Day Ten: Or, what this blog needs is a montage

Well I got the order of the 100m women wrong, but I was on the money with the 10,000m (which is a bit like bragging I tipped the Melbourne Cup would be won by a horse). Bekele's win was amazing - he runs 10,000m like no one else ever has - he ran the last lap in 53.42sec, which is 3 seconds faster than Gebrselassie could do at his peak. He joins Nurmi, Zatopek, Lasse Virren and Gebrselassie as dual winners of the 10,000m.

He is now 11 from 11 over 10,000m, which is Herb Elliott like. Stunning running. His last lap was as awesome and unreal as Bolt's 100m.

The women's 3k steeple was also a great race - the winner, Galvina-Samitova became the first woman to break 9 minutes - it was brave front running; it's one thing to sit and kick, it's another thing entirely to just run away from the field with a kilometre to go and not get caught.
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Great to see Emma Snowsill win the triathlon - finally Australia gets a gold in the event we have basically owned for the last decade.
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A big night of athletics tonight, the men's 3,000m steeple is always fun to watch, but it hasn't been a great year for steeplers, and the field is not up to the standard of previous Games - no one has run under 8 minutes. Kenya should still get at least 2 of the 3 medals Richard Kipkemboi is my tip for Gold. Would love to see Youcef Abdi run a PB.
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The women's 800m will be won by another Kenyan - Pamela Jelimo is a class above the rest - if she is pushed she could get closer to the tainted 25 year old WR, but I doubt she'll break it (that would be too much to hope for).
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Must admit I don't know much about the field of the men's long jump or 400m Hurdles; but Angelo Taylor looked the best in the Hurdles semis, so I'll tip him to win his second Gold (he won the event in Sydney).
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The women's pole vault will be won by Elena Isinbaeva. In other huge tips, I'm picking Michael Phelps to win 8 Gold, the USA to get to the moon first, and the Allies to win WWII.
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Here's a trivia question: who eats this each day?
Breakfast: Three fried-egg sandwiches loaded with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, fried onions and mayonnaise. Two cups of coffee. One five-egg omelette. One bowl of grits. Three slices of French toast topped with powdered sugar. Three chocolate-chip pancakes.
Lunch: One pound of pasta. Two large ham and cheese sandwiches with mayonnaise on white bread, plus 1,000 calories of energy drinks.
Dinner: One pound of pasta, an entire pizza and even more energy drinks.

Yep, Michael Phelps. A bowl of grits??? And they were getting stuck into Ian Thorpe for eating an in-n-out burger.
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Foxsports, thinks life is pretty cut and dried. Check out the poll on its website today:
How do you rate the Australian swim team's performance at the Olympics?
Great OR Disappointing.

Guess it can only be one or the other. "Good", "About right", or "What we hoped for" are obviously too controversial.
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For a good laugh, enjoy Jon Stewart's commentary on the Olympic scandals of the first week.
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A good story on the TV coverage, comparing it with that of NBC. NBC has a live streaming on it's website. Pity we don't have that here (and unfortunately you can't use the NBC stream unless you live in America).
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10:26pm: What a great run by Sally McLellan to get into the final of the 100m Hurdles. Such an amazing achievement, and to be honest I think she can run a lot better than she did. She came 4th but in reality 2nd, 3rd and 4th were all together. She won't catch Lolo Jones, but you never know... a bronze is not an impossibility.

The Swedish runner in the second semi hit the first hurdle and went down - which just shows anything can happen in the hurdles, and why Sally McLellan is in with a big chance tomorrow night. The greatest female hurdler of the last 20 years was Gail Devers and she never won the Olympic title due to falls.

But even without any falls, aside from Lolo Jones, the minor medals are up for grabs. Let's hope Channel 7 shows it live (though since it'll be on at 12:30am I'll be lucky to make it - but I will though!).
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11:08pm: Props to Channel 7 for showing the men's 3,000m steeplechase live.... and then they blow it all by showing a minute of ads in the middle of the race... geez you losers, it only goes for 8 minutes, why not wait?

Great run by Youcef Abdi! Another PB and he comes 6th!... 6th!!! An absolutely fantastic effort for a guy who has just kept at it over the years. Two runs in the Olympics, and two PBs - that's how you do it. To put it in context, the guy who came 7th - Ezekei Kemboi - was the Olympic Champion in Athens. The race not only showed that he knows how to peak at the right time, but would have also guaranteed Youcef some invites to major meets in Europe that will help pay the bills for a while. Just fantastic.

My tip of Kipkemboi faltered in the straight and came third.
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Also well done to Dani Samuels - 9th in the women's discus. Have we seen any of the competition? Of course not.
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11:33pm: At the moment in the women's pole vault it is down to 2 vaulter - Stuczynski of the USA, who has vaulted 4.80m and Isinbaeva who has done only one vault - 4.7m and has passed every other height. If she doesn't make any other height she will finish 4th, if she makes another height she will win. It's edge of the seat time (of course I'm only guessing it is, because I only know about it by hitting refresh on the web page - Channel 7 wouldn't know it's even on - guess now that Tatiana Grigorieva is doing good work on Gladiators, the pole vault no longer rates...)
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11:41pm: Jelimo wins the 800m in a cakewalk. She went out hard, and kicked hard with a lap to go. It wasn't even a race. The 800m are usually hustle and bustle affairs, but Jelimo doesn't bother with all of that, she ran tonight like Jepkosgei (who came second tonight) did last year in the world championships - she takes the lead and sees if anyone can keep up - they can't.

Oh and by the way, Isinbaeva cleared 4.85m; Stuczynski passed at that height, and then missed at 4.90m so Isinbaeva wins. What drama, what excitement... refreshing that page just felt like I was at the stadium. Oh well. you can't have everything, and at least they showed the 2 track finals live.