No offense taken. That's why I posted this. It's mockery, not hero worship. The Olympic machine itself should be the subject mockery, or, even better, scrutiny. However, no athlete competing at the Olympics should be mocked, because what they are doing is stupendous and terrific, like any Picasso or Georgia O'Keefe or Albert Einstein. Sure, the striving may seem strange to us left-wing hipsters, but a certain portion of the human race is hardwired to be competitive, and to value winning more than anything else. It's just the way it is, and I will always have respect for Olympic athletes and their accomplishments. But the IOC and Juan Antonio Samaranch and Jacques Rogge are autocratic kleptocrats, and it's too bad that, by association, they tarnish the image of Olympic athletes.

By: Saucy Intruder

Saucy Intruder — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:31:41 -0800

heh heh.. bangkok post.

By: stavrogin

stavrogin — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:34:02 -0800

I think it's worth noting that the Times Online has a "Post To Fark" button at the bottom of every story... Some days, Fark has a "Post To Metafilter" button at the bottom of every story.

By: KokuRyu

KokuRyu — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:34:51 -0800

Besides, if you were locked up for two weeks with Alenka Bikar or the Finnish long jump squad, wouldn't it positively carbonate your hormones?

By: billyfleetwood

billyfleetwood — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:40:48 -0800

I remember reading something about this subject years ago. The weird part is that over the past couple of weeks, whenever i've mentioned to somebody that Olympic village is a huge meat market, the usual response has been mostly skeptical.

By: joedan

joedan — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:44:54 -0800

Yeah, I'm pretty sure we've discussed this on MeFi before. This story comes out around the time of every Olympics.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:46:25 -0800

i would contribute to this thread, but i'm too busy watching the Russian rhythmic gymnastics team...

By: longsleeves

longsleeves — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:03:54 -0800

What, no comment yet about how American athletes may have had the most sex, but not the most GOLD MEDAL sex?

By: pjern

pjern — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:22:38 -0800

I tried out for the Olympic hookup team back in 1976. I was a couple of inches short. Life goes on.

By: grounded

grounded — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:35:36 -0800

Funny how all these Olympic sex articles came out within days of each other. I suspect the Media Office issued a press release with talking points and all.

By: LobsterMitten

LobsterMitten — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:43:35 -0800

He goes on about the women's "virility"... and then about how they're gushing estrogen... and then at the end about how this is all fuelled by testosterone. Informative.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:09:38 -0800

Hell, Lobster, all those athletes are taking so many performance enhancing drugs (and I don't believe they are really tested carefully -- the Olympics depends on drug-enhanced performances for ratings) that those could all be true statements!

By: Ambrosia Voyeur

Ambrosia Voyeur — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:46:07 -0800

heh.

By: dhartung

dhartung — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 00:22:22 -0800

Now, I have always felt a bit sorry for the jocks. They're in their own narrow social milieu, and they devote so much time to their obsessive pursuit that they have little time to develop friends and get some experience with the opposite sex. So when they go to their "cons" I expect them to get a little wild. Just keep it out of the hotel jacuzzi so the mundanes don't see, OK?

By: dirtynumbangelboy

dirtynumbangelboy — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 00:53:51 -0800

The Olympic machine itself should be the subject mockery, or, even better, scrutiny. However, no athlete competing at the Olympics should be mocked, because what they are doing is stupendous and terrific, like any Picasso or Georgia O'Keefe or Albert Einstein. Quoted for the motherfucking truth. Hell, Lobster, all those athletes are taking so many performance enhancing drugs Cite or STFU, n00b. See above. i would contribute to this thread, but i'm too busy watching the Russian rhythmic gymnastics team Men's diving. Why does Matthew Matcham have a boyfriend? goddammit.

By: pernishus

pernishus — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 02:12:59 -0800

Why does Matthew Matcham have a boyfriend? I see he's on your 'A' list... [grin]

By: the cydonian

the cydonian — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 02:17:24 -0800

I find it befittingly appropriate that India's " most eligible bachelor" has effing returned to the country, and is (was) busy meeting VVIP's and such. Clearly, India needs to do some work on improving all aspects of our Olympic participation, not just tripling our medal tally from 2004. _{Sigh. 1.1 billion people getting one-third the Olympic medals Phelps has won. Oooh well, we aren't doing so bad in the Nobel Prizes and Booker's.}

By: the cydonian

the cydonian — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 02:18:11 -0800

_{The ummm, formatting, ummm... it was Opera's fault! I swear it looked alright in Live Preview. :-|}

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 03:52:40 -0800

Men's diving. Why does Matthew Matcham have a boyfriend? goddammit. You mean this guy? His boyfriend wasn't all *that* much to look at. I reckon a bait & switch is easily possible. Here's the deal: I'll send Matthew in your direction if you can divert the Belorussian* rhythmic gymnasts this way. * yeh, take that, Russians.

By: jack_mo

jack_mo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 04:05:52 -0800

lukemeister wrote: The Year of the Sex Olympics (1968): the play depicts a world of the future where a small elite control the media, keeping the lower classes docile by serving them an endless diet of lowest common denominator programming and pornography. Thank God that didn't happen! That teleplay is just unbelievably prophetic. I would've loved to have sat down with the late, great Nigel Kneale and watched a few episodes of Big Brother. (Afterwards, fuelled by righteous anger, we could've taken a trip to the BBC to punch them in the collective dick for wiping the colour master tapes.)

By: paisley henosis

paisley henosis — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 04:37:33 -0800

I find it befittingly appropriate that India's " most eligible bachelor" has effing returned to the country, and is (was) busy meeting VVIP's and such. I think he actually left the next day, he didn't stay in China long at all. The paper today has a photo of some guy giving him a brand new "luxury Volvo," too. Cause the guy with his own private shooting range needs a free car.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:46:20 -0800

Citations, so I don't have to "STFU" just because dnab says so: Ukrainian Blonska stripped of silver medal in heptathlon "Ukrainian weightlifter Igor Razoronov has become the sixth athlete to be thrown out of the Beijing Olympics after testing positive for the banned substance nandrolone." NY Times: As Records Fall, Suspicions of Doping Linger So are you just naive, or does your lust for all those "great artists" blind you to the obvious?

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:48:23 -0800

Cause the guy with his own private shooting range needs a free car. Private shooting range? I assumed he got all his air-rifle practice from taking potshots at pigeons & pariah dogs from the rooftop of his parental home.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:49:48 -0800

Oh, and hey, animal abuse too! They dope the horses for the Olympic equestrian events. Does that not matter either> And more: "Another disastrous blot on Ireland's copybook" And here's a good summary of the reasons not to believe Rogge or the Chinese that they have it all under control, move along, nothing to see here.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:55:37 -0800

Withnail: Listen to this. "Curse of the superman. I took drugs to win medals said top athlete Geoff Woade." I: Where's the coffee? Withnail [reading from the paper]: "In a world exclusive interview 33 year old shot putter Geoff Woade who weight 317 pounds, admitted taking massive doses of anabolic steroids, drugs banned in sport. It used to get him bad tempered and act down said his wife. He used to pick on me. But now he's stopped his much better in our sex life and in our general life." [I pours water from the kettle into a bowl and goes back into the living room. Withnail follows him.] Withnail: My God, this huge, thatched head with its earlobes and cannonball is now considered sane. "Geoff Woade is feeling better and is now prepared to step back into society and start tossing his orb about." Look at him. Look at Geoff Woade. His head must weight fifty pounds on its own. [Withnail stands infront of a mirror and brushes his long, greasy hair with a comb. I sits on the settee and starts drinking the coffee from the bowl using a spoon.] Withnail: Imagine the size of his balls. Imagine getting into a fight with the fucker! I: Please! I don't feel good. Withnail: That's what you'd say but that wouldn't wash with Geoff. No! He'd like a bit of pleading. Add spice to it. In fact, he'd probably tell you what he was going to do before he did it. "I'm going to pull you head off". "Oh no, please, don't pull my head off". "I'm going to pull your head off because I don't like your head!"

By: dirtynumbangelboy

dirtynumbangelboy — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 07:07:38 -0800

1) You said 'all'. A few--even a few dozen--is not 'all'. 2) MeTa.

By: cortex

cortex — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 07:42:08 -0800

[Please drop it, pronto.]

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:23:11 -0800

Nope, not when we could be watching the gymnastics instead.

By: cortex

cortex — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:33:05 -0800

[Hi! Please read that previous comment! It was pretty clear!]

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:44:55 -0800

Working list of doping-banned athletes Pre-Olympics 2008 Name Gender Country Sport Drug World Record? Nathan Baggaley M Australia Canoeing Anabolic Steroids Silver Medalist Lisa Huethaler F Austria Triathlon Bribery Rebecca Gumoa F Brazil Swimming Donka Mincheva F Bulgaria Weightlifting Gergana Kirilova F Bulgaria Weightlifting Milka Maneva F Bulgaria Weightlifting Alan Tsagaev M Bulgaria Weightlifting Demir Demirev M Bulgaria Weightlifting Georgi Markov M Bulgaria Weightlifting Ivailo Filev M Bulgaria Weightlifting Ivan Markov M Bulgaria Weightlifting Ivan Stoitsov M Bulgaria Weightlifting Mehmed Fikretov M Bulgaria Weightlifting Velichko Cholako M Bulgaria Weightlifting Gao Li F China Diving furosemide Zhang Jun F China Diving furosemide Song Hongjuan F China Race Walking EPO Sun Yingjie F China Track and Field Androsterone Wang Hongni F China Track and Field OOC failed test Asian Games triathlon gold medallist Shan Yan F China Weightlifting indapamide- masking agent Ouyang Kunpeng M China Swimming 3 silver medals in the 2006 Doha Asian Games Xin Jia M China Track and Field Testosterone Zhang Qi M China Track and Field Under Investigation National Chinese Record Shot put Luo Meng M China Wrestling Yi Changming China Swimming Under Investigation Milan Andreas M Czech Republic Archery THC Peter Riis Andersen M Denmark Mountain Biking Ambesse Tolosa F Ethiopia Marathon Morphine Won 4 marathons lifetime including Paris and Tokyo Dwain Chambers M GB, UK Track and Field THG, Testosterone, EPO, HGH, Insulin, Costas Kenteris F Greece Track and Field Missed Test Katerina Thanou F Greece Track and Field Motorcycle Accident/Missed Test Silver Medalist 100m 2004 Aikaterini Roditi F Greece Weightlifting M3 Anna Athanasiadou F Greece Weightlifting M3 Eleni Kourtelidou F Greece Weightlifting M3 Olibia Toka F Greece Weightlifting M3 Vasiliki Kasapi F Greece Weightlifting Dimitris Regas M Greece Track and Field Methyltrienolone Tassos Goussis M Greece Track and Field Methyltrienolone Atrhouros Akritidis M Greece Weightlifting M3 Dimitros Papageridis M Greece Weightlifting M3 Konstantinos Papadopoulos M Greece Weightlifting M3 Vasilis Konstantinidis M Greece Weightlifting M3 Victor Mitrov M Greece Weightlifting M3 Anita Kumari F India Weightlifting Stanozolol Kavita Devi F India Weightlifting Monika Devi F India Weightlifting Anabolic Steroids Saileja Rujari F India Weightlifting Satish Rai M India Weightlifting Stanozolol Max Jaben M Israel Swimming Boldenone Marta Bastianelli F Italy Cycling Andrea Baldini F Italy Fencing Laure La Piana F Italy Swimming Ivan Basso M Italy Cycling Operation Puerto Riccardo Ricco M Italy Cycling EPO Julien Dunkley M Jamaica Track and Field Boldenone Simon Vroeman M Netherlan Track and Field Dianabol Steeplechase World Record Holder Mohammad Shah M Pakistan Track and Field Winny Noshee Parveen M Pakistan Track and Field Nandrolone Cristina Vasiloiu F Romania Track and Field EPO Elena Antoci F Romania Track and Field EPO Liliana Popescu F Romania Track and Field Valery Borchin F Russia Race Walking EPO Darya Pishchalnikova F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Gulfia Khanafeyeva F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Former Hammer Throw Record Olga Yegorova F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Former 5000m Champ Svetlana Cherkasova F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Tatyana Tomashova F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Twice 1500m Champ Yelena Soboleva, F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Indoor 1500m Champ Yuliya Fomenko F Russia Track and Field Tampered Test Vladimir Gusev M Russia Cycling Abnormal Blood Alexei Voevodi M Russia Race Walking EPO Vladimir Kanaikin M Russia Race Walking EPO Mikulas Konopka M Slovenia Track and Field Metadienon and Winstrol 2007 Indoor Europeon Championship Shot Put Süreyya Ayhan F Turkey Track and Field Missed Test European 1500m Champ Ismayl Sillakh M Ukraine Boxing Unknown Jessica Hardy F USA Swimming Clen 50m Breaststroke World Record, former 100m Breaststroke WR Sadam Ali M USA Boxing Cathine Justin Gatlin M USA Track and Field Testosterone Former 100m World Record Paul Doherty M USA Weightlifting Testosterone USA olympian

By: cortex

cortex — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:49:04 -0800

fcm, your last three links have all been empty.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:53:22 -0800

cortex, Can you investigate Katullus? There's no way he's doing all those great posts without a little help, if you know what I mean.

By: cowbellemoo

cowbellemoo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:08:20 -0800

Can cortex or any other helpful soul explain to me how the doping comments aren't a massive unsexy derail? C'mon, people, back to the wink-wink-nudge-nudge.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:13:30 -0800

cowbellemoo, Maybe the performances on the field aren't the only ones being enhanced.

By: cortex

cortex — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:16:24 -0800

The topic wandering isn't really a problem on the blue; it happens a lot, and it's pretty much par for the course (and even, in its benign form, a good thing) in conversation here. But if it's going to continue, it needs to be done without any further sniping or interpersonal nastiness. That's basically it.

By: scrump

scrump — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:27:21 -0800

I think nola might like the Olympics better if there were gators in the pool.

Who wouldn't?

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:29:56 -0800

I would like to see events combined - for instance, throwing the javelin while doing the 3 1/2 reverse somersault from the 10-meter diving board.

By: LobsterMitten

LobsterMitten — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:40:33 -0800

"I'm going to pull your head off because I don't like your head!" hee hee hee

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:44:21 -0800

Hmm, wonder what's up with those links being empty. Sorry about that, cortex. I'm really trying hard to live up to the challenge to "cite or STFU, n00b." I apologize profusely for not citing properly before. So here are those links again: "Olympics rocked by first major doping scandal" http://www.independent.ie/sport/other-sports/olympics-2008/news/olympics-rocked-by-first-major-doping-scandal-1456439.html Working list of athletes banned pre-olympics for doping: http://grg51.typepad.com/steroid_nation/2008/08/nathan-baggaley.html Doping athletes still an olympic-sized problem: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/ 20080822/dope_athletes_080822/20080824?s_name=beijing2008 I can keep going. There are roughly 2 million hits for "2008 olympics doping" on Google. But I rest my case. I also apologize for thinking "STFU n00b" was meant as an insult or an abusive comment.

By: ktoad

ktoad — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:07:18 -0800

We started out with sex and ended up on drugs. I usually try to work it the other way.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:09:51 -0800

And somehow, we skipped rock and roll.

By: cowbellemoo

cowbellemoo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:24:27 -0800

Maybe the performances on the field aren't the only ones being enhanced. :O cortex: Mmmkay. I guess I was just thrown by the drastic change in tenor and it didn't feel right. Happy sexy fun to OMGDOPING.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:24:31 -0800

Found a pretty cool article on Wired that seems worth posting too: Cheats of Strength: 10 Next-Gen Olympic Doping Methods

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:28:11 -0800

We started out with sex and ended up on drugs. And somehow, we skipped rock and roll. It's very good indeed.

By: Busithoth

Busithoth — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:32:14 -0800

I just think it's nice to get corroboration on my long-held belief that these athletes are fucking like bunnies when outside the view of 100+ frames per second cameras. (what a money shot that'd make, though) I don't follow Olympics much, and when I see people who follow it (them?) compulsively, I take another step away. They've got their viewers, the record books will be updated accordingly, and yet not one of these fuckers is any better prepared for war (which was the whole point of the games, back in the day). As for scandals, I think the IOC has more skeletons in their closet than the athletes. Oh, and thank the gods NYC wasn't chosen for 2012...

By: Zambrano

Zambrano — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:42:43 -0800

... or Paris.

By: KokuRyu

KokuRyu — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:43:03 -0800

I can keep going. There are roughly 2 million hits for "2008 olympics doping" on Google. But I rest my case. Okay, I take it back. According to fcm, all Olympic athletes use performance-enhancing drugs, so Olympic athletes deserve to be mocked. God, I can't stand "jocks", even though high school was twenty years ago.

By: homunculus

homunculus — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 10:58:03 -0800

Weary Beijing volunteers verging on mutiny

By: dirtynumbangelboy

dirtynumbangelboy — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 11:20:01 -0800

So uh, math: 10500 athletes ~5000 tests 78 positives = 0.007% of athletes = "all those athletes are taking so many performance enhancing drugs" Uh.. right. Yeah, ok.

By: cortex

cortex — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 12:28:38 -0800

For fuck's sake, cut it out. fourcheesemac, that very much includes you. If you cannot drop the fucking petty rivalry thing, do it elsewhere.

By: Fuzzy Monster

Fuzzy Monster — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 13:37:06 -0800

Yeah, not every Olympic athlete is drugged up. Many of them are simply genetic mutants, like Michael Phelps.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 14:51:00 -0800

Many of them are simply genetic mutants Many of them? I'd say the vast majority. I take it as a given that to reach the Olympics, you first have to be blessed with the required genetic freakdom for your chosen sport, then devote most of your waking hours to training for a decade or more. Unfortunately, many can put the training in, but not happen to be almost seven feet tall with arms that reach to the knees, taking the swimmers as an example. In that case, you train for the decade, and if lucky might make a quarter-final in your national qualifying rounds.

By: ten pounds of inedita

ten pounds of inedita — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 15:51:55 -0800

They're totally genetic freaks. Every single one of them. Unfortunately, most of them will pass on those genes. With all the fucking that goes on at the village, I imagine that they occasionally pas on those genes with each other. Creatures with hands the size of walrus flippers and legs like treetrunks, able to shatter steel with one punch and hit the bullseye from 300 yards by throwing the genetic baseline at it. And, actually, I'm with fcm on this: the incidence of PED use is orders of magnitude higher than what has been caught. Maybe not 100%, but more than 80%.

By: nursegracer

nursegracer — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 16:15:41 -0800

Even better, some of the genetic adaptations useful in sports can greatly enhance the sexual experience with a given athlete. For example: Fencers. Damn, we have some amazing leg strength. When one of my teammates from college was fencing Sada Jacobson, I was mesmerized by the fact that her leading thigh was bigger around than my head. Or perhaps we can consider the kayakers. Their lower bodies may be atrophied, but damn, they could make up for it with the ability to keep their partner hovering in the air using only one arm.

By: dirtynumbangelboy

dirtynumbangelboy — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 16:34:45 -0800

And, actually, I'm with fcm on this: the incidence of PED use is orders of magnitude higher than what has been caught. Maybe not 100%, but more than 80%. And this is based on.. what, exactly?

By: ten pounds of inedita

ten pounds of inedita — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 16:38:50 -0800

You're too close to the debate; I'm not going to treat with you on the subject.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 16:46:45 -0800

nursegracer: they get a terrible rap from the public, but I bet a synchronised swimmer would be able to exhaust an entire college football team.

By: sammyo

sammyo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 17:32:58 -0800

Hmm, I'd wondered why the (quite young) woman's Saber team that swept gold/silver/bronze in the first day or two was 'sent home to enter college' right after their award presentation and miss the closing ceremony...

By: troybob

troybob — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:04:53 -0800

Back to the important stuff: I had planned that men's gymnastics and greco-roman wrestling would be the hottest matches, but then I came across water polo, and what's cool is that those guys aren't overly skinny like the swimmers (bulky = better), and they don't seem to shave their chests as often (hairy = hot). Whether or not these guys are hooking up with each other is less important than my fantasy that they are, and that I have been invited.

By: mannequito

mannequito — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:09:18 -0800

So is this a summer only phenomenon ... how about the winter olympics? Might make it worth my while to stick around Vancouver a bit longer.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:15:40 -0800

Thank you, ten pounds. *Any* reasonable observer of the history of sports doping and PED usage suspects that the numbers are high -- though even I don't think it's really 80 percent, but somewhere pretty far north of .007 percent is a no brainer. There are literally hundreds of ways athletes can beat the testing system, including using slightly modified versions of many of the PEDs that simply don't show up on current tests. Many doctors and experts think the testing system is a joke -- on purpose. And unless you believe that super high tech swim suits and sneakers have accelerated human evolution, the sheer number of new "world record" scores and times we see every four years is itself dispositive.

By: ten pounds of inedita

ten pounds of inedita — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:27:03 -0800

The Silvester polls (also here) suggest that as recently as 1984, 68% of athletes were doping. In 2008, with the increased availability of different PEDs (many of which can't be caught in testing), the more rigorous cleaning programs and the frankly laughable testing regime, I can't imagine that the number has dropped. Remember, anabolic steroids were prohibited by the IOC in 1976, but eight years later 68% of athletes were still doping. Note that the people who are getting caught tend to be from non-first-world nations where doping technology isn't what it is in, say, Canada. If we learned today that the number was 99%, I wouldn't even bat an eye. To relate this to the topic, I have to assume that the newer PEDs don't interfere with the ability to get it up.

By: KokuRyu

KokuRyu — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 19:20:36 -0800

I'm not really sure how performance enhancing drugs can really help the pure beauty and artistry linked to here. She and her peers are as close to superheroes that our species is going to get. But, sneer in her general direction if you like.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 19:55:22 -0800

You know, I don't actually think that the use of PEDs (or not) obviates the "pure beauty and artistry" of athletic performance. Well, "pure," maybe. But beauty and artistry are in the eye of the beholder. Drug-enhanced performance can be amazing to watch. Ask anyone who's watched Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens play. If the point is simply to enhance the visual spectacle -- which, I argue, is in fact the case -- the use of PEDs is a brilliant strategy. The question is not whether the athleticism is amazing or not. It's whether the competition is *fair* or not. And whether it's truthfully represented or not. And whether we're watching the results only of hard work and discipline and sacrifice or the results of chemically enhanced bodies. And most of all, whether or not all the athletes have the same advantages and handicaps. Indeed, if 100 percent of the athletes were doped, it would be fair, at least. But if 80 percent, or 40 percent, or for that matter .007 percent of the athletes are using PEDs, then it's not a fair competition. For example, it used to be a rule that Olympians had to be nominally "amateur." Somewhere, that went away. And instead of collegiate level basketball, now we get to see pro players in the Olympics. It's unquestionably a more exciting game, faster and more aggressive and athletic than collegiate ball. But is it "pure" or is it "enhanced?" And do all the players and all the teams enjoy the same advantages, or does this privilege the US team, since the US has an established and wealthy professional basketball league that dwarfs any other nation's? And do you really feel better about your country when it wins easily, when it's expected to win and does, when it has huge structural advantages that make it a joke when the USA plays Greece or Latvia? So this is another reason I don't really get what the argument is here. There is little doubt that some significant number -- more than .007 percent, less than 100 percent -- of Olympians are using illegal PEDs along with every legal advantage they can gain. It doesn't detract from the observation that many of the PED users are actually, clearly, amazing athletes anyway. So what? That doesn't excuse cheating. The sad thing is that "winning" has become more important than "competing." Yet the rhetoric continues to assure us we're watching fair competition in which all nations and all athletes are roughly equal to begin with. If the IOC would just abandon the rules and let everyone use whatever techniques they wished to improve their performances, we'd be onto something. Indeed, John Tierney argued for just this in a NY Times piece a few weeks back. Since we can't seem to beat back the bioengineering of athletic performance, let's open it all up. (See "Let the Games Be Doped.") Using pre-taped vocal tracks can make a concert better too. The only question is whether what you're hearing is what you think you're hearing. Sure it sounds "better." Does it matter that the star is not really singing all the lines? Is it OK if everyone knows she's lip synching? Does it matter? These are philosophical, not factual, questions. Me, I assume when I watch Olympic competition that I am seeing doped athletes. It's the consequence of years of doping scandals, across dozens of sports. Whether or not it's true, it's a pretty widespread perception. But saying so gets one shouted down and told to shut up around here. Because those magnificent athletes couldn't possibly put winning above the pure beauty of sportsmanlike competition on a level playing field. Nor could their coaches, or their governments, or their financial backers, or the TV networks, or the advertisers. Nope. Everyone is as pure as the driven snow, positively and truly Olympian, with an unbroken heritage of global harmony and peaceful competition going back to the ancient Greeks. (OK, actually, the early 20th century, but that's another one of those fictions -- that the Olympics are not part of the global order of power and nationalism and colonialism. Pshaw.) So the real problem is hypocrisy, as usual. I could care less whether athletes use drugs. I just find it surprising that some people are so invested in the pretense that they don't.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 20:12:14 -0800

(PS -- I am, by the way, a supporter of drug-enhanced sex, between athletes or not. )

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 21:10:01 -0800

And do you really feel better about your country when it wins easily, when it's expected to win and does, when it has huge structural advantages that make it a joke when the USA plays Greece or Latvia? Hey, the Latvian womens' team gave the USA a good run for their money, only going down 84-74. I'd rephrase the question as "do you really feel better about your country when it wins by only ten points over a country around one hundredth its size?"

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:22:39 -0800

Women's basketball. That's another story. Indeed, the only real competition seems to be in the marginal sports that don't have big TV audiences. I tuned in twice or three times to the Olympics over the past two weeks, only to hear gung ho American announcers rooting for American athletes in a shamelessly partisan way, and almost always predicting the exact outcomes of the later stages of competition based on established rankings and records. There was almost zero suspense, short of someone actually screwing up a dive or falling off a balance beam. They told you who was going to "win," and were usually right. No truly fair competition is that predictable.

By: mecran01

mecran01 — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:52:14 -0800

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:58:01 -0800

Actually, I watched the BMX. And after I got over laughing at the idea of it being an Olympic sport, I was might impressed with those Latvian riders. So fair enough. I was strictly talking men's basketball. No insult to Latvia intended.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 23:06:08 -0800

Well, in the men's basketball, our Baltic neighbours, Lithuania, are quite a powerhouse. There are only around 2 million people living there, too. But overall, it's surprising that the competition was so close against the Dream Team. The Spaniards were right up with them throughout the gold medal game, and even more surprisingly, Argentina are now ranked #1 in the world, USA second, Spain third & Greece fourth. (presumably, the top NBA players are worth too much to bother competing for the US regularly...?) I also found BMX to be a silly sport for the Olympics, but hey, a gold's a gold!

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 23:06:58 -0800

(oh, and no insult taken)

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 23:39:55 -0800

It seems to me that athletes who are worth millions of dollars healthy would not play all out in the Olympics when they had an upcoming professional season. Maybe I'm just wrong about that. Or maybe US professional basketball players aren't all they're cracked up to be. My point, however, is that we already know which countries and which exact athletes "dominate" in which sports. And there were very few major upsets that I could see in the big sports. Where's the competition in that?

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 00:00:36 -0800

It seems to me that athletes who are worth millions of dollars healthy would not play all out in the Olympics when they had an upcoming professional season. Maybe I'm just wrong about that. Fair point. They probably never got out of second gear.

By: any major dude

any major dude — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 08:31:31 -0800

The story about athletes and free condoms has been recurring since Barcelona 1992, I think it's funny that they didn't start handing out the condoms until it was assured there would technically be no East German women in the competition.

By: troybob

troybob — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 09:52:38 -0800

There was almost zero suspense, short of someone actually screwing up a dive or falling off a balance beam. They told you who was going to "win," and were usually right. My impression was that a good bit of that commentary was added after the actual events, for the time-delayed stuff. In men's gymnasty, they made this obvious at many points ("here is where he is going to screw up', etc.)

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:46:06 -0800

Really? How totally lame.

By: Civil_Disobedient

Civil_Disobedient — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 19:20:44 -0800

Apologies for continuing the derail, but I recently heard an NPR story about a N. Korean Olympic athlete that was stripped of her medal because she was caught for doping. The sport in question? Air pistol. I started to envision some freakish dude with a beefed-up trigger-finger as wide as a kielbasa, but apparently the "dope" in question was a beta-blocker used to control trembling. If freakin' air pistol competitors are doping, I don't think it's crazy to assume a goodly percentage of the other, more "sporty" sports are filled with dopers as well.

By: Civil_Disobedient

Civil_Disobedient — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 19:22:06 -0800

Ah, appears it was a male athlete. Apologies once again.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 04:52:25 -0800

Awesome. I have no idea why shooting is an Olympic sport; or why they don't let military marksmen walk away with it, which they surely would do if they competed. But yeah, if you need to be drugged to control your ITCHY TRIGGER FINGER you should definitely not be around firearms. Or large crowds. Or other athletes. It's not a derail, anyway. Topics evolve. This one sure did. See what happens when you tell someone to "shut the fuck up"? You get the opposite effect. People don't like being told to shut up; I know I don't. It has the opposite effect on me, and I certainly have not one ounce of respect for people who use such fascist tactics in a debate. Now this thread is a comprehensive documentation of the doping scandals in Beijing/08 to date, and those of you who insist that you would be shocked, SHOCKED, to find Olympic athletes, those great paragons of virtue and artistry, using PEDs, made it happen by trying to silence ideas you didn't like hearing. I'll lay down the marker: by four years from now, we'll have learned that there were just as many doping athletes at Beijing 08 as there were in any of the last several Olympics, if not more. Some major names will become the Marion Joneses of Beijing, including some of the big winners being lauded and lusted over in all the Olympo-syncophantic threads elsewhere on MeFi. Remember Marion Jones? No doubt if someone had said she was doping during the Sydney games here on MeFi, they would have been told to shut the fuck up for saying so. Now she's going to jail. Because any honest and rational observer knows that a significant number of athletes must be doping for there to be so many new "world records" set every four years. I'd put money on it, if anyone is interested and has patience to wait four years. Will it be Phelps? Bolt? Liukin? I don't know. But it will be someone who's got a chestful of gold and a huge endorsement deal out of the whole thing.

By: jaimystery

jaimystery — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 08:44:37 -0800

I have no idea why shooting is an Olympic sport; or why they don't let military marksmen walk away with it, which they surely would do if they competed. But yeah, if you need to be drugged to control your ITCHY TRIGGER FINGER you should definitely not be around firearms. Or large crowds. Or other athletes. Obviously, you don't know about Walton Eller (Gold Men's Double Trap) and Vincent Hancock (Gold Men's Skeet) - both members of the US Army Marksmanship Unit. Or about Lones W. Wigger, Jr.. Many of the top Olympians in marksmanship are military or ex-military - especially for male shooters.

By: paisley henosis

paisley henosis — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 08:52:06 -0800

Reading the last few posts makes me think how interesting it would be if the Olympics were returned to their original, martial focus. Events centered around skills useful to a modern soldier, and athletes culled from active-duty rosters. You could even have Elite and Service tiers, so that Special Forces types could competes amongst their own, and grunts amongst their own. Seems like it would give the winning nations even more Big Swinging Dick status, too.

By: cortex

cortex — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:00:29 -0800

But yeah, if you need to be drugged to control your ITCHY TRIGGER FINGER you should definitely not be around firearms. And if you need to be drugged to control your INABILITY TO STOP LEAPING IN PLACE CONSTANTLY you should probably avoid pole vaulting competitions. Shooting involves minute, precise control of a small object to fire an even smaller object through space at a small target. Marksmen using drugs aren't going to be compensating for wild tremors, they're trying to edge down that last little bit of involuntary twitch that distance amplifies to a difference of an inch or three in the far distance. Larger doping arguments notwithstanding, there might very well be a much higher bang-for-buck incentive, so to speak, for a shooter to medicate than for a runner to do so.

By: fourcheesemac

fourcheesemac — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 15:31:10 -0800

Very interesting and informative. Thank you very much.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:43:49 -0800

how interesting it would be if the Olympics were returned to their original, martial focus. Events centered around skills useful to a modern soldier They already have these kinds of competitions, but they involve carrying out campaigns from behind a keyboard & monitor.

By: UbuRoivas

UbuRoivas — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:49:46 -0800

there might very well be a much higher bang-for-buck incentive, so to speak, for a shooter to medicate than for a runner to do so. I think it's more the idea that at such an elite level, every last percentage point counts - think of Michael Phelps winning a race by 0.01 of a second. And different kinds of medication are suited to different sports. There was an Aussie modern pentathlete (?) a few games ago (might've been the Commonwealth Games, I can't remember) who earned the nickname "The Cappuccino Kid" when he was found to have extremely high levels of caffeine in his system after competing in the fencing - for the reaction time, right? He claimed to have had one too many coffees before the event, when in reality that kind of caffeination could only have been achieved by swallowing a few bottles full of student-style anti-sleep pills.