redfiona99

1 - There were 5 (five!!) women in the Vienna Philharmonic

2 - A Brit came ahead of a Russian and a Swiss in a cross-country skiing race.

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More completely, I had a blast watching Jools's Hootenanny last night as I always do. I would have felt sorry about making the mothership and grandmothership sit through it but the Dubliners (or rather, survivors and friends) were on so the mothership was happy and none of the other channels offered anything that she would have enjoyed more. There's really nothing on for people my Nan's age any more. Much though I like him, Graham Norton is not Grandma-suitable.

My Mum got me up to watch the Neu Jahrs Konzert this morning, which was pleasingly placid. Not sure about the second set of ballet though. The nearest theme that Mum and I could come up with was "ghostly weddings", which I suspect wasn't the intention.

After that came the 2nd of the Four Hills, where the Austrians were once again conspired against, particularly Wolfgang Loitzl. Not that I can particularly object to this set of Norwegians doing well because they are grade A adorable. It's just ... damn it, I'm Austrian, of course I want no-one but Austrians to win.

Following that came the cross-country with the aforementioned sign of the apocalypse. I then went upstairs to do a little fact checking, which lead to some wiki editing. The articles for Austrian ski-jumpers are sadly under-tended so I started to do some adding of material from the German language wiki. I enjoy that kind of thing entirely too much.

Then I watched the World's Strongest Man final which I enjoyed as I tend to. Well done Žydrūnas Savickas.

Ski-jumping:

The retirement of Janne Ahonen (the man in my ski-jumping icon) lasted even for an even shorter time than we expected, and he's back. Not doing as well as he used to, but that's being put down to a lack of practise.

Andi Widhoelzl is now commentating for Eurosport and being charming despite the dubbing. Mother and I are having an interesting debate as to who out of Gregor Schlierenzauer and Simon Amman is less intelligible in German.

Other than that, Eurosport are doing a 'let's humanise the winter-sportspersons', I think mostly for those silly markets where they aren't already huge and yesterday's was Martin Schmitt (http://martin-schmitt.smaitec.de/index2.html). For all that I may have only cheered him on to wind my Mother up (in a display of determined awkwardness, she cheers for various Finns and Scandanavians in winter sports), I now find him adorable beyond all belief.

I also love how friendly they all are - for those that don't watch it, Schmitt was awesome then went through a rough patch that he's only just now getting out of, and one of the questions he got was 'was Wolfgang Loitzl's (http://www.wolfgang-loitzl.de/) success after many years of trying an inspiration for you to keep going?' and he said yes, and how nice it was to see Loitzl, who was such a hard worker etc, finally get the success he deserved. That came after Schlierenzauer (http://www.gregorschlierenzauer.at/) had been interviewed about last year's 4 Hills and he went how awesome it was for 'Wolfie', always the backbone of the Austrian team, to finally get some individual glory.

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I think the friendliness is also why I like Strongman quite so much. I must once again declare my love for Travis Ortmayer, he's just so lovely.

The Russian whose name I couldn't remember, and who is great fun and can be whimsically witty in what is at least his second language is Michael Koklayaev. Richard Skog was his usual amusing self, and I'm hoping that Darren Sadler will one day get the success he deserves for trying his best despite only being 5 foot 10.

I love Christmas because it means I get to watch Winter Sports, bobsleigh this time.

In between trying to figure out what the T is in FIBT (Federation International Bobsleigh ?), I fell back in love with sledding. Because they're all so nice and funny and charming and Winter Sports are just better ;)

Also, any Canadians on my flist, any money your government is spending on bobsleighing is worth it, particularly in the women's. They're beating the Germans on home ice at Altenberg.

Andre Lange is apparently threatening to retire, which makes me :( because I remember him being the young German. There's a ridiculously young American driver called Napier doing quite well and the Austrians are being particularly pants. The second of the GB Ladies 2 man crews has qualified for the Olympics which makes me happy.

Strongman

It is Christmas so it is Strongman time. They're stuck on Bravo this year, but Bravo are running the most awesome advert. They've cartoonified the Strongmen and turned them into superheros complete with national emblem or name inspired costumes. I love Terry Hollands's one, where he's done up like a Celt with a St. George's cross instead of woad, and Mariusz has an imperial eagle. In the advert they're doing various things, like thingy Poundstone is lifting the Statue of Liberty, but my favourite is Phil Pfister stopping a train to let people past.

Wrestling

Also on Bravo. I have tried to resist TNA's blandishments, and they've been helping me by offering me such fare as Mick Foley v Kurt Angle and Bobby Lashley v Scott Steiner, but then I saw Desmond Wolfe v Christopher Daniels and it was like 'damn'. I think I shall have to treat TNA the way I treated WCW - enjoy the cruiserweights, ignore the heavyweights.

I missed heat 3 due to a mixture of fun family duties and Channel 5 lying about their schedule. ( What I do know is )

( Heat 4 )

I didn't get to see most of heat 5 either ( contestants were )

There are no words for how much I'm cheering for Burnley. I also can't write Chris Daniels.

As for the final of world's strongest man - well Mariuz dyed his hair blond so when he won it made him look even more ubermenschlich than usual. I mean, I realise his general unstoppableness would be boring but it's how determined he is. The Fingal's fingers are normally his weakest event (in the sense that he doesn't normally win it rather than any excessive pantness) and he's apparently been training for 3 hours a day at it. He's as happy about his performance in that as he is at winning the overall.

Usual thing of much cheering happened.

After yesterday's very exciting and close heat (which lead to Terry Hollands and Laurence Shahlaei getting through) there's another one on today and guess who else has popped up as one of the referee/assistant/trying to prevent the strongmen from being broken into five pieces people - Juho Akola.

Just as well actually since he's just had to catch one of them mid-faint.

Terry Hollands is a marvel - he's pretty much falling to pieces (both patellas and I think the left ACL are totally gone by the sounds of it) and he's saying that its nothing much.

Of today's lot there's a Mark Westerby who's a farmer who only started strongman at the age of 38, and is walloping a lot of the competition. There's also a tree surgeon.

They are all ridiculously wonderful. And there's a lot of yelling for each other.

Because, as usual, I have been doing nothing but watching sport. There were winter sports and they were on my TV. How could I resist?

At this point I would like to state my undying love for the following: the French biathlon coaches, Ole Einar Bjordahlen, Lars Berger, who kept smiling after a cursed weekend), the Oberhof organising committee, who managed to keep things flowing smoothly despite having not enough snow and far too much rain, and the Oberhof crowd who, in said pouring rain, never had any umbrellas up for fear of spoiling the view of spectators behind them.

The Russians are back though, and how. They're the only ones who seem to have everything together.

Ski-jumping goes less well, but, I've accepted that the Austrians can't win everything, and at least Schlierensauer won in Bischofhofen, and the Swiss didn't win the overall title.

Formula 1 - Dear Heikki Koivannen, please step outside, without your helmet on because you're paler than Mika and Kimi ever managed. Evidence here - http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/6175945.stm

I feel kind of sorry for Fisi, he's about to get beaten by yet another beginner. I would love for him to do well, but I don't see it happening.

World's Strongest Man - ( Final )

( World's Strongest Man, Qualifier 2 )

( Qualifier 3 )

( Torchwood - Out of Time )
That last thing may have been my only problem with the whole thing, so I say well done, Torchwood crew, it's nice to see you finally hitting your stride.

( Torchwood - Combat )

Anyone who spoils me for the Torchwood finale will be bludgeoned to death. This is a friendly warning, really.

Mostly for Rya since it concerns our favourite Viking - Svend Karlsen is still competing. His absence last year was, apparently due to a knee injury which is still giving him some pain.

Other than that, I'm still in awe of how sportsmanlike they are, and pleased that an Austrian won whichever event it was they were replaying on Eurosport today.

Must remember to bring back my strongman icon.

Mariusz won.

By a country mile (15 points).

Jesse Marunde came second, and since he's an American and good, and one of the few who might possibly beat Pudzianowski, it might mean there's more of it on television.

There was at least one new world record - you know the Hercules hold (the one where they've got to hold up two pillars for as long as possible) well Tarmo Mitt got the world record in that, 1 minute 12 or so seconds. Seriously, I have no idea how he did it, and I'm not sure if he has either. I've never seen anyone so focused. It was bloody scary. And of course deeply impressive.

I'd also like to declare my undying affection for Marunde because when they were interviewing him afterwards he was all 'Mariusz is such a great guy and he always helps everyone out' and yes, much love. He also held Pudzianowski's hand up in victory at the end.