Sports on TV

I arose late yesterday with a bit of a headache (don't ask) and thought I'd watch TV to help wake myself up. To my delight, Eurosport was broadcasting, live, the elite women's race from the Vasaloppet , one of the great nordic skiing events in the world. The commentators were knowledgeable, and discussed, intelligently, how changes in temperature could affect the snow quality and how that could affect the athletes' performance in the latter stages of the race because their wax would be less effective. After that was over (two Norwegians went 1-2, including a 41-year-old who came second), they started brodcasting taped coverage of an indoor track meet in Calais, France. Again, the commentators were knowledgeable about the events, even commenting about how one long-jumper's "leg-shoot" technique had been sloppy. Not once did we have to hear about how one athlete had overcome the tragic loss of her dog when she was 6 or how another athlete had a surprising performance despite the hangnail he'd suffered 10 days before. After that, it was a match from the Champions League of team handball. Later in the day, BBC 2 broadcast a game from the Anglo-Welsh cup in rugby. All of these are great sports I only get to see in the states during the Olympics, or never.