Almost halfway through the Vancouver Olympics, the old cold war battle is long since over. For some, the Americans vs. the Soviets gave the Olympics their juice. There was a rooting interest in beating the commies, great satisfaction in a miraculous hockey gold in 1980. Since the breakup of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Soviet sports system, the Russian domination of the Olympics has begun to slip.
After Thursday's events, the United States has captured 18 medals, Russia just four. That's right, four, and just one of those are gold. A microcosm can be seen in figure skating where the Russians didn't even place a pair on the podium, and Yevgeny Plushenko, lured out of retirement by a desperate Russian figure skating federation captured silver behind American Evan Lysacek. The once dominant female cross country skiers are invisible and the Russians have not embraced new sports like snowboarding as American have.
Even the other former Soviet republics have not fared well. Belarus has two medals, Kazakhstan and Estonia one each, Ukraine none.
With Russia hosting the Games in four years, will the government and the sports federations commit the resources to capture many medals as the Canadians have this time around and virtually every country that has hosted the Games, both Winter and Summer, have done recently?
PREDICTION UPDATE:
34 Events
Gold - 13 (38%)
Medals - 47 (46%)
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