We watched the Moguls event in the Winter Olympics for women and men over the weekend. While those athletes are no doubt highly talented at skiing moguls, I couldn’t shake the feeling that somehow the ‘mogul skiing’ has gotten lost in the “Mogul Event”. For one thing, 1/2 of the scoring is about making the turns, but 1/4 of the scoring is about speed. So – simply put – the fewer mogul turns and the faster they are made down a single fall line is rewarded. Several times, the announcers emphasized how important it was for the skiers to go fast by being slightly out-of-control and simply skip over the top of the bumps rather than actually make skillful turns on or around them, lest they slow down. Lastly, the jumping is focused on two Kicker ramps placed within the course at specific intervals. The jumping is awesome – double twisting back flips – but one competitor commented on her success by saying that that she really trained for it with ‘thousands of jumps into the pool’. What?
Call me a traditionalist, but I would probably have been in favor of a longer course, more points for the ability to actually ski the cleanest line down a more varied and variegated run.
But then again, I don’t run the Olympics.
