Six-ender stuns Hamiltons
In a sport known for its politeness, the sight of American curlers Matt and
Becca Hamilton of McFarland, Wis., banging their brooms against the Olympic ice in frustration was a bit of a rarity. But then so was the manner in which they lost the game.
Despite holding a 4-3 lead heading into the final end, or round, of curling’s mixed doubles match Friday, the United States lost, 9-4, to reigning world champion Switzerland after the Swiss managed something exceedingly unusual in curling: a perfect score known as a sixender. How rare is a six-ender? Think of a perfect game in baseball.
First, a bit of a primer: Mixed doubles curling, which is making its Olympic debut in Pyeongchang, has different rules from standard curling. There are only two players on each team – a man and a woman – as opposed to four. There are eight ends instead of 10. And each team throws six rocks in each end instead of eight.
Although Switzerland was behind by one point going into the final end, Jenny
Perret and Martin Rios had an advantage known as the hammer – the right to throw the final stone of the game. They managed to get their first five stones into the house, putting the Americans in a precarious position.
Becca Hamilton threw her final rock, which needed to get to the button – the center of the bull’s eye-shaped target – in order to preserve their lead. “Hard, hurry, hurry!” she screamed at her brother, Matt, who was frantically sweeping the ice in a bid to get the stone to the right spot. “You got to go, go, go, go, go!!” She then raced ahead and joined in the sweeping frenzy as the rock drew close to the button.
It was not to be. The stone ended up a few inches past its target, prompting the disappointed siblings to slam their brooms against the ice. Switzerland promptly knocked the Americans’ lone rock out of the house and kept all six of their stones within the target’s rings, giving them that rare and coveted sixender. (In regular curling, which uses eight stones, a perfect score is known as an eight-ender or “a snowman.”)
No curling team has ever managed a perfect score at the Olympics, according to the World Curling Federation.
Perfect scores in professional-level curling are so unusual that various countries’ curling clubs have special awards for them. Curling Canada hands out pins and certificates to teams who score eight-enders. The American Curling Foundation & Museum has an eightender patch it bestows upon teams who nab perfect scores.
Davis skips ceremony: Speedskater Shani Davis didn’t attend the opening ceremony after losing a coin flip to carry the U.S. flag and lead American athletes into the stadium.
A U.S. Speedskating spokesman said that Davis originally planned to skip Friday night’s festivities because of his training schedule but briefly reconsidered when he was nominated by his teammates to be the flag bearer.
Davis and luger Erin Hamlin tied, 4-4, in voting by fellow athletes to carry the flag. Hamlin won the honor in a coin toss, a process the 35-year-old speedskater said was executed “dishonorably” in a post on his Twitter account.
Halfpipe star shelved: Olympic
halfpipe champion Iouri Podladtchikov won’t defend his title due to injuries sustained last month at the Winter X Games.
The gold medalist, known as the IPod, practiced on the Olympic halfpipe Friday, but afterward said it would be “totally unreasonable” for him to compete.
The 29-year-old, who was born in Russia and competes for Switzerland, took a nasty fall on his final jump at the X Games on Jan. 28, banging his face against the bottom of the pipe.
He was motionless for more than 10 minutes while medics stabilized his neck and strapped him to a stretcher.
Physicians diagnosed him with a broken nose and released him from the hospital the next day.
He traveled to South Korea with the hopes of competing, starting with the qualifying round next Tuesday.
Fashion statement: Pita Taufatofua has shown once again he’s willing to give the shirt off his back for Tonga in Olympic conditions, whether it be sun, snow or shine.
Less than two years after shooting to international fame when he walked shirtless and oiled-up into the opening ceremony of the Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, Taufatofua was bare chested again when he carried the Tongan flag into the opener of the Winter Games in Pyeongchang on Friday.
Taufatofua competed in taekwondo in Rio, and is back competing in crosscountry skiing, despite representing a tropical south Pacific island nation where it doesn’t snow.
Reaching a milestone: Team USA said 19-year-old ski jumper Casey Larson has become the 100,000th man to compete at the Olympics.
Historian Bill Mallon calculated that Larson reached the milestone by being the 16th starter in Thursday’s qualifying at the Pyeongchang Olympics.
Mallon conducted extensive research into who would become the 100,000th male athlete to compete since the modern games began in Athens in 1896.