The Winter Olympics have been in Nagano and Salt Lake City the past times, now they were held in Turin. Japan and the United States were a bit far away for a visit to the Olympics but now I had to go. I wanted to experience the Olympic atmosphere!
In the Netherlands speedskating is immensely popular so it was no surprise I visited this event. Once in Turin I wanted to visit the hockey as well but this was impossible. Everything was sold out.
After a couple of days skiing in Zermatt we, three friends and myself, took the car and drove to Turin. After a long drive we arrived at the little attic I had rented for the occasion. The next days the Oval Lingotto, the speedskating venue, would be our home during the day. We had tickets for the ladies 1500 meters and the mens 5000 meters. Both events had Dutch favourites. Ireen Wust and Sven Kramer both were expected to come home with medals. The first event we visited was the ladies 1500. I had never visited a speedskating event and I soon noticed this sport can better be watched on television unless the atmosphere is great as it probably is in Thialf, Heerenveen (the Dutch speedskating venue is known for its atmosphere). Here in Turin the audience was quiet so no advantage here. It is difficult to watch without all the statistics right there. Every now and then you see a woman skating but in fact you have no clue what’s happening!
After an hour or so, Ireen seemed to have won the bronze medal. Gold went to Cindy Klassen. No big cheers afterwards, it was all pretty mellow. Was this the true Olympic experience?
That evening we tried our luck in the so-called Holland Heineken House, a venue built for celebrating medals won by the Dutch. In fact it’s just a venue to party and celebrating medals is just a cover. Dutch people take any excuse to drink and party, lame people. We entered “the House” and soon we met friends from back home all dressed in orange of course. They were all there to drink and none of them really seemed to be interested in the Olympics. Just drink 30 beers and shout to whoever was on the podium and dance on whatever Dutch song was played. Yes, a real authentic place! Luckily this area was well protected and fenced so no Italians have noticed this nonsense.
The next day the mens 5000 was on the agenda. Chad Hedrick was the man to beat but our Sven Kramer was also a likely candidate to win gold or at least a medal. There wasn’t ofcourse a whole lot more to see than at the ladies events the day before, so after some time Chad turned out to be the winner. No celebrations again. We left the arena and because we had one more day to spend I bought tickets for the ladies 3000. The others were not interested, for some stupid reason I was. Don’t you learn from your mistakes Paul? Well, at least I got to see Ireen win the gold medal even though the big screen had to show the final results for me to be aware of it…
As you have probably understood by now, the Olympic atmosphere was disappointing to me. For a better feel I would suggest to explore the city a bit and visit different events instead of one. Also, go to celebrations in the city center instead of the Holland Heineken House to experience some authenticity.
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