February 23, 2010 Day 23

It is down to less than 1 week left in the Winter Olympics. It has gone so fast and I can't believe it will almost be over.

Today at WOP was the Team Nordic Combined. This event has ski jumping in the morning and cross country skiing in the afternoon. I had to do double duty today and do some chaparoning of the medalists and then do some processing after. I was able to get right down into the mixed zone with the athletes and the reporters. It was chaos. One of my pictures is a where Waldo where in the scrum, you have to keep an eye on your athlete while they are being swarmed by the media. it was pretty cool to be right down in front where the medalists are during their flower ceremony.

Because of the high profile nature of Cross country skiing and Biathalon, we had the WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) observers with us and we have got to know them quite well. They are really nice guys and I got a picture with Rune Andersen from Norway and Scott Burns from the U.S. They are both directors at WADA but it also shows how tall they are as well.

Some interesting statistics thus far: we have completed over 1,500 doping control tests compared to 1,200 conducted in Torino. There has been no publically reported positive tests at the Winter Olympics as of today but I am sure there will be a few before the Olympics are done...

The events of today and the past 3 weeks has made me realize that no matter how much bad press of what the media says about the Olympics, the games are about people and the spirit of competition. It is not about the money, the facilities or the venues or the records. That is why I have also included a picture of "Otim". He is the corsing guard at WOP just outside our doping control station. His job was to stop traffic and to make sure it was safe to cross the road where the big trucks and media vehicles were going. He did his job everyday with a smile, took his job very seriously even though he was basically a crossing guard and did it the best he could. He never took a lunch break and would eat while he worked all day. I will remember people like Otim just as much as the cool things I have seen at the Olympics...