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Introduction
Logan, Utah
Freestyle Aerials
Medals Plaza
-->Speedskating
Hockey
Ladies Figure Skating
Olympic Square
Temple Square
Star Gazing
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Back to Medals Plaza....
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We allowed ourselves the luxury of sleeping past daybreak before setting out to Kearns, about 15 miles southwest of Salt Lake City, for the women's 1,000 m. speedskating event. The Olympic Oval, home to the long-track speedskating events, is an intimate facility with just 6,800 seats. At 4,675 feet above sea level, it's also the highest enclosed facility in the world, a condition that made for lots of world records.
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When we arrived in the Oval, we were surprised and pleased to see that we had front-row seats. Since Nieka grew up in Wisconsin, home of speedskating legends like Eric Heiden, Dan Jansen, Bonnie Blair, Chris Witty, and Casey FitzRandolph, she was really psyched!
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We asked our seatmate to take a photo of us and noticed she looked a bit familiar. Turns out we had seats adjacent to her at the Freestyle Aerials, too. She's a Utahn and was very curious to hear our impressions about whether or not we felt any pressure from Mormon missionaries. We assured her that the idea of these being the "Mo-lympics" was a media concoction.
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An official Salt Lake 2002 Zamboni grooms the ice between races. Did you know that you can go to a special school to learn to be a Zamboni driver? Zamboni is a registered trademark of....don't ask.
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Battling mononucleosis, Chris Witty was not favored to win the 1,000 meters. Witty was paired with Canada's Catriona LeMay Doan who had won gold in the 500 m. days before. This was clearly the most-anticipated pairing of the day and the crowd went wild. Witty took a comanding lead fairly early in the race and won easily with a world record time of 1 minute 13.83 seconds. After the final pairs were completed, Witty took a well-deserved victory lap. American Jennifer Rodriguez captured the bronze.
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Ken and I were impressed that Catriona LeMay Doan waited on the ice for Chris Witty to finish her victory laps so that she could congratulate her. LeMay Doan has said she plans to retire soon, so this was likely her final Olympic race.
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On to Hockey....
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