2010 Olympics Day 3

Svein Tuft of the Day for Day 3: Ivan Babikov

My pick for Team Canada's unnoticed noteworthy performance of the day is cross-country skier Ivan Babikov.

Babikov finished eighth in the men's 15 km free this morning. He was eighteen seconds (in a thirty-three minute race) behind the bronze medallist. Canada's previous best result in the 15 km event was a fourteenth place by Pierre Harvey in 1988.

Harvey's son, twenty-one-year-old Alex Harvey, finished 21st in his first Olympic start.

Medal Prediction Update

I had a few complete misses in today's results — the first of these Games. I had pegged Rob Fagan as having an outside chance at a medal in snowboard cross, but I had not identified Mike Robertson, today's silver medalist. A few more of those surprises will probably have to happen over the next two weeks if Canada is going to get to the top of the medal table.

Conversely, I had picked Devon Kershaw with an outside chance at a medal in the men's 15 km cross country race. It appears that he didn't enter the event. Oops.

I had picked the men's downhill as a strong medal chance for Canada, and the pairs figure skating as a possibility. So despite Robertson's great result, my predicted total has gone down again today.

As a brief editorial comment, I should say that I loved watching the snowboard cross today. The course seemed to be set up to enable lots of passing and lead changes, unlike what I remember from Torino. I was on the edge of my seat through every round.

Canada's great medal chance for Day 4 is in women's snowboard cross. Of course, if today proved anything, it's that anything can happen in snowboard cross. It should be exciting!

Sport	Event	Athlete	Category	Result	Impact
Initial Prediction					27.05
Day 1					-0.75
Day 2					+0.45
Alpine Ski	Downhill - M	Osborn-Paradis, Manual	Strong	17th	-0.65
Alpine Ski	Downhill - M	Guay, Erik	Outside	5th	-0.10
Alpine Ski	Downhill - M	Dixon, Robbie	Outside	60th	-0.10
Cross Country Ski	15 km Free - M	Kershaw, Devon	Outside	DNS	-0.10
Snowboard	Snowboard Cross - M	Robertson, Mike	None	SILVER	+1.00
Snowboard	Snowboard Cross - M	Fagan, Rob	Outside	5th	-0.10
Speedskating - LT	500 m - M	Gregg, Jamie	Outside	8th	-0.10
Figure Skating	Pairs	Davison and Dubé	Possibility	6th	-0.35
Day 3					-0.50
Current					26.25