What to watch for - Day 12.

It’s safe to say I’ll be a little depressed tomorrow because the countdown until gymnastics at the Olympics goes back to four years. However, there are still four events left and the Americans have some great opportunities to earn more medals.

If you don’t typically like men’s gymnastics, I encourage you to watch tonight’s horizontal bar final. You will be entertained, I promise! The guys have absolutely nothing to lose and don’t hold anything back in these routines. The person to actually catch the bars after his skills is typically the one to win. American Jonathan Horton won the silver in Beijing, I still think it should have been gold, and is in the final again in London. The only color medal he doesn’t have is Olympic gold and with this possibly being his last Olympic event he will through everything out there in this routine. Danell Leyva is also in the final and after what he did on the event in the all-around final to win bronze, it’s clear he is definitely capable of a great score. Other contenders include Epke Zonderland of the Netherlands, who does a very difficult three-release series, and defending champion Zou Kai of China.

No one from Team USA is in the parallel bars final, which means the reigning world champion Leyva won’t have a chance to keep his title. This is considered to be a pretty wide open race with a lot of previous top-three finishers, but the top two qualifying scores came from the Japanese brothers Yusuke and Kazuhito Tanaka.

The two per country rule did not just affect Jordyn Weiber in the all-around but also kept Kyla Ross out of the finals for beam. She qualified in sixth, but with Gabby Douglas and Aly Raisman qualifying second and fifth, she has been left out. The top qualifier was China’s Sui Lu, while Russia’s Viktoria Komova tied Douglas in the second spot. Keep an eye on Romania’s Catalina Ponor who won the event in 2004. Romania considers this their event and Ponor looked fearless in the team finals on the apparatus.

All eyes will be on Weiber in the floor exercise final but it was Raisman who qualified first with a 15.325. This is Weiber’s chance for an individual gold and her time to shine alone. She qualified sixth but had a step out of bounds that of course kept her out of the all-around and from a higher qualifying score. This final is jam packed with talented gymnasts. Two Olympic champions in Romania’s Ponor and Sandra Izbasa, two floor world champions in Australia’s Lauren Mitchell and Russia’s Ksenia Afanasyeva and three world all-around champions in Italy’s Vanessa Ferrari, Russia’s Aliya Mustafina and Weiber. Can’t wait!

There will be medals awarded in track and field in the men’s high jump, men’s discus, men’s 1500m and women’s 100m hurdles.

In the men’s 1500m, Algeria’s Taoufik Makhloufi had the top time in the semifinals followed by Asbel Kiprop of Kenya and Mekonnen Gebremedhin of Ethiopia. American Leo Manzano posted the fourth-best time in the semifinals and is joined by teammate Andrew Wheating in the final.

There are a lot of stories about redemption every four years and the biggest one of these games comes from Lolo Jones. She was on pace to win the gold in the 100m hurdles in Beijing but tripped on the last hurdle to stumble and miss out on a medal. Jones is just one of those people you want to cheer for and she has a great shot at winning a medal again this time around.

Beach volleyball continues for Misty May-Treanor and Carrie Walsh Jennings. Their match tonight determines whether they play for the gold or bronze. They have still never lost a match and are in good position to win their third straight gold.

My favorite.

I’ve been so busy the past few days that I haven’t had time to write about all what has happened in my favorite sport – gymnastics.

First of all, it always kind of ticks me off that people only think about and appreciate gymnastics every four years. It’s hard and impressive stuff. I’d like to see all the athletes people consider the best in the world do some of this stuff. Then the Olympics come around and people are amazed, once again, at what gymnasts can do and are wondering what happened to the people from four years ago. While gymnastics is not as publicized as the other big sports every year, they still do typically show the national and world championships on NBC every year. If you want to know when it’s on, just ask me. I’ll keep you up-to-date.

I’ll start with the men. Yes, a bit of a disappointment because they definitely had the talent to medal and possibly even win with the way the other favorites faltered. They did so well in qualifying but once things started to go sour in the final, they couldn’t pull it together. Gymnastics is one of those individual sports that is turned into a team sport after a certain point (like swimming, tennis, track and field) and it’s hard for some to learn how to be a team. Since male gymnasts are typically older, compared to the women, a lot of them have already competed in college and learned this team aspect. Neither of the top two guys for the U.S decided to go the college route. I think their lack of experience as a team was evident in the team final. They just didn’t know how to be teammates when things started going wrong for them. Instead of getting up and cheering on the others to perform well and get good scores to make up for their mistakes, they sat and sulked about how they had messed up. And then never really pulled it together. If you look at team captain Jonathan Horton, who competed in college, he was there cheering on every one of his teammates no matter how he had performed.

In the all-around final, both Danell Leyva and John Orozco struggled again and it was a question as to if either of them would be able to pull it together. One of the biggest differences between men and women’s gymnastics is that you don’t have to be perfect in every event to win or medal. Because there are six events it’s rare that one guy is amazing at all of them and tends to put up a low score on at least one or even two. Because Leyva had pommel horse early on, he was able to put up good scores on his last events that also happened to be his best. I’m happy that he came back to win a medal and it makes me wonder if he and John had both done this in the team final what could the team have ended up with?

But let’s also talk about that team final in general. China came out strong and there was no question through the meet that they would win. The biggest surprise continued to be the British. Where did they come from? Those of you that don’t keep up with the sport may not know that they were not far off from failing to make the Olympics. Yet, they got themselves in medal contention. At the end, they thought they had won silver, Ukraine had finished third and Japan (the favorites) were off the podium. Japan was going to go home without a medal because their best gymnast, and the world’s best gymnast, totally tanked at the end of his pommel horse routine. The question was whether or not he had made it to a handstand to attempt the required skill of a dismount or not. Japan had to put in an inquiry and as the coach did this he had cash in his hand. What? And American money, not British pounds. What was going on?

Well, it turns out that now when you inquire a score you have to pay and if you get the score changed you get the money back. It’s kind of like the coach’s challenge in football. You can challenge the ruling, but if you’re wrong you lose the timeout. This is to keep coaches from inquiring every score in the attempt to continually boost a total. To be clear, a coach can’t inquire as to why judges took deductions certain places, but it’s to ask why the start value was off and why a certain skill wasn’t considered completed. In the end, Japan got moved from fourth to second, the Brits ended up third and Ukraine got the boot to fourth. Everyone was unhappy except for Japan. The funny thing was that if GBR had known the whole time they would get third, they would have been just as ecstatic as when they thought they had silver. Craziest ending I’ve ever seen in a team final.

On to the Fab Five and they really are fabulous and adorable. Although neither of them are even old enough to go to college yet, they know how to be a team and support one another. They were great in qualifying and of course we know about Jordyn Weiber not making the all-around final. Yes, I’m still sad about that but I’ve already given my opinion on this topic. They came out again in the team finals on fire and scored big on vault. McKayla Maroney’s vault was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen more gymnastics than the average person. Very soon it was clear that the fight was between the U.S. and Russia. Uneven bars is the worst event for the Americans and the best for the Russians and after that we knew that it was going to be down to what both teams could accomplish on the beam and floor. Well, Russia fell apart and the USA excelled. Talk about not knowing how to be a team - the Russians could not figure out how to stop crying and continued to fall further from the lead.

But those cute girls from the USA nailed just about everything and those floor routines were almost like icing on the cake. Weiber attacked her routine and after her first pass the look on her face said it all. She knew she had it. Then Aly Raisman was crying before her routine was even over. Yes, they knew they had won, but in gymnastics nothing is official until the score is out. You could see the overwhelming joy on their faces when the saw the scoreboard change. They were truly the best team there and proved it.

I’m still amazed by Weiber and her composure. Yes, she cried after qualifying, but who wouldn’t? Then she came out and performed her routines wonderfully in the team final with a smile on her face, while also cheering for her teammates. Unfortunately, this wasn’t something you really saw from the guys. Then she was there again during the all-around finals, cheering on her teammates in a meet she desperately wanted to be in. But enough about her – for now.

Douglas put together a great all-around meet. She really doesn’t have a weak event and made no major mistakes, which is what it takes to win the all-around at the Olympics. After a long drought of not winning this event, the Americans have really started to dominate the gold and I love it. Let’s also not forget the significance of her being the first African-American to win the event. And how can you not love that girl? She has a smile that would light up any room and is sure to always thank the Lord and the people who have helped her get to where she is.

I knew it was going to be hard for Raisman to win gold and even silver, but bronze was definitely doable. In the end, she did get third, just not the bronze medal. If she didn’t have one extra step somewhere on any event that bronze would be all hers alone. It’s crazy that someone who fell off beam and then just gave up on the event ended up with third. If one of the gymnasts here acted like that towards her coach, she would be ripped apart by the media. What happens in Russia?

I hate the gymnastics tie-breaking procedure. It’s come into play now a few times in these games. I just don’t understand why it can’t remain a tie. They give out two medals in swimming, track & field, etc. Just because it’s a subjective sport they can’t tie? This kept Nastia Liukin from a gold on bars in Beijing and kept a very deserving gymnast from a medal in the all-around. The FIG should really review some its policies this year.

Now we move on to event finals where they U.S. (women at least) should bring in some more medals. Vault happened last night and was a little disappointing. I don’t know what happened to Maroney. She didn’t need to stick her first vault to get a great score and help her to first. She got the perfect type of score she needed without nailing the landing. All she had to do was put the next one to her feet and the gold was hers. My friends and I laughed about Tim Daggett jinxing it, but if there was a gold medal guaranteed for anyone, it was for her in this event. In the end, she still got second by a tenth of a point after falling on her second vault, that’s pretty incredible. I was more disappointed at her reaction to the fellow gymnasts coming up to congratulate her. I know she’s 16, but she’s better than that.

For the men, the only events we have left that have Americans are vault and high bar. Vault will be hard but high bar is doable. I love this final because the guys throw everything out there and hold nothing back. It is awesome to watch.

Now we are on to bars, beam and floor for the ladies. Bars will probably be the hardest one to medal in, but we could go one-two on both beam and floor. Douglas will be on bars with some strong competition. But if she nails her routine and others stumble, she could walk away with another shiny piece of hardware. And it’s clear the judges like her, which is good in this subjective sport.

Douglas and Raisman are on beam and have great routines. Raisman is the favorite if she can avoid what happened in the all-around. You can imagine I’m cheering for Weiber on floor. She has been so great and consistent and such a good teammate that I want this for her. Raisman will want it too and won’t give it away easy. It’ll be an exciting final to watch.

You can be sure I’ll give my final thoughts once the events are all completed.

What to watch for - Day 11.

There were some great moments last night and some disappointing ones. I’ll be honest in saying that there aren’t a lot of medal events on tonight.

Gymnastics continues with three more event finals in men’s vault, men’s still rings and women’s uneven bars. There isn’t an American in the still rings event final, so you can be sure NBC will only show the three medal routines and then move on to something else.

Team USA’s Sam Mikulak will be in the men’s vault final after qualifying fourth. Russia’s Denis Ablyazin was the top qualifier but there aren’t a lot of big names (i.e. title holders) in this final. It should be pretty open for the taking and clearly favorites can stumble. I’m looking at you, McKayla Maroney.

Gabby Douglas looks to win her third gold in as many attempts on the uneven bars tonight. However, she will have some stiff competition just to earn a medal. Great Britain’s Beth Tweddle is outstanding on this event and turned in the best qualifying score. She’s the best gymnast in GBR’s history and the crowd will be behind her 100%. If she hits her routine, the place is sure to go nuts. Also in the final is defending Olympic champion He Kexin, who tied with Nastia Liukin for first but won gold on a tie-breaker in Beijing. Viktoria Komova and Aliya Mustafina are still in search of a gold for Russia and are outstanding on this event. They are certainly in medal contention as well.

The American’s swept the podium in the 400m in Beijing with Lashawn Merritt winning gold. Neither of those will happen tonight. Merritt won’t be defending his title after pulling up in his qualifying race due to a hamstring injury. And neither of the other two Americans even qualified for the final. Makes you wonder where Jeremy Wariner is, right? The favorite in this race is Grenada’s James Kirani. If he wins, or even makes the podium, it will be that country’s first Olympic medal.

Unlike the 400m, USA will have a chance to defend its podium sweep from Beijing with three Americans competing in the final of the 400m hurdles. Angelo Taylor and Kerron Clement took first and second, respectively, four years ago and hope to repeat, while Michael Tinsley is the other teammate running for the red, white and blue.

I have also heard that the women’s steeplechase will be shown in primetime. If there is an event that the ancient Greeks invented to stay entertained, this has to be one of them. This race involves a lot of running with a jump over a large post into a puddle of water every lap. I find it to be one of the oddest races in track, but you’ll just have to watch to see if you agree with me.

With Todd Rogers and Phil Dalhausser out of the men’s beach volleyball tournament, it’s up to Americans Jake Gibb and Sean Rosenthal to defend the title from Beijing. The duo continues play tonight in the quarterfinals.

What to watch for - Day 10.

Good news, bad news. I’ll give you the bad first – swimming has officially concluded. The good news is that gymnastics returns tonight after a two-day absence for three nights of event finals.

I’d talk more about the men’s tennis final, but it may be over by the time you read this. I will say that if Andy Murray wins, Wimbledon will go crazy.

Tonight will be the men’s floor exercise and pommel horse and the women’s vault. American Jake Dalton is in the mix on a packed final on the floor exercise, as is all-around champion Kohei Uchimura and runner up Marcel Nguyen. Qualifying first was the defending champion Zou Kai of China, but all eight gymnasts qualified within 0.4 points of each other. Floor should be one of the more exciting finals for the men.

Great Britain has one of its best chances for a gold in gymnastics in the pommel horse final in Louis Smith. Smith qualified in first with a great routine and won the bronze in Beijing. The reigning world champion, Krisztian Berki of Hungary, qualified fifth but is probably the favorite.

McKayla Maroney made the U.S. team purely to land vaults to help the team to gold. She did that and now has the chance to get herself an individual gold. If Maroney puts up a vault like she did on Tuesday, she will undoubtedly be the Olympic champion. She is the reigning world champion and the best vaulter in the world. Even with her step on the vault in qualifying she still put up an amazing score. If I remember correctly, the gymnasts will compete two vaults and the average of the two scores will determine the winner. The vaults have to be from “two different families”, basically meaning that they can’t do the same vault twice and have to prove that they really are the best by nailing two different kinds of vaults. Also in contention is Germany’s Oksana Chusovitina, who is competing at the ripe gymnastics age of 37 and is the reigning silver medalist.

Everyday from here on out I’ll give you the laundry list of track events that will be handing out medals for the day. They’ll show several heats and semis in primetime as well, but not all will have finals the same night. Today is the women’s marathon, women’s triple jump, men’s hammer throw, men’s steeplechase, women’s 400m and the most popular race of the games – the men’s 100m.

Jamaica defended its title in the women’s 100m yesterday and looks to remain the home of both the fastest man and woman in the world. There’s a very good chance this will be the case. Usain Bolt amazed all of us in Beijing with both his runs but is not the favorite because his teammate, Yohan Blake, defeated him in the Jamaican Olympic trials. Blake is the current world champion because Bolt false started in that race last year. It’s important to note that no one is allowed a false start anymore. If you go before the gun, you are out, which is what happened to Bolt at worlds. Also in the race are Americans Justin Gatlin and Tyson Gay. Gatlin won the gold medal in the event in Athens but was not in Beijing due to a four-year ban from the sport because of doping. He’s back, and I assume clean, but he’s never been in an Olympic race with Bolt. Gay was in the race in 2008, but claims a hamstring injury was the reason he was not able to compete with Bolt. Gay is one of two guys in the race, along with Blake, that have ever defeated Bolt at 100m.

The women’s 400m looks to be a race of redemption for the USA’s Sanya Richards-Ross. She was the heavy favorite in 2008 and was leading after 200m before her hamstring tightened. She ended up finishing third but came back to lead the 4x400m team to gold. Great Britain’s Christin Oburugu is back to defend her Olympic title and will obviously have the home crowd behind her. Two other Americans, Dee Dee Trotter and Frencent McCorory, are also in the final. Side note: Richards-Ross is married to NFL player Aaron Ross and they are sure to have the most athletic children in the world. Hopefully, they’ll follow in their parents’ footsteps and go to Texas (or switch it up and maybe go to Mizzou). Either way - Hook’em Sanya!

Tonight will show another match featuring Misty May-Treanor and Carrie Walsh Jennings. They continue on to the quarterfinals in the elimination round of beach volleyball.

What to watch for - Day 9.

I’m very sad to say that today is the last day in the pool for the London Olympics. Four years removed from eight gold medals in Beijing, Michael Phelps has still provided us some great entertainment in London. We are all lucky to have watched him compete these last several games and there’s a pretty good chance we will never see someone like him again.

Phelps goes for gold medal number four and overall medal number six of these games in the 4x100 individual medal relay tonight. The American men have never lost this race, except for 1980 when the U.S. boycotted the games, so it’s safe to say they are the favorites. Besides Phelps, it’s not known for sure who will compete in the final. I’m not sure who will swim breaststroke, but I’d go with Matt Grevers in the backstroke and Nathan Adrian in the freestyle

The women qualified in fourth in the 4x100 medley relay, while Australia blew everyone away but also used their best swimmers in qualifying. Team USA has finished first or second every time since the race was added, so they have a great chance at gold as well. It’s another question mark as to who will swim the final for the Americans but Missy Franklin is a pretty good bet. This would give Franklin her fourth gold medal and her sixth medal in seven events – not bad for 17-years-old. She is sure to swim the backstroke leg. I’d put Rebecca Soni in at breaststroke, Dana Volmer at fly and Allison Schmitt at freestyle. I’d think three gold medal winners and one silver in those events 100m would give you a pretty good chance at relay gold.

The other events that end the week in the pool include the women’s 50m freestyle and the men’s 1500m freestyle – the longest and shortest events in swimming. Jessica Hardy will compete the all-out sprint for the red, white and blue, while American Connor Jaeger will swim in the 1500m. Neither are necessarily favorites but you never know in these two races.

There are six finals in track and field tonight – men’s 20km walk, women’s discus, men’s long jump, women’s heptathlon 800m, men’s 10,000m and women’s 100m. The most popular of all these will be the women’s 100m to determine the fastest woman in the world. Jamaica swept the podium in 2008 and reigning champion, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, is back to defend her title. American Carmelita Jeter, who is the current world champion, turned in the top qualifying time and will have U.S. teammates Alliyson Felix and Tianna Madison in the semifinal as well. Jamaicans Veronica Campbell-Brown and Kerron Stewart will also compete for spots in the final.

American Marquise Goodwin is the American favorite after winning the Olympic trials. I have a certain fondness for Goodwin because he is also a member of the Texas football team – Hook’em Horns! He has won the U.S. outdoor and NCAA titles and turned in the best leap in the qualifying round. Here’s to hoping Goodwin will win a gold medal and a football national championship in the span of six months!

Beach volleyball has reached the knockout stage and Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings are still in the hunt for their third gold. After losing their first Olympic set the other day, the duo looks to remain undefeated (and in the tournament) as they take on a rookie Netherlands team tonight.

What to watch for - Day 8.

The Olympics sure don’t disappoint. We are pretty lucky to live in a country that is successful at stuff like this and that NBC only shows us events that we have a chance to win. Let me also say that if you can’t stay off news sites or social media during the day and end up finding out everything that happens before primetime, you are seriously missing out. I’ve made it through everyday so far without knowing what I’m going to see and it’s so much more exciting. Just try it out if you haven’t already!

No gymnastics tonight. But don’t worry! It’s not over yet. Just a two-day break until event finals start on Sunday. But track and field does start today and the Americans are sure to be just as dominate on the track as they’ve been in the pool.

Speaking of the pool, Michael Phelps goes for his third gold of the games in the 100m butterfly tonight. This is the race that he barely won in 2008 and took the extra stroke at the end, which turned out to be the difference between eight gold medals and seven gold medals and a silver. The guy he narrowly beat, Serbia’s Milorad Cavic, is back and in lane six. Phelps qualified in first and will have a great position in lane four in between American Tyler McGill in lane three and South Africa’s Chad le Clos in lane five. Phelps is looking very strong right now and is going for career medal 21 with this race. I think it’s going to be gold.

We’ve got Missy back in the pool after she failed to medal in the 100m free last night. I hate to use the word “failed” in a sentence about her because she’s so amazing. Tonight is the 200m backstroke and Franklin and Elizabeth Beisel were the top two qualifiers in the race. World-record holder and defending Olympic champion, Kristy Coventry, will be in lane seven with Beisel in fourth and Franklin in fifth.

It’s hard to label something as the most exciting event of the night, but it might be the 50m freestyle. It’s the shortest race in swimming and really proves how fast a swimmer is. After not qualifying in the 100m free, Cullen Jones turned in the best qualifying time and will be in lane five, while the guy that tied him, Cesar Cielo, is in lane four, followed by another American, Anthony Ervin. Cielo is the world record holder and posted the same qualifying time as Jones.

One of the distance swim races happens tonight in the women’s 800m freestyle. American Katie Ledecky, the 15-year-old and the youngest member of the U.S. team, qualified for the final in third and will be in lane three. Analysts say that even at 15 she is the real deal. Great Britain’s star swimmer, Rebecca Adlington, is the defending Olympic champion and world record holder. She qualified in first and will be the overwhelming fan favorite.

There will be some qualifiers for various track and field events and finals in two.

I strongly suggest you cheer for Christian Cantwell in the men’s shot put final tonight. Why? Well, because he is a Mizzou grad (can’t imagine you need anymore reason than that). He won silver in Beijing and qualified for tonight’s finals in first. Americans Reese Hoffa and Ryan Whitnig also qualified for the final. Whitnig won the event at this year’s world championships and has a good chance to make the podium. Germany’s David Storl and Canada’s Dylan Armstrong are also favorites.

There are 22 women in the 10,000m, which is the longest race outside the marathon. Americans Lisa Uhl, Janet Bawcom and U.S. Olympic Trial winner Amy Hastings are all in the final. Bawcom is Kenyan born and the first Kenyan-American to represent the USA in the Olympics.

What to watch for - Day 7.

I say it every morning, but wasn’t last night great? Some great finishes at the aquatic center and a comeback for a medal in men’s gymnastics. More of the same should happen tonight,

We’ve heard a lot about the women’s gymnastics all-around since Sunday and today is the actual competition. No, Jordyn Weiber will not be in it. But Gabby Douglas and Aly Raisman will be. Russia’s Viktoria Komova posted the best qualifying and was the favorite after Sunday, while Russia will also have a chance in Aliya Mustafina. I think that Douglas is now the favorite after her performance in team finals. While Komova is very talented and came within tenths of beating Weiber at the world championships last year, she showed that she can let emotion get to her during a competition. The question will be what type of gymnast shows up tonight? Raisman is solid and consistent but lacks the start value of both Douglas and Komova. However, if the others slip and she performs like she has all year, Raisman could end up quite a surprise. In the past Douglas has had struggles with staying concentrated and faltered in big meets. If she competes like she has in these games she could be the third straight all-around champion for the U.S. Beijing was the first time the Americans went one-two and there is a strong chance that could happen again today.

Tonight is Michael Phelps v. Ryan Lochte 2.0 with the 200m individual medley, basically the same race from Saturday just cut in half. This storyline has not been as advertised since Lochte destroyed everyone in the 400 IM and has struggled since, while Phelps struggled and has now picked up some steam. Lochte is the reigning world champion and current world record holder, while Phelps is the two-time defending Olympic champion. Lochte ended up qualifying first and Phelps third, which puts them next to each other in lanes three and four. If Phelps wins, he’ll be the first person to win three gold medals in the same individual event. I’m just hoping this race lives up to the original hype!

Lochte will have a quick turnaround for the 200 IM since he swims in the 200m backstroke right before. The question will be if Lochte seems to save anything for his showdown with Phelps or will go for the gold here and see what he has left in the IM. American Tyler Clary was the top qualifier and will swim in land four, while Lochte qualified second and will be in lane five.

Missy Franklins goes for medal number four in her fifth race – the 100m freestyle - of the games. Franklin will be in lane three, while current Team USA member Jessica Hardy will be in lane eight. Watch out for top qualifier Ranomo Kromowidjojo from the Netherlands who had a great semifinal win.

American Rebecca Soni has a chance to defend her Olympic title in the 200m breaststoke. Soni set a new world record in qualifying and is swimming very strong. The U.S. also has another great swimmer in Micah Lawrence who will be in lane seven.

Also today, USA men’s basketball takes on Nigeria at 5:15 p.m. (est). The Americans are averaging 104 points per game. This is Nigera’s first time in the Olympic games and is currently 1-1 after losing to Litiuania. We’ll see if Kobe Bryant has the opportunity to do what he did against Tunisia – autograph an opposing player’s shoe after a game.