Now that the WInter Games are over, it won't be long before all the wailing and moaning about the US team's overall "poor performance" will end. Nevermind that countries aren't really supposed to count medals, nevermind that the US won the second highest number of medals. From what the sportswriters say, the only thing that matters is that the US didn't completely dominate the Games. They miss the point. Many of the US athletes are not much better, complaining about one thing or another. They miss the point, too. The writers and the athletes have forgotten what sport is, or should be - competition for the sheer joy of competing, the exhilaration of just enjoying your sport. When sport is reduced to its essential component, all that remains is the testing of an individual, even in team events - how good did you do compared to how good you can do.
There were a dozen or so athletes in these games that were the sole representative of their country, and each one competed to the best of his or her ability. None of them had any chance at all of a gold medal, or even a medal. But they competed, they tried, they did the best that they could, so that they could always say, even if only to themselves, "I did it." Those athletes are just as much winners of these Games a anyone who leaves with several medals around his or her neck; no, they are bigger winners. The biggest winner? - the Giant Slalom skier from Kyrgystan (I think.) In his first run, he missed a gate. He stopped, and went back, uphill, and did it right. He finished 43 seconds behind the winner, but he got to the final because others missed gates and didn't go back. I think his name is Ivan Borisov. He understands what the joy of competing is, the sheer exhilaration of testing yourself. Some of you who have competed in the past, especially in an individual event, understand what I am saying. Whether it is you against the guy across the mat, you against the mountain, or you against the stopwatch, it is a test, it is you against you. It is Sport at it simplest and its best. Ivan Borisov understands. He passed his test. In my book, he's the real winner of the Games.