[GT] Opening Ceremonies (Friday AM) and Day 1 (PM of Friday Feb 9 - AM of Saturday Feb 10)

[CofR]

In writing this GT I’ve realized that it may be easier to follow (and write) threads based on days of game competition. When events start taking place over midnight it might get hard to follow along if we have conversation split between two threads. So starting today for the sake of continuity I'll do Game Threads to be overnight, covering a single day in Korea. This thread includes the schedule for the entirety of Day 1, going from Friday night to Saturday morning. (Unless people would prefer it the other way, I certainly don't mind writing the threads in whatever way people think will be easiest)

Day 0 of the games ends with the Opening Ceremonies; the broadcast begins at 03:30 on Friday morning and will be available on CBC. Canada will be the 69th team to enter the stadium (expected to be around 05:15) and will be lead by flag bearers Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir.

At 17:05 Day 1 of competition will begin as Canada continues the round robin section of the Mixed Doubles Curling event taking on Switzerland. Kaitlyn Lawes and John Morris are in tough against a Swiss team that is the defending World Champions in this event. This match should be on Sportsnet.

Beginning at 18:00 the Men’s Slopestyle Qualifications begins on TSN. Four Canadian boarders will be competing in this event including Mark McMorris continuing his journey of recovery following the devastating injury he suffered in March of 2017. McMorris earned a bronze medal in this event in Sochi and is currently the #2 seed in the FIS rankings for this event. Max Parrot finished 5th in Sochi while Sebastian Toutuant finished 9th in 2014, Tyler Nicholson will be competing in his first Olympics for Canada. At 21:00 the second runs of the qualifying heats will begin and will also be on TSN.

At 00:15 the first medal event of the games takes place on CBC, the Women’s 15km Skiathlon. 21-year-old Anne-Marie Comeau is competing in her first Olympics after taking 2 years off from international competition in 2015. 24-year-old Cendrine Brown is also taking part in her first Olympics. Dahria Beatty and Emily Nishikawa, both from the Yukon Territory will also be skiing for Canada, Nishikawa finished in 42nd in this event in Sochi.

At 00:40 the Women’s Hockey Tournament begins with a matchup between Japan and Sweden. This game will be on TSN.

On CBC at 03:00 the short track speed skating events begin with the heats for the Men’s 1500m. In the first heat 21-year-old Samuel Girard of Quebec will be making his Olympic debut. In the second heat, which is expected to start at 03:05 Charles Hamelin will defend his Gold Medal in this event. In the third heat at 03:10 Pascal Dion will be making his Olympic debut for Canada.

03:10 over on TSN2 also sees the first run of the Men’s Singles in the Luge Competition. 22-year-old Calgarian Mitchel Malyk will be competing in his second Olympics after finishing 26th in Sochi. Sam Edney of Calgary participates in his 4th Olympics, his best finish being 7th place in 2010. 19-year-old Reid Watts of Vancouver will be making his Olympic debut.

03:44 sees the beginning of the Women’s 500m Short Track Speed Skating event. In the first heat Kim Boutin makes her Olympic debut. Jamie Macdonald will also be skating in her first Olympics in the 6th heat at 03:59. Marianne St. Gelais competes in her 3rd Olympics in an event where she won a Silver Medal in 2010 in heat 7. These races should be on CBC like the Men’s Short Track events earlier.

04:00 the Women’s 3000m Long Track Speed Skating Event will take place, an event that Canada’s Cindy Klassen still holds a World Record in.

At 04:05 on TSN the Canadian Mixed Doubles Curling Team takes on the Olympic Athletes from Russia.

Beginning at 04:15 on Sportsnet 1 the Women’s 7.5km Sprint Biathlon event will take place, at the time of writing this I can’t find exactly which members of the Canadian biathlon team will be participating in this event but I will update the thread as soon as I find out.

At 04:21 the Semi-Finals for the Men’s 1500m Short Track Speed Skating will take place, this should be on CBC and the Final will take place at 05:28.

At 04:52 the first of two heats will take place in the Women’s 3000m Short Track Relay. Canada is the 5th ranked team in this event and will skate in Heat 1.

05:10 has a Women’s Hockey Game between the Swiss team and the Korean team featuring players from both the North and South. It doesn’t appear like this one will be televised but it should be able to be streamed on the CBC website.

05:35 see’s the next round of the Men’s Normal Hill Individual Ski Jumping competition. Calgary’s Mackenzie Boyd-Clowes has qualified and will be jumping 20th. This event will be on Sportsnet. The final will take place at 06:35

[transplant99]

Im confused I think...lol.

So as an example...this

At 17:05 Day 1 of competition will begin as Canada continues the round robin section of the Mixed Doubles Curling event taking on Switzerland. Kaitlyn Lawes and John Morris are in tough against a Swiss team that is the defending World Champions in this event. This match should be on Sportsnet.

Is at 5 tomorrow afternoon

And this

At 00:15 the first medal event of the games takes place on CBC, the Women’s 15km Skiathlon. 21-year-old Anne-Marie Comeau is competing in her first Olympics after taking 2 years off from international competition in 2015. 24-year-old Cendrine Brown is also taking part in her first Olympics. Dahria Beatty and Emily Nishikawa, both from the Yukon Territory will also be skiing for Canada, Nishikawa finished in 42nd in this event in Sochi.

Is just after midnight Friday?

[getbak]

Originally Posted by CofR

In writing this GT I’ve realized that it may be easier to follow (and write) threads based on days of game competition. When events start taking place over midnight it might get hard to follow along if we have conversation split between two threads. So starting today for the sake of continuity I'll do Game Threads to be overnight, covering a single day in Korea. This thread includes the schedule for the entirety of Day 1, going from Friday night to Saturday morning. (Unless people would prefer it the other way, I certainly don't mind writing the threads in whatever way people think will be easiest)

Yes, I agree it makes more sense to do them by competition day. I would guess that most of the people who will be watching events at 3 or 4 AM will likely have stayed up all night, rather than having woken up really early.

[wwkayaker]

^I think you have the converted times correct.

[CofR]

Originally Posted by transplant99

Im confused I think...lol.

So as an example...this



Is at 5 tomorrow afternoon

And this





Is just after midnight Friday?

Yep, correct on both accounts! That skiathalon Event is technically Saturday morning MST

[FiftyBelow]

Rosemary Barton and Perdita are awful commentators so far. Once Canada had finished marching in, had to shut it off immediately. Such amateur and nonsense commentary.

[SebC]

That was a pretty good Death Star they had there.

[bigtmac19]

That Flame lighting was cool!

[Hatter]

I wasn't overly excited about these games for a few reasons, but watching our athletes march into the stadium always gets me hyped. I'll be following along as much as possible.

Let's go Canada!

[Johnny Makarov]

What was the over/under on the number of teenage gyrating korean girls in the ceremony?

[Otto-matic]

Maybe its just because I haven't sat down to watch any of the olympics yet but I wasn't as excited as I was before for them to start.

I think it mostly has to do with all the drugs/doping scandals that makes it hard to cheer for the games. You don't really know if the winner is clean or if it'll take 4 years for the athlete to get a medal after the top 3 is caught cheating.

[getbak]

I'm watching the Opening Ceremonies on the CBC website. The Korean alphabet is crazy. All the "N" countries were early, followed by the "L" and "M" countries. Canada is 69th out of 91 countries.

[Flamenspiel]

Thanks for that great info CofR!.

Just wanted to say I was not impressed with the Opening Ceremonies coverage, too much chit chat during the program. Can't they just shut up and do brief descriptions. I remember the BBC broadcast in London, they said very little and just let it play.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by Flamenspiel

Just wanted to say I was not impressed with the Opening Ceremonies coverage, too much chit chat during the program. Can't they just shut up and do brief descriptions. I remember the BBC broadcast in London, they said very little and just let it play.

Taking a page out of NBC's playbook...ugh.

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by Flamenspiel

Thanks for that great info CofR!.

Just wanted to say I was not impressed with the Opening Ceremonies coverage, too much chit chat during the program. Can't they just shut up and do brief descriptions. I remember the BBC broadcast in London, they said very little and just let it play.

They also kept cutting to commercial during the performances.

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by getbak

I'm watching the Opening Ceremonies on the CBC website. The Korean alphabet is crazy. All the "N" countries were early, followed by the "L" and "M" countries. Canada is 69th out of 91 countries.

G,N,D,R.M,B,S,(A,E,Y,O,U,I),J,K,T,P,H

[bigtmac19]

Originally Posted by GirlySports

They also kept cutting to commercial during the performances.

That was very off putting, I thought in the past, they showed the ceremony commercial free?

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by bigtmac19

That was very off putting, I thought in the past, they showed the ceremony commercial free?

not commercial free but the commercials breaks were shorter, maybe 1 minute instead of 3. And the timing was idiotic. In the middle of all the performances.

French CBC had no commercials

[Flamenspiel]

I think I will be doing the online thing for this olympics, it works great when sharing Apple TV on to the home theatre with a newer iPad(my old min iPad seemed to choke on it) or Macbook. I like the timeslots, there is very little that happens during the main part of the working day, If you can clear your schedule by six PM and sleep a little less....

[FireGilbert]

I always forget how boring the ceremonies are but end up watching them anyways. I didn't help the Australian commentary was absolute rubbish. They talked over everything, provided useless facts, and had poorly timed commercial breaks.

I always enjoy the parade of athletes though. The highlights were the shirtless Tongan and the North and South Korean flag bearers holding onto that flag like their lives depended on it.