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Napa-Sonoma Half Marathon, July 20, 2014
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Friday, August 8, 2008

Opening Ceremonies

Wow!

I'm just getting back to the Olympic Village after an amazing Opening Ceremonies. It was a rush to walk into the National Stadium or Bird's Nest in front of over 90,000 spectators who roared when Team USA came out of the tunnel and onto the track. It was only louder when the Chinese delegation came out much later.

I thought it was appropriate that I walked in with the other two US racewalkers: Kevin Eastler and Joanne Dow. We didn't racewalk because we would have been going too fast for the NBC cameras to get good shots of us waving to all of our fans at home. In fact, it was the only time I've been in a stadium and had volunteers telling me to "Speed up already, you're slowing everything down."

If you want to see me on the telecast (which was broadcast live all over the world, except in the US thanks to NBC), look for Lindsey Davenport (I was right after the tennis players) and Jenny Finch (I was right before the women's softball team.) And I was on the side closest to the stands.

I won't spoil the secret of the lighting of the Olympic flame, but it was pretty awesome. Cathy Freeman lighting the flame in Sydney was more dramatic, but this was pretty creative, too.

It's almost 2am here in Beijing and I leave tomorrow morning at 8:15am from the village to the airport for Dalian. Off to bed. (I would post photos from the Opening Ceremonies but the IOC and USOC are being super-duper strict about what can be posted. If I follow the rules to the letter, I won't be able to post any photos from the Olympic Village, any Olympic venues, or of any athletes... so look for some rules to be broken shortly.)

1 comment:

Unknown said...

WAY COOL!

Thanks for keeping us posted on the activities "behind the scenes" at the Games. We are stoked you decided to walk.

Enjoy your time, and enjoy the experience. Our thoughts are with you and your family.

All the Best,
Pete, Tracy, and Jada