I love the Olympics, I assume that no one will be surprised by that statement. I love what the games and its athletes represent – perseverance, dedication, sacrifice, loyalty. It’s a sharp contrast to many of our modern day professional sports and athletes.
While I never participated in an Olympic games, I have represented Canada on the International stage 3 times, so I know the feeling of representing your country and competing against the world’s best. I have won 2 medals, a silver and a bronze in 1976 and 1977 – in 1978 we finished out of the medals. My experience on the world’s stage came at the World Championships, a little different from the Olympics but none the less it was still the best vs. the best.
There were no opening or closing ceremonies and the entire sporting world was not watching, only the immediate hockey community was following us. But still, there was the pressure of representing one’s country and in the 70’s this pressure was very different than it is now.
It wasn’t so much athlete vs. athlete, it was culture vs. culture, political system vs. political system – which one was better. The rivalry was one of hatred - not only did we hate the Russians, our fans, the politicians and most everyone in Canada did as well. We hated their culture and their system – therefore we had to beat them. It might not have be right, but that’s how things were at that time.
Today, the pressure, I believe, is different. Most often it comes from within. Each athlete is to perform the best that they can when it is their turn to perform. Which is the way it should be - athlete vs. athlete.
As you may know from previous blogs, I didn’t win the Stanley Cup (losing on 2 occasions to the Edmonton Oilers) and to this day I can’t bear to watch the trophy presentation of any sport, it just puts me in a bad mood. I’ve never heard the national anthem playing after any of my world championships that I participated in either, but I love watching the medal ceremonies at the Olympics. The raw emotion, the tears and the joy is awesome to watch. I love watching the athlete interviews, they’re real, very inspiring and very authentic. Even some of the commercials are uplifting and moving to watch.
Here are some of my memories as an Olympic fan:
1968 Mexico (Summer)
Bob Beamon – not sure if I actually remember the jump as it happened, but I have seen it a million times since, a long jump and Olympic record that still stands today, incredible!
The Kenyans – Those guys ran forever and didn’t seem to get tired.
1972 Munich (Summer)
Such a horrifying tragedy! I could not believe what I was seeing. I didn’t understand as a 14 year old kid, and I still do not understand it. So sad and so wrong.
1976 Montreal (Summer)
Our first Olympics, it started as a dream by the mayor of Montreal and he made it happen, I’ll give him that, but we Canadians are still paying for it. The highlight for me and all of Canada came from Greg Joy, a high jumper who won Canada’s first and only medal on the 2nd last day. Greg was a national hero. Also a little Romanian kid named Nadia Comaneci scored perfect 10’s in winning the Ladies Gymnastic title.
1980 Lake Placid (Winter)
Of course what hockey fan could forget the Lake Placid Olympics – the Miracle on Ice. The underdog USA Men’s Hockey Team winning the Gold medal, with their historic win over the Soviets.
I was playing in Atlanta at the time cheering for the US – little did I know that US goaltender Jim Craig would be my teammate after the games. He arrived with lots of fan fare as you could imagine, but the magic was gone – he could not stop a beach ball. Not really sure what happened, but it was quite evident right from the very first practice that Jim was having trouble adjusting. With all of the fan fare and hoopla Jim pretty much had to play right away, the fans were waiting to see him.
Our first game with Jim in net was against the Colorado Rockies. We won 4-1, Jim was the first star and all seemed to be good… The feeling in the dressing room was that we couldn’t let Colorado get many shots or at least quality shots, I was second star and the joke in the room was that I blocked more shots than Jim.
A funny side bar to the game was that they were filming a Coke Cola commercial and if you were in any of the shots you would be paid. Every player went out of their way to tap Jim on the pads, go talk to him during any stoppage of play – even had some forwards back checking for the first time.
A final note to the games, since I am huge speed skating fan now (thanks to two of my kids, Patrick and Victoria) a big shout out to US speed skater Eric Heiden who won 5 gold medals. He won in the 500, 1000, 1500, 5,000 and the 10,000 this will never be matched. Could you imagine Usain Bolt winning the 1,500 let alone the longer distances?!
1980 – 1984 – Russia and the USA respectively (Summer)
Both were boycotted by several different countries – what a shame to let political differences enter into the world of international sports. I have since met many athletes whose dreams were shattered by this decision, many of them never got another chance at Olympic success.
1988 Calgary (Winter)
Back in Canada, these games were a huge success, they ran them like a business and they were the first winter Olympics to earn a profit. The main focus was the future, build something that will create a legacy! Build venues that will serve as training centres for Canada’s future athletes, along with the new venues build an infrastructure that serve the entire community for years to come. Let me tell you, it has worked. Calgary is a world class city and the medal count for the Canadian athletes has risen with each passing Olympics.
One of the Olympics most exciting and most watched sport is Short Track speed skating, it was a demonstration sport in these games.
Two fun side stories: Eddie the Eagle, representing Great Britain in Ski Jumping. Eddie came in last place but was a star of the Olympics. Jamaica bobsled team earned the respect of the entire world with their efforts and no John Candy was not here coach. My kids have watched Cool Runnings so many times that I’m sure I could recite it.
1988 Seoul, South Korea (Summer)
This was the first time for me, and I’m sure many others, that I saw anything to do with doping or performance enhancing drugs. I remember watching this race in a local bar in Toronto, the place was packed in anticipation of 100 metre final. Ben Johnson won in record time, an amazing race - the bar and the rest of Canada went crazy! It was short lived because Ben tested positive for some sort of steroid, which pretty much meant he went from a hero to zero overnight.
At the time I was like everyone else – throw the book at him, kick him out of the country (Ben was from Jamaica). My opinion has changed over the years. While I do not condone performance-enhancing drugs in sports, I now understand why athletes are tempted to use them. I have seen many documentaries, read many stories on the race and seen Ben interviewed several times.
I believe that he was doping but what is unfortunate is that he was the only one that got caught – many other athletes that he was competing against were doing the same thing. Ben still lives in Canada but pretty much in anonymity and still maintains that his sample was tampered with or sabotaged.
2010 Vancouver (Winter)
Back in Canada for a third time, lots of pressure on the host nation as we are the only country to host an Olympic games and to have never won a gold medal during those games. Well, the athletes responded. The Canadians had a record haul, 26 medals in total including 14 golds! And yes we won the gold medal in hockey, for many Canadians that is the only medal that counted.
2012 London (Summer)
I just remember in watching these games and thinking that I’d love to visit this country and ride my bike through the country side. The Olympics are always a great showcase for a country and London did a really great job with this.
2014 Sochi (Winter) A lot has been written whether the games should have been awarded to Russia, but I won’t get into that. My son Patrick competed for a spot in speed skating for the Canadian delegation but fell a bit short in the Olympic trials. Just to make it that far made me one proud dad!
So far the games have been tremendous and seem just like in any other Olympics, I am glued to the old TV set, I even downloaded an app and am watching on my phone.