Monthly Archives: August 2008

Well, folks, it’s been fun. Thanks for following along on my Olympic journey. Today, I’m flying to Shanghai for a week of sightseeing and relaxing (and vacationing!) with my friend Lindsay. I am taking off my reporter’s hat and replacing it with the flowered-shirt and around-the-neck camera of a visiting tourist. I am also turning off my cell phone, Blackberry and computer for the next seven days, so I will not be updating this site/blog/wp-content/uploads/legacy/journal until I return home to the States.

Until then … nin man zo!

In New York, out-of-towners find it funny/annoying/narcissistic that we refer to New York as “The City.” As in, “I live in The City,” or, “I’m going to The City tonight.”

Well, folks, here you can tell your hotel to book you a trip to “The Wall,” and a few hours later, you are on your way. Which is what Lindsay, Jim, Luke and I did this morning. The media center has a built-in travel agency, so Jim set up a trip for today. At 9 a.m., Mr. Ge picked us up in a silver van and drove us an hour to the Mutyanu section of the wall. By 3 p.m., we were back in our hotel rooms. In between, we walked roughly 2 miles and the equivalent of walking the stairs of the Washington Monument 10-15 times. They really should call this thing The Steps. The Great Wall of Steps. Large Steps. Tiny steps. Steep Steps. If there is a type of step, they built it into The Wall.

After a restful three hours of sleep, I dashed through the worst rain storm we’ve had yet and caught the 7:30 a.m. bus to the media center. Once we arrived, I hopped a second bus to the BMX venue and had just found a seat when a volunteer came onto the bus and informed us the BMX finals had been posponed until tomorrow (Friday) morning. Free day! (Well, until softball finals at 5:30 and women’s soccer finals at 9 p.m. That is, if it doesn’t stop raining.

This morning, I took the bus to the Laoshan BMX track to see the debut of BMX at the Olympics. Instead of rehashing the details, I’ll let you read the piece I did for ESPN.com and the one I wrote for ESPNTHEMAG.com and if you still don’t have your fill of BMX coverage, check out my BMXers in Beijing piece for EXPN.com.

Overall, the races were great. Today was a scorcher, and the smog unfortunately returned , clouding visibility on the Green once again. But that didn’t stop the Games from taking place as planned (only three days to go!). After BMX, I visited the Forbidden City with USA weightlifter Cheryl Hayworth and track cyclist Jennie Reed for a MAG.com piece (check back for this one).