CBC running out of excuses for Canada's slow start
William Houston August 13, 2008
Host Scott Russell wrapped up the CBC's Olympic coverage this morning with these words.
“Canada has yet to win a medal at the Games and the people back home are talking, I'm sure.”
He had it right.
Commentary on sports talk radio rarely reflects the sentiments of normal people, but the radio ranting this week is probably not far off the feelings of the folks at home in front of the TV.
It's getting ugly for the team. And Canadians are wondering why.
Now, we'll see how well the CBC answers the question.
Russell started the conversation this morning when he described the Canadian team's inability to “translate” good results at world championships to success at the Olympics as “endemic”.
Brian Williams, when he was a CBC Olympic host, called the process a “conversion rate”.
At the 2002 Salt Lake Winter Games, U.S., German and Russian athletes converted success at World Cup events to success at the Olympics 60 per cent of the time; the Canadians were able to do it only 30 per cent of the time.
The Canadian 30 per cent rule appears to be in effect in Beijing. Too many Canadian athletes have underachieved.
Russell broached the subject with fencer Sherraine Schalm, who was seeded fifth in her event but was knocked out in the first round.
He asked her why she could not convert success from world championships and World Cups to the Olympics.
“It's a hard question,” she said. “But really, everybody here could possibly win, so there are 32 other girls who are asking themselves the same question and there are 32 other countries asking themselves the same question.”
In other words, she didn't have an answer.
Schalm's has been one of the more bizarre stories of the Olympics. After her loss, she told the media she was so devastated that it felt “like getting kicked in the nuts, repeatedly” -- if she had happened to be a man, of course.
At the start of the interview, Russell described her comment as “effusive and violent”, but we were never told specifically what the effusive and violent comment was.
The kicked-in-the-you-know-where was a strange remark, but it wasn't a violent reaction.
During the interview, which was requested by the CBC and Radio Canada, Schalm apologized profusely for the remark.
“I feel really sick about it,” she said.
The CBC was right to pursue the Schalm story. Now, we'll see how hard it pursues the causes of the poor performance of the Canadian team.
“We all want this story to be interesting and fascinating,” Trevor Pilling, the executive producer of Olympic coverage, said. “And Canadians like all sports fan want their country to do well. I would say even in the last Summer Games most of Canada's success has come in the latter half of the Games. So, we're preparing all the tough questions, regardless of the results, but we need it to play out a little bit before we get onto too much of a negative bandwagon.”
Home
Calendar
Search
Register
Login
Logged