63 Days

Have I mentioned how much I love Phil Hersh? Well, maybe not on this blog, but trust me, I've said it a bunch of times. Hersh is a sports journalist who covers Olympic sports for the Chicago Tribune and I have enjoyed reading his articles (mostly the figure skating ones) for years. I think he is candid and honest (and funny) and just generally tells it like it is. To be completely objective, I know some skating fans have accused him of playing favorites, but since Michelle Kwan is one of his favorites, that's never really bothered me all that much. :) Anyway, the point is that on Wednesday, Hersh attempted to get to the bottom of why speed skater Shani Davis called speed skating sponsor, Stephen Colbert a jerk. The comment seemed to come after Colbert's joke about the Canadian Olympic officials who stopped allowing non-Canadian athletes to train in Canadian venues for the months leading up to the Olympics in Vancouver. (See my post from Wednesday. Be sure to check out my comment at the bottom for the video.) Hersh opined that it goes back further to the 2006 Olympic controversy when Shani Davis requested not to skate in the team pursuit in Turino and it was suggested that he was unpatriotic for doing so. At that point, on his show, Colbert made some remarks a lot unfriendlier towards Davis than the more recent jokes. Click here to read Hersh's article and see the 2006 Colbert clip.

According to a poll, over 18 million Canadians will watch a collective 63 million hours per week of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Norway holds the record for most Winter Olympic medals with 280. That's 63 more than Russia and the United States, who both come in second. However, in 2006, Norway only collected 19 medals - and only two of those were gold - the lowest amount since 1988.