Big Deal About Nothing

Recently a picture surfaced of Michael Phelps hitting the bong pretty hard at a University party.  The picture was taken in November and shows the Olympic hero taking a mean hit and showing off the true power of his lungs.  Unfortunately for Phelps people are blowing this way out of proportion and he has been suspended for 3 months and lost his place as the spokesman for Kellogg's.

Is this really that big of a deal?  So the guy likes to smoke a little weed.  Its not as if he was baked out of his mind while he was winning all those gold medals in the Olympics and it's not as if he is a big pot head and rolling around with Cheech and Chong in his spare time.  The only thing that this picture tells me is that it fully explains how he is able to eat so much all the time.

Let's look at this picture realistically.  He is at a party with a bunch of college kids and they are offering him beer, weed, and probably a million other things.  He doesn't want to look like a complete tool and be the sober guy all night just watching people have a good time so he took the lesser of two evils.  He took probably one hit coughed like crazy and then passed it to the left.

Phelps has already apologized profusely for this and his lawyer has said, "Michael accepts these decisions and understands their point of view.  He feels bad he let anyone down. He's also encouraged by the thousands of comments he's received from his fans and the support from his many sponsors. He intends to work hard to regain every one's trust."

The worst part of all of this nonsense is that the local sheriffs department in the county where Phelps toked up is starting an investigation and says Phelps will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.  This guy needs to take a cue from Police Chief Wiggum and let loose instead of trying to be supercop and get his name all over the newspapers.  This guy is just trying to get his 15 minutes of fame and in the end will only look like a jackass because if the American public has to choose between some no name cop and the greatest Olympic athlete ever it is a no contest.

Turning back to his suspension Phelps has resumed training in his hometown of Baltimore, but his plans to return to competitive swimming will have to be put on hold. Phelps had planned to compete in early March at a Grand Prix meet in Austin, Texas.  Now, he won't be able to compete until early May, which would give him a little more than two months for some racing before July's world championships in Rome.  As if a suspension will even affect him.  I'm sure he could show up baked out of his mind and still set world records.

The whole ordeal was bet summed up by a Evan Morgenstein, who represents other notable athletes, when he said, "the penalty is far greater than the crime. He has said he is sorry. Let's move on to the real problems in this country."

Michael Phelps – The Greatest Olympian

On Sunday August 17, 2008 a 23 year-old swam his way into the record books and into immortality. Michael Phelps won 8 gold medals in a single Olympics and set 7 world records in the process. Phelps mastered 8 different events and made it known he was the best in the world at all of them. He now holds the record for most gold medals in a single Olympics (8) and most gold medals won in an Olympic career (14) and he is only 23 years old.

Michael Phelps may be the most discussed name in the entire world right now as his attempt at 8 gold medals in a single Olympics has been all everyone is talking about. People who know nothing about swimming or even watch the Olympics know what Phelps was trying to do and now know what he has accomplished.

In the summer of 2004 Phelps attempted to break the Olympic record for most gold medals won in a single Olympics (7 by US swimmer Mark Spitz in 1972). Phelps came up short in 2004 however winning 6 golds and 2 bronzes. This “failure” as Phelps called it urged him on as he vowed he would attempt greatness again in 2008.

Phelps came into the 2008 Olympics in Beijing highly publicized about what he was planning on doing and that anything less than 8 golds would be considered a monumental failure. He had 17 swims in 9 days and very few people believed that he would be able to do it as they believed everything would have to go right for Phelps and luckily for him it did.

There were numerous close calls however as every gold didn’t come quite as easily as Phelps would have liked. In the first relay event it took a miracle swim by Jason Lezak to ensure that Phelps would not fail early. In the 200m Butterfly Phelps looked sluggish and barely managed to win as he claimed afterwards that his goggles filled up with water. However the closest call was in the 100m Butterfly where going into the final 5 meters Phelps was behind and managed to barely win by just 0.01 seconds.

The magnitude of the accomplishment was not lost on some of Phelps’s competitors. "I just don't think there is a perspective for him," said Simon Burnett, British anchor of the 4x100 medley relay freestyle, when asked to put Phelps in perspective. "He's beyond everything we know. In Athens when he was going for eight golds, I said it would never happen -- not in this day and age with semifinal swims and the competition level. Phelps has taken every expectation and broken it. He seems to be the only guy who sees the impossible as possible, and that's what makes him the best. Once he crosses the threshold, other people are able to foresee it happening. If he can do it, we can do it. But he's always one step ahead of us."

Phelps now has the honor of being called the greatest Olympian of all time a title and maybe even the best athlete of all time. His 14 career gold medals absolutely shatter the old standard which was 9 and in 2012 at the Olympics in London England he could add to that total. But for now Phelps claims that he is just looking forward to going back home to Baltimore and relaxing.

Michael Phelps was able to achieve what some people thought to be impossible. He broke world records and set new standards of excellence for all athletes. He did it with pure talent, some help from his teammates, and a little luck but he managed to accomplish what he set out to do.

Phelps can now let the spotlight shine on someone else for a change as he sits back and reflects on one of the greatest achievements in sports history.

Olympic Report

Michael Phelps

It is now official that Michael Phelps is the most successful Olympian in history. Yesterday Phelps earned 2 more gold medals to push his career total to 11 golds surpassing Carl Lewis, Mark Spitz, Paavo Nurmi, and Larysa Latynina.

"I'm almost at a loss for words," Phelps said. "Growing up I always wanted to be an Olympian. Now to be the most decorated Olympian of all time, it just sounds weird saying. It started setting in a little bit after the butterfly. I was just trying to focus on my next race, but I just kept thinking, `Wow, greatest Olympian of all time.' It's a pretty cool title. I'm definitely honored."

Not only has Phelps dominated these races by winning gold but he has also broken a world record in every race as well. Yesterday as part of the 800m US Freestyle Relay team Phelps beat the old world record by just over 5 seconds, which is an eternity in swimming. Phelps is now over the halfway point on his quest to earn 8 gold medals in a single Olympics (the current record is 7 by Mark Spitz). Phelps attempted to do this four years ago but came up short only winning 6 gold and 2 bronze.

Phelps has just 3 races left and they are all events that he won gold at in 2004 while in Athens so things look good for the American. The events are 200 individual medley, 100 fly and 400 medley relay.

Faking

It was recently discovered that China used digital technology to enhance the fireworks display from the opening ceremonies. CGI was used to add more fireworks for televisions and make the ceremony seem more impressive than it really was. This is probably the dumbest thing to do ever as it makes your country look so bad that you are so desperate to look impressive that you basically lie to everyone around the world. Not a good way to start off the games there in China.

To add to the whole mess it was also reported that the little girl who sang the Chinese national anthem wasn't actually singing. The girl who actually sang the song was deemed not cute enough for television and so she was replaced by a better looking girl who was then forced to lip sync. This fake singer went on numerous talk shows afterwards and went along with the whole thing until everyone found out she wasn't any good. China was are you doing? This is worse than Brittany Spears and Ashley Simpson combined.

ID Please

I don't care what anybody says those female Chinese gymnasts are not more than 10 years old. Li Shanshan (16) is 4-foot-9, 79 pounds. Yang Yilin (15) is 4-foot-11, 77 pounds. He Kexin (16) is 4-foot-8, 73 pounds. Jiang Yuyuan (16) is 4-foot-7, 71 pounds. But the prize goes to Deng Linlin (16), who's listed at 4-foot-6 and a strapping 68 pounds. No 16 year old in the world is 68 pounds. Who does China think that they are fooling with this stuff? Its sad that a country is this desperate to win that they lie to the whole world and cheat to try and come out ahead.

Canada

Canada still does not have 1 medal to its name. To make matters worse 17 Canadian records have been broken in the pool so far these Olympics and yet there are 0 medals to show for it. That means that these athletes have swam faster than any other Canadian ever has and it still isn't good enough.

Here is a Day 6 recap of how Canada did:

ARCHERY
Jason Lyon, advanced to the round of 16. The other two Canadians were eliminated after first-round losses.

BASEBALL
Men - Scott Thorman hit a three-run home run and Mike Saunders added a solo homer as Canada opened its preliminary round with a 10-0 rout of host China.

CANOE/KAYAK
Women's singles kayak - Sarah Boudens, Pembroke failed to advance after placing 19th in qualifying.

CYCLING
Men's individual time trial - Svein Tuft placed seventh in the 47.3-kilometre event; Ryder Hesjedal was 16th.

Women's individual time trial - Alexandra Wrubleski completed the 23.5-kilometre course in 39 minutes 15.42 seconds to finish 24th.

DIVING
Men's synchronized three-metre springboard - Alexandre Despatie and Arturo Miranda placed fifth in the competition with a score of 409.29.

FENCING
Men's individual foil - Joshua McGuire went to overtime in his opening match to defeat Tomer Or, Israel (11-10), then was eliminated with a loss in the round of 16 to Salvatore Sanzo of Italy (15-3).

ROWING
Women's eights - Canada earned a berth in the final by winning their repechage race.

SHOOTING
Women's 25-metre sport pistol - 41. Avianna Chao scored 558.0 points to finish 41st in qualifying and did not advance.

SHOOTING
Women's 25-metre sport pistol - 41. Avianna Chao scored 558.0 points to finish 41st in qualifying and did not advance.

SOFTBALL
Melanie Matthews and Jennifer Yee each drove in three runs as Canada improved to 2-0 after a 9-2 win over the Netherlands.

SWIMMING
Men's 100 freestyle - Brent Hayden finished sixth in his semifinal and did not advance.

Men's 200 backstroke - Keith Beavers and Tobias Oriwol both earned semifinal berths after finishing 15th and 16th repectively in qualifying.
Men's 200 breaststroke - Mike Brown clinched a berth in the final after winning his semifinal (2:08.84).

Men's 200 individual medley - Keith Beavers tied for eighth in qualifying and will race in the semifinals; Brian Johns was 18th did not advance.

Men's 4x200 freestyle relay - Canada set a Canadian record but finished fifth in the final.

Women's 200 butterfly - Audrey Lacroix placed sixth in her semifinal and did not advance.

Women's 200 individual medley - Julia Wilkinson placed seventh in the final.

Hopefully Canada can get a few medals out of our rowing team and maybe women's softball as well but with countries like Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Azerbaijan beating us things are starting to get ugly.