Latest / The CFL Outsiders / The CFL Outsiders Olympic Bonus The CFL on Ice.

Transcript

The CFL Outsiders Olympic Bonus The CFL on Ice. · The CFL Outsiders

• 0:00
  Hey kids, welcome back to a February bonus issue of the CFL Outsiders.
• 0:06
  I remain, as always, your 100 % unbiased, completely impartial, and thrilled to have a guest tonight host, Old Man Shouting at Clouds.
• 0:20
  Joining me as usual is MJ.
• 0:23
  Things are really great in Tiger Town right now.
• 0:26
  Happy to be here.
• 0:28
  Haha, and GT.
• 0:30
  Hey everyone, how you doing?
• 0:31
  Welcome back.
• 0:32
  It's February, which means it's Olympics, which we're talking about tonight.
• 0:35
  So did wear my Olympic shirt.
• 0:37
  I wore this back in Canada day and kind of explained it, but for all the new people that have not been around, weren't listening to us back in the dark days of July.
• 0:46
  This is leftover from when I lived in Calgary for the 1988 Olympics.
• 0:51
  And we might talk about that with our guests a little bit later.
• 0:54
  And it's the Canada flag on the front and all of the other
• 0:58
  before and after olympics behind us we have alberville we have the poor old on the back there's a couple of more this thing is now i can't believe what's close to forty years old
• 1:08
  and hanging in so that's not bad and it's you know not from costco so that's all right
• 1:12
  It's a close, it looks like a classic.
• 1:16
  Yes.
• 1:17
  And as I said, we've got a bit of an interview going here.
• 1:20
  think GT had to lobby me hard on this one because I think the whole thing of it is a pretext.
• 1:26
  It's just so that we get two Calgary fans on the podcast and they can outnumber us now.
• 1:30
  But our guest, Ken Childs, who tells me has never been to a Calgary loss.
• 1:36
  They've won every time he's been there.
• 1:39
  And he's here to talk to us a little bit about the connection between bobsledding and the CFL.
• 1:46
  So where do we go from there?
• 1:48
  Do you have something you'd like to start with Ken or do you want someone to throw a question at you?
• 1:52
  No, I just I also did not get this in Costco.
• 1:55
  was the this is by far the best indigenous people's hoodie out of all of them.
• 2:01
  Their best logo by far.
• 2:03
  Also, a little disappointed that we're not having as good of an offseason as Hamilton is.
• 2:08
  Everything's debatable.
• 2:10
  uh
• 2:15
  and winning the offseason gets you nothing as we know.
• 2:20
  All right, so who's going to start out and talk to Greg about what, sorry, talk to Ken about what we're, what's going on here.
• 2:30
  Well also I lobbied hard.
• 2:34
  I lobbied hard.
• 2:35
  I'm just, for those who don't know Ken, he is a CFL fan and a sliding fan and not Canadian.
• 2:44
  I would actually love to start if we could maybe talk about how you even found CFL football and more specifically
• 2:51
  the Stampeders and not the Riders or the Ticots.
• 2:54
  it's a few things.
• 2:57
  My connection to Calgary actually goes back to the 88 Olympics and how I got involved in sliding sports and all that in general.
• 3:04
  I was about nine years old at the time of the 88 Olympics.
• 3:07
  I was really sick for like two, three weeks there and it just happened to coincide with the Calgary Olympics.
• 3:14
  So I was in bed pretty much the whole time, watched most of the Olympics on TV as much as you got at the time, which is nowhere near
• 3:21
  Everything anyone that ever complains now about how much Olympics they can watch now needs to just stop because back in the day you had it on one channel.
• 3:29
  You watch whatever they showed you and you just and you liked it.
• 3:32
  That was it.
• 3:33
  But I was big into race cars and big into racing and I saw bobsled on TV at Calgary and I was like, man, that is a that is awesome.
• 3:41
  They're kind of like race cars.
• 3:42
  They go real fast and was kind of hooked.
• 3:44
  And in in the States, we had the ABC's Wide World of Sports.
• 3:49
  And so every winter, bobsled or luge or whatever would just happen to be on.
• 3:55
  Once in while, and you never really knew.
• 3:57
  In the TV guide, it just said Wide World of Sports, so you'd watch it hope the guide, it was something he enjoyed.
• 4:02
  Once in while, you get like Skajorin or something like that, you know, equally cool.
• 4:05
  But there'd be bobsled once in a while and so on and so forth.
• 4:08
  You'd kind of watch it.
• 4:09
  We had Speed Channel for a while, and that had every winter.
• 4:13
  And I'd be watching and decided in 2010, right after Vancouver, like, I'm gonna go to the next World Cup event in Lake Placid.
• 4:20
  And I went to try to do that and I went online to find information and there was none And is either the best or worst decision I've ever made in my life, depending on what do you
• 4:29
  ask me.
• 4:30
  was like, yeah, I'll do it myself.
• 4:31
  And at the time I was working for a couple of motor sports websites on the side.
• 4:35
  My day jobs and IT completely unrelated to anything else I do.
• 4:39
  I reached out, Jeff Bodine at the time was doing the bobsled project here for the USA team.
• 4:43
  And so I kind of used that in my NASCAR stuff to kind of get involved and started my little website.
• 4:48
  And here I am 15 layers talking to you guys.
• 4:52
  As for the stampeters themselves, I'm originally from Western Massachusetts and kind of flutie country.
• 4:58
  So.
• 5:00
  Aha!
• 5:02
  Yeah, he started off at BC, but really had real success in Calgary.
• 5:06
  So you heard about it, and you heard about the Stampeders And so started paying attention then, and that's kind of...
• 5:13
  You know, between one and the other and everything else, just kind of have ended up being a Stampeders fan.
• 5:17
  went to my first game in 2022.
• 5:19
  finally got up there for a game.
• 5:20
  The team rolled out the red carpet for me could not have been nicer.
• 5:23
  They're wonderful.
• 5:23
  Um, Max Campbell, uh, was with the team at the time.
• 5:27
  He reached out to me and we did an interview and stuff and it was super cool.
• 5:31
  so went out there, we won that game against, uh, Montreal and VA was actually the quarterback for Montreal at that time.
• 5:37
  I was sitting right in near the end zone and there's a last second.
• 5:40
  pass into the end zone, got batted away to secure the Stampeders win.
• 5:44
  And that was the opening day of the 22 season.
• 5:47
  And then this year I went for the big game against the riders at the time, where the stamps were like one game back or whatever.
• 5:54
  And we won that one and kind of a blowout actually.
• 5:56
  um And yeah, so it's the teams to and else in the games I've been to I've tried partly that in like, you either free tickets or free flights hasn't happened yet.
• 6:05
  Working on it, I really working the angles on that one if you have
• 6:08
  to be a Stampeders his front office person and he happened to be seeing this right now.
• 6:12
  I got a direct flight from Raleigh to Calgary now hooked me up under feet.
• 6:18
  It's easy if you can get me up there enough.
• 6:19
  I like it and I gotta admit I'm more impressed with your undefeated record knowing it's in the last few years.
• 6:25
  If it was back in the mid, you know, 14, 15, 16, most of those were pretty much undefeated.
• 6:32
  But no, Undefeated in games I've attended.
• 6:34
  You know, down here, it's CFL plus has really helped out a lot as far as that goes.
• 6:40
  Before that, though, the ESPN had all the games on the stream or whatever.
• 6:43
  So the last.
• 6:45
  Goodness, I don't even know how long now.
• 6:46
  It's been a lot easier to watch games than it used to be.
• 6:48
  It used to be you just once in a while ESPN to had a game on and you just got to watch whatever happened to be on.
• 6:55
  And then, God, maybe seven or eight years ago, ESPN started having on their streaming service every game.
• 7:02
  And then once in a while, it'd be on like ESPN2, but the rest was streaming.
• 7:04
  And now with CBS Sports and CFL plus and all that, I've got a whole rig set up if it's on CFL plus so I can watch it on my TV still.
• 7:12
  And yeah, it's a it's really, really easy now to be a CFL fan in the States compared to what it used to be 15, 20 years ago, for sure.
• 7:21
  So Ken, you picked a great time in the 90s in those areas to be a Stampeter fan, because that was a tremendous team.
• 7:27
  And not only was there Doug, but there was everybody else that went with him in those times.
• 7:31
  Supunges and Pitts and Allen and all those guys.
• 7:34
  And the defense was unbelievable at the same time.
• 7:37
  that was, you picked a real easy time to become a fan, for sure.
• 7:41
  Unlike my, yeah, good.
• 7:44
  I guess just a couple of quick questions about television only because you were mentioning it.
• 7:49
  uh...
• 7:50
  i've always been curious is in the u s when you watched on on ESPN was it simply a rebroadcast of the TSN
• 7:57
  all of the the t s and coverage yeah
• 8:01
  Yeah, So unfortunately, we don't get any we don't get really any of the pregame stuff we get if game times like set to like seven o'clock, it comes on at seven.
• 8:09
  We get, know, we'll get whoever happens to be in the studio for like a quick two, three minute hit.
• 8:15
  And then it's off to the game or whatever.
• 8:17
  We don't really get any postgame.
• 8:18
  We don't get even the Grey Cup We only get maybe a half hour before the game starts compared to like, you know, the better.
• 8:24
  I was amazed when I went up for my first game, I got back to the hotel.
• 8:27
  I always stay at the Holiday Inn Express right over the bridge, you know, right by where the SE train stops.
• 8:31
  And I get back over there, turn on the TV, and there's like just post game on.
• 8:36
  like, my goodness, this is amazing.
• 8:38
  And really got to enjoy that.
• 8:39
  I've eaten my weight and everything over at Nick's.
• 8:42
  uh You know, really, really tried to do it right, you know.
• 8:45
  And did you ever make it to any of the games uh in the mid-90s during the American expansion?
• 8:53
  Okay.
• 8:54
  I was very much, didn't get out of New England really until the late 90s when I went to college down here in North Carolina.
• 9:01
  So I didn't really get to go to any of those.
• 9:02
  I'd see it on, again, it'd be on TV a little more prominently back then because there were American teams, but still nothing compared to what we have now.
• 9:09
  Right on.
• 9:10
  Okay, cool.
• 9:11
  So yeah, I guess I'm really excited to talk to this because like you watching Olympics Was on CBC and I didn't get a choice Like I did there was no TSN.
• 9:21
  I didn't have cable I had CBC and whatever sport was on was on and a lot of times it was the most random like speed track like speed skating like 10,000 meter or some random like
• 9:35
  we're doing like alpine skiing and now we're off to like biathlon and then yes we're doing now we're off to the track so it was kind of interesting that you get to just see a bunch
• 9:46
  of different things and I think everyone in Canada knows about bobsled because of cool runnings but there's not
• 9:55
  quality teams over the years as well.
• 9:57
  so I mean, there's been some really great drivers like Pierre and Justin Kripps and who else did I have down and Lynden Rush.
• 10:05
  But we're here to talk CFL players.
• 10:08
  So there's a little pipeline happening.
• 10:11
  It's this year you've got I'm going to say three and a half and I'm only saying three and a half because you're you got Lucas Toyko who was drafted but never actually played.
• 10:20
  He got cut by the Lions uh after being drafted out of Toronto.
• 10:24
  Went to University of Toronto play there got drafted.
• 10:26
  In one of the later rounds just got cut before the season started.
• 10:31
  It happens, you know, but you've got Jay Dearborn, who's piloting this slide.
• 10:34
  He actually had a really good season this year in North America Cup.
• 10:38
  So you have your World Cup, which is the all around the world, all the tracks and all that.
• 10:43
  And then there's a Europe Cup and a North America Cup.
• 10:45
  North America Cup is used to be the four tracks.
• 10:48
  You know, it's a very bitter subject for a lot of people.
• 10:51
  The Calgary track, everyone very much wants to open still.
• 10:54
  Everyone is very disappointed.
• 10:55
  It's not so.
• 10:58
  it's very close.
• 10:58
  They
• 11:00
  They started doing a renovation in hopes of getting this Olympics or the last one.
• 11:04
  They're one of the Olympics.
• 11:05
  Yeah.
• 11:06
  It was this one.
• 11:07
  Yeah.
• 11:08
  And then they, when they decided they weren't going to continue trying to do that, they took all the funding for it and put it toward other stuff.
• 11:15
  so the track just remains kind of sitting there.
• 11:17
  You will know if I hit the Powerball down here specifically because all of a sudden, construction is going to start working on that track again because everybody, literally
• 11:25
  anybody that's been to the track involved in the sport loves the track there.
• 11:29
  And nobody has a bad thing to say about it.
• 11:32
  Even people that haven't slid well there, they love the track.
• 11:35
  It's one of the few tracks on the bobsled tour that's actually positioned like near a big city.
• 11:41
  know, there's Park City is, you know, got that one pretty close to Salt Lake City and all that.
• 11:46
  But really the track in Calgary is the one you can be on the track and look out and there's the city.
• 11:52
  And so it's kind of special in that way.
• 11:54
  But then the track itself, a lot of people just have a lot of great memories.
• 11:57
  Obviously, cool runnings is something that, especially by now, anyone in the sport watched as a kid.
• 12:03
  They all know it from that.
• 12:04
  So it's got a lot of special things there.
• 12:05
  But North America Cup's got three tracks, Lake Placid, Park City, and Whistler.
• 12:10
  And so J.
• 12:11
  Dearborn race.
• 12:12
  full season on the NAC tour.
• 12:14
  Won a bunch of races and actually qualified in for the Olympics ahead of one of Canada's World Cup guys because he just scored so many points with so many wins in second places or
• 12:23
  whatever.
• 12:23
  Ironically, the guy he usually lost to was Shane Pitter, the Jamaican guy.
• 12:28
  Jamaica's actually got a legit bobsled team now.
• 12:31
  like legit winning races.
• 12:33
  North America Cup, not the most competitive of tours, a lot of development and sliders or whatever there.
• 12:38
  Jay, definitely kind of on the more development side.
• 12:41
  He hasn't done a lot of racing outside of North America, if any, but he's a good pilot and knows what he's doing as Shane Pinner is as well, the Jamaican kid.
• 12:49
  But Jay's got three seasons, two in Saskatchewan and one in Hamilton.
• 12:52
  And then they've also Shaq Marie Lawrence.
• 12:55
  who's been almost anywhere in the CFL at some point or another.
• 12:58
  It seems like anyway, he may just be three teams, but he's been all around.
• 13:02
  then Keaton Brugeling made the team this year.
• 13:04
  Seven receptions on seven targets by Bo Levi Mitchell this year.
• 13:07
  Really, yeah, as far as I'm concerned, his most reliable target all season should be throw to him more.
• 13:13
  think he had a, he may have had a touchdown as well.
• 13:16
  I think I remember celebrating that one if it happened.
• 13:19
  It may have been brought back, but either way.
• 13:21
  He got a ball in the end zone.
• 13:22
  That's all I care about.
• 13:23
  legit, like throughout the years, though, you've had all these guys, um, Jesse Lumsden, for instance, very decorated, bobsled, Brakeman, big CFL guy.
• 13:34
  Um, you've had a couple of guys, um, even on the American team that played in the States, went up and played a year or two in the CFL, came back and pushed the slides.
• 13:42
  Um, it's really, and it goes back, you know, you look back years and years and years, it was just like this.
• 13:47
  small little funnel of CFL guys that usually aren't starters or things like that, but have a shot at or trying to do something else.
• 13:56
  I think the reason you don't see this in the States more in part is because you just contracts and the NFL are just bigger and is more concerned about liability and stuff like
• 14:04
  that.
• 14:05
  know, everyone in the CFL is on a short contract.
• 14:09
  Usually, unless you are a star player, you're not on a very
• 14:13
  high paying contract So you get a guy like Keaton who's been a legitimate, decent CFL player for a few years now, but also kind of once the season's over, know, the CFL season
• 14:24
  ends mid November, that is right when the the bobsled season picks up.
• 14:28
  So it's real easy to go from one to the other where that NFL you have your season goes through the end of December.
• 14:34
  If you want to get involved on a team, you're going to miss half the season.
• 14:37
  So I think that's part of it as well, but
• 14:40
  The team this year really has, I mean, you've got four of your eight men's bobsledders have some CFL experience this season.
• 14:49
  For the team this year.
• 14:51
  do you know, Ken, is that something that happens because the two sports match up well, or is it more that there's a connection's been made and it just the pipeline keeps feeding?
• 15:02
  I think it's a little of both.
• 15:03
  I think that you get...
• 15:04
  The guys see this as a thing they can do and they have a outside of some fame and whatever and the CFL that they could maybe have.
• 15:12
  And again, you don't generally have a lot of guys that are bigger names than the CFL.
• 15:17
  They're kind of your role players and things like that.
• 15:19
  But they're solid guys, but there's what you need in bobsled, especially the brakeman is a level of explosiveness.
• 15:26
  You sit there quiet and then you hit the sled and you got
• 15:30
  I'm going to say 50 meters, it depends on the track, about 50 meters to go as hard as you can, get in the sled, get quiet.
• 15:37
  so your football players, especially guys that are currently active training football players, that is exactly what they do for football.
• 15:45
  There's not a lot of different weightlifting, different training that you have to go to where, you know, from being a quality CFL player to being a quality push athlete in
• 15:58
  bobsled.
• 15:59
  So I think that and I think a lot of those guys have seen this you Jesse Lumsden into those guys be quality breakman You know have a shot at medals, know, Jesse, obviously, you
• 16:10
  know, those guys have all got World Cup medals.
• 16:13
  They've got you know, they've been in the Olympics all the That's all things that they can do without having to really change much of what they do during the football season or
• 16:21
  outside of the football season a lot of that training is in the offseason for the bobsled is
• 16:26
  push sprint training, know, some push training, pushing the stuff, but it's a lot of speed training.
• 16:30
  And that's what a lot of those guys are doing anyway.
• 16:32
  You know, you're mostly seeing your linebackers running backs.
• 16:35
  Guys like that are usually the people that are trying to get into bobsleigh later on.
• 16:40
  Yeah, because was Jesse Lumsden the first one to move from CFL to...
• 16:44
  Oh no, there's a few earlier on.
• 16:48
  Jesse's, I think, by far one of the more decorated ones, if not the most decorated one.
• 16:56
  But there's been some earlier.
• 16:59
  I'm trying to remember, there's a couple names in the 80s and things like that of guys that had been doing it.
• 17:04
  So it's been a thing for a little while now.
• 17:07
  I think...
• 17:09
  We're seeing a little more success now from some of these guys in part because the way football weight training is Your linebackers nowadays are far more explosive than they
• 17:20
  were 25 years ago.
• 17:22
  You know all these guys just now are I mean you got offensive linemen that could easily outrun me in a 40 yard dash.
• 17:28
  know giving up 100 pounds to me they can still blow right past me like it's nothing.
• 17:32
  So your linebackers and guys like that are just big explosive guys.
• 17:37
  This sport is perfect for him.
• 17:38
  I'm honestly I'm surprised we don't have more, but there again there's a pretty good lineage now of body or CFL guys in the sport.
• 17:46
  And.
• 17:46
  I don't see why that's going to stop anytime soon.
• 17:50
  Ken, do you know the history of the name Samuel Jaguer?
• 17:56
  uh Why don't you talk about him a little bit if you could.
• 18:01
  Kind of, I mean, almost kind of like a Lumsden deal.
• 18:04
  Just dude came in from the CFL and Sam's another guy that was just a big dude that could push the heck out of his sled and.
• 18:12
  God, can't remember how long ago he retired from bobsleigh, but it's been a little bit now, but just another guy that like a Jesse Lumsden, just a dude that's big, strong guy
• 18:22
  can push the heck out of his side because that's.
• 18:24
  what they do.
• 18:25
  mean, you go to a you go to watch linebackers and stuff, they're pushing those big matted sleds.
• 18:31
  It's not a lot different.
• 18:32
  It really isn't.
• 18:34
  Yeah, I just, I just found it him an interesting case because I'm not sure if there's anybody else could make his claim, which is, you know, he's, he's, uh, an Olympic athlete
• 18:44
  and NFL super bowl champion, NSCFL gray cup champion all at the same time.
• 18:49
  So yeah.
• 18:51
  Yeah.
• 18:52
  Yeah.
• 18:52
  He was on the two.
• 18:53
  He was in 2010.
• 18:55
  I think it was Baltimore that he played with at the time.
• 18:57
  Yeah.
• 18:58
  So, yeah.
• 19:00
  And then he was, and then he went play two Grey Cups with Hamilton, of course.
• 19:03
  So yeah.
• 19:04
  Yeah, so, but yeah, I mean, it just, just goes to show though, those guys are just, they're all, they're athletes.
• 19:12
  You know, it's a lot of your European countries have a lot of guys that come from, Latvians always have a lot of decathletes.
• 19:20
  And, and bombslaying in general has, at least used to have a lot of decathletes.
• 19:25
  Fewer now as you get more people from different sports, but like decatalon is one of those sports where you have to be kind of good at everything.
• 19:33
  So you're not just training as a sprinter.
• 19:35
  know, so a lot of the European countries have those guys.
• 19:38
  George Fleischhauer for Germany is a 400 meter hurdle guy, which is a hulking human being of a person.
• 19:46
  I mean, but I think in you know, in the States and in Canada,
• 19:50
  Somebody with a strong football background uh kind of has that advantage if they're just used to those explosive moves and everything to begin with.
• 19:58
  Yeah, so I guess like for people who don't know like we're talking heavy sleds.
• 20:02
  How heavy are these sleds and how fast are they going and how steep is that track?
• 20:08
  Because this seems I've been to the Calgary track and it's like almost vertical.
• 20:13
  Yeah, so the slides are going to depend on two man or four man.
• 20:18
  Your heavier slides are pushing around 600 pounds.
• 20:21
  I figure that works out to kilograms, but once you get everybody in the slide, it's about 1300 pounds worth of people and slide going at once.
• 20:32
  Your two man slides lighter, obviously, but it's a big heavy sled.
• 20:37
  So in in cool runnings when they're carrying the sled on their shoulders or whatever.
• 20:41
  That would never actually happen.
• 20:43
  The sleds are way too heavy, never would happen.
• 20:45
  They're very heavy.
• 20:46
  So you need to be a big, strong guy to get these things moving.
• 20:50
  You see, and part of it is the sled has a weight tolerance.
• 20:52
  It's to be between like X and Y.
• 20:55
  the heavier side involves how much does it have to be with everybody in it?
• 20:59
  So the bigger your people in the sled, the lighter your sled gets to be.
• 21:04
  there's also a minimum tolerance of the sled weight as well.
• 21:06
  what used to happen back in like the 50s.
• 21:08
  You just had a bunch of like 280 pound dudes all in the sled.
• 21:13
  Like, you know, it got kind of comical.
• 21:14
  So they started setting rules on all that kind of stuff.
• 21:17
  But the tracks themselves vary wildly in steepness.
• 21:20
  A lot of them, like the Calgary track, God, it's about like a 10 % grade most of the way down, but you have
• 21:27
  Certain parts of the track that are steeper, Winterberg for instance, your first five curves, very flat, and then you hit the fifth curve and it's like a three story drop, just
• 21:39
  right downhill.
• 21:40
  The track in Cortina that they'll be at for the Olympics is pretty steadily graded.
• 21:44
  there's a couple big drops, but nothing too crazy, but they all vary wildly.
• 21:49
  All of them have uh what you call a labyrinth section, which is like a left, right, left kind of thing.
• 21:54
  They all have an uphill portion usually, except for a set.
• 21:59
  Even St.
• 21:59
  Moritz does a little bit.
• 22:00
  St.
• 22:00
  Moritz is the one track that's still built out of snow and ice every year.
• 22:04
  They literally go in end of November and start packing snow and ice and they make the same track every year roughly.
• 22:12
  And that's got a little uphill section, but nothing too crazy.
• 22:15
  But some of them have a chrysal, which is a 270 to 360 degree curve.
• 22:22
  That's usually got a small uphill section as well.
• 22:24
  So if you make a mistake before that, it tends to compound going up the hill.
• 22:27
  But they all vary kind of wildly, depending on where they were built, when they were built, you don't have to give East Germany and Russia or the USSR a whole lot of credit
• 22:38
  for anything, but they built the heck out of some tracks back in the 80s.
• 22:41
  There's one in Segovia, Latvia that was up five stories stilt.
• 22:45
  basically like up, you take an elevator to the top and you run it back down.
• 22:50
  So yeah, the track's kind of very wildly, but usually you go down about a hundred and 150 meters or so, give or take, it just depends on the track.
• 22:59
  The Cortina, think this is the third time the Olympics have been in Cortina.
• 23:05
  So is this a new track or is it a brand new track, a brand new layout?
• 23:11
  Yeah.
• 23:11
  So, well, yes and no.
• 23:12
  The track itself is brand new.
• 23:16
  old one was built in the way back in the day.
• 23:19
  They all used to just be built out of hand in the snow and they carved something out of the snow and that was your track.
• 23:23
  Eventually, when they went to concrete tracks that were kind of built in the ground, they turned into that and then they just naturally iced the concrete track.
• 23:32
  So they're
• 23:33
  ended up being a set course to Cortina and the track runs kind of ran at that point, much like Lake Placid and some of these other places were built into kind of the what the snow
• 23:44
  track used to go.
• 23:44
  And it just kind of ran like that.
• 23:47
  So the one in Cortina kind of runs through town a little bit.
• 23:49
  um Yeah.
• 23:51
  And so when they built the new track, the old track was built and then eventually they put a cooling part underneath it.
• 23:58
  So the sides were not refrigerated.
• 24:00
  So if it got a little too warm, there just wouldn't be any ice on the sides if you hit the wall, sparks or whatever.
• 24:05
  But the new track has been built either on top or kind of along most of the old track in and around that area.
• 24:14
  So there's some new sections, a lot of the track name, like the curve names and things like that come from the old track names and things like that.
• 24:23
  So it was definitely a level of history that's been built into the track.
• 24:27
  The folks in Cortina were very proud of their old track.
• 24:29
  They stopped using that right around 2010 or so, give or take.
• 24:32
  And so this track is kind of a point of pride for the people in the area there.
• 24:36
  A lot of the Cortina Bobsleigh Club is already rearing and ready to go once these Olympics are over.
• 24:41
  As my friend John Morgan said at one point, this is the first Olympics we've had in a while that
• 24:45
  gone, really simply blacked and where we've gone to a place where there's like a history of sliding that Predate the Olympics coming in.
• 24:52
  Sarajevo, Calgary, pretty much everywhere else built a track brand new kind of for the Olympics.
• 25:00
  This is obviously a new track for the Olympics, but it's in the same location in the same place as a lot of these older, as the old Olympic track was.
• 25:07
  And also Cortina hosted the one year that there wasn't bobsleigh in the Olympics.
• 25:11
  It was Squaw Valley, I think it was 1960.
• 25:14
  And Squaw Valley did not have bobsleigh in the Olympics.
• 25:16
  And Cortina held the world championships that year out there because there was not an Olympic bobsleigh here.
• 25:23
  So why was there no Bob Sliegh that?
• 25:27
  They did not want to build a track.
• 25:30
  And yeah, they just didn't want to do it.
• 25:32
  They didn't want to try it.
• 25:33
  So there's just no bobsleigh there.
• 25:34
  And so it got moved out
• 25:36
  I've got a very basic question, but I've always wondered about it when you're doing the four-man sled Once those two guys in the middle hop in the sled is their work done or do
• 25:45
  they actually?
• 25:47
  Make a difference in the in the race
• 25:49
  their main job once they're in is to get down as low as they can and be aerodynamically out of the way.
• 25:55
  And that's really kind of come on in the last, I'm going to say the last few years, but we're talking 125 years in bobsled.
• 26:01
  When I say in the last few years, I mean like the last 35 or so.
• 26:04
  There's really been an extra effort.
• 26:07
  You you watch like even the Calgary games, guys are getting their heads down, but they're not really like getting like super, super low.
• 26:16
  some of the top teams were, but a lot of guys, you kind of saw heads.
• 26:20
  The teams that are doing it right, you got these giant guys getting in basically a bathtub and they're getting super low and super down there.
• 26:26
  And their main job is not so much to kind of try to lean to the corners and stuff like that.
• 26:31
  Their main job is just get it, get, effectively get out of the way.
• 26:34
  You know, the brakeman in the back, his only job at the end is to, you know, pull the brakes.
• 26:38
  But it is...
• 26:40
  getting in the sled is really their main goal after they push it.
• 26:44
  what you see when you're watching the races, they'll have a push time that'll pop up and then a velocity afterward.
• 26:51
  That velocity is just as important, if not more important than the start time, because it's what you'll have is guys that can start real fast.
• 26:59
  But if they don't get in the sled just right, anything that's not going forward is scrubbing off speed.
• 27:04
  So the guys are trying to get in as hard as it is to do, get in quietly.
• 27:09
  and not get in in a way that's going to move the sled this way, you want to try to keep it moving forward.
• 27:15
  So you'll see sometimes guys with a top three or four start time, but like a tenth of the quickest start velocity.
• 27:22
  that's effectively means that they did kind of a bad job getting in the sled.
• 27:27
  So but once that's done, everyone in the back behind the pilot, their job's pretty much done until they cross the line.
• 27:32
  Now, was there not a pretty significant situation in Vancouver in 2010?
• 27:38
  Was that the bobsledder or was that the Luz?
• 27:40
  I seem to just...
• 27:43
  Okay.
• 27:43
  Georgian slider came off the curve.
• 27:45
  There's a lot of, yeah, there's a lot of people still bring that up, obviously.
• 27:49
  but the thing to really know about that is that it wasn't so much the track itself.
• 27:55
  we have people that come off that, come off the final curve and hit that wall all the time.
• 28:01
  Even today, the speed was a factor.
• 28:02
  All that was a factor.
• 28:04
  When you build a track, do what they call icing in.
• 28:08
  Basically, they run the water down to get all the ice in.
• 28:12
  The walls are not 90 degree parallel.
• 28:15
  When they put ice in, they kind of curve it in a little bit.
• 28:18
  That's in part so when you get up by the wall, you hit the wall, you kind of drift back out and stuff like that.
• 28:23
  Some tracks are more perpendicular than others.
• 28:27
  That one is icing a little bit.
• 28:28
  So when he hit it, he didn't hit a teed off wall.
• 28:33
  He hit a small ramp.
• 28:35
  And so he hit that and went up.
• 28:36
  Realistically, had he hit that wall 10, you know, three meters in either direction, probably fine.
• 28:44
  Pretty bruised up, probably fine.
• 28:46
  But yeah, that was a since then they've they still to this day run run lower down than they used to, or than they anticipated.
• 28:53
  they don't run from the very, very top anymore for Luge They do for Bobsled and Skeleton.
• 28:57
  They still go from the very top.
• 28:58
  ah Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 29:01
  So Skeleton runs only wherever Bobsled runs, because they use the tracks to start.
• 29:07
  Yeah, they use the grooves that are cut for Bobsled.
• 29:10
  And for Skeleton, you have your option of whichever one you want to use and whatever side you want to start or whatever.
• 29:14
  But yeah, Skeleton goes wherever Bobsled goes.
• 29:16
  Would you rather be on the skeleton sled or the bob sled?
• 29:21
  Or the luge maybe?
• 29:23
  Luge absolutely not.
• 29:25
  I am too round in my stomach to see over my stomach and see what's going on there.
• 29:28
  Probably bobsled, but that's more because, you know, I'd much rather just let someone else drive me down.
• 29:35
  Driving would be a little more hinky.
• 29:36
  I would rather crash doing skeleton.
• 29:38
  If you crash doing skeleton, you're going to have a lot of bruises.
• 29:40
  that's gonna be it.
• 29:41
  You're maybe a concussion because your head's like whatever.
• 29:44
  Bombsled when you go over, if informing you now have 1,300 pounds of weight and force slapping your head on the wall when you come out of a curve.
• 29:52
  Yeah, know, nobody thinks about that.
• 29:53
  They think, okay, well, the slides right there, whatever.
• 29:55
  Especially the pilot whose head is up and has really nowhere to go below because everyone's crowded in behind you.
• 30:02
  You have nowhere to go.
• 30:04
  So a lot of times you see guys like their head just tilted way over in the ice and stuff like that.
• 30:08
  They come over and crack their head on the wall a little bit or whatever.
• 30:11
  And then Luge is just different because Bobsled or skeleton and the runners are rounded.
• 30:15
  Luge and the runners are sharp.
• 30:16
  So if you oversteer, overcorrect, you can turn a lot harder into a wall.
• 30:21
  So the impact tends to be a little harder.
• 30:23
  And so yeah, if.
• 30:26
  I was just going down nice and safe, probably a bobsleigh.
• 30:29
  If I knew I was crashing at some point, probably a skeleton.
• 30:31
  I'll leave loose to the lugers They're all different league.
• 30:34
  I just know if anyone follows what Jesse Lumpsten was doing, any Ti Cat fan, 2014 Sochi was just horrifically awful.
• 30:46
  I felt so bad for him and Justin Krips on their crash.
• 30:51
  They were doing so well and then they just had that crash.
• 30:57
  I mean, Krips got his back in 2018.
• 31:00
  You know, he won the gold He actually, Krips has a great story about that.
• 31:04
  You he tied for goal with Francesco Friedrich, who Friedrich is legitimately the greatest bobsledder to ever bobsled, hands down.
• 31:12
  But he, Krips comes across the finish line, and when you're in a sled, there's a clock up that you can look up and see.
• 31:21
  And it's got your time and then a number.
• 31:24
  And the number tells you what position you're in.
• 31:26
  Crips is last one down.
• 31:27
  He crosses the line.
• 31:29
  He looks up.
• 31:30
  He sees one.
• 31:31
  He looks ahead and he sees hanging over Francesco Fridjic holding up the one.
• 31:35
  Super excited.
• 31:37
  And his first thought he told me later, he goes, my first thought was, man, Franz is really happy for me.
• 31:43
  That's pretty cool.
• 31:45
  And he was happy because they had tied.
• 31:47
  But yeah, Crips is one of the very good dudes in the sport, too.
• 31:51
  He's uh by far just one of the nicest people you'll meet.
• 31:55
  He's out there coaching now and everything like that.
• 31:57
  And he's just a good dude, very humble guy for guy that's accomplished as much as he has.
• 32:04
  Lumsden as well.
• 32:04
  um That whole Canadian team generally is big.
• 32:08
  Lumsden's hanging around CFL?
• 32:10
  Guys being like, hey, do you want to come play Bob?
• 32:13
  You could also have bobsled.
• 32:16
  Take Ticat You could also have bobsled.
• 32:19
  I mean, I mean, if he's not Keaton's gonna be right there like, hey, look, I'm in the Olympics right now.
• 32:24
  Like, you you guys could be hanging out with me.
• 32:26
  You know, I hope so.
• 32:27
  I really in my heart of hearts would love it if this pipeline continues.
• 32:31
  Because it really, for what it highlights the CFL to a point, you know, because every time you've got a CFL guy in the Olympics, there's stories about the CFL guy in the Olympics.
• 32:41
  In this case, we have effectively four of them.
• 32:44
  that are all there.
• 32:45
  And then, you know, you've got Lumsden kind of helping out.
• 32:47
  got, it's cool having that.
• 32:52
  You know, it's good for the CFL.
• 32:54
  It's good for the Canadian Bopsley program.
• 32:56
  It puts a lot of eyes from one side or the other in the other direction.
• 33:01
  You know, it can't hurt having one of the biggest events on the planet at any given time, having people hearing about the CFL.
• 33:10
  It just can't.
• 33:11
  Sure.
• 33:12
  Well, the three-down nation article for Keaton's resigning was like Bobsledder resigns with the tie-cats, right?
• 33:18
  Like that's great.
• 33:19
  I love it.
• 33:20
  And he had a great season this year.
• 33:22
  mean, personally, I think he should have been used more.
• 33:24
  That's just me.
• 33:25
  ah
• 33:26
  some other Ticat receivers, but we can, we'll talk about that later.
• 33:30
  I think his longest reception was like 30 something yards this year.
• 33:34
  You know, it was cool seeing him out there, you know, doing his thing and getting some targets.
• 33:39
  And yeah, it's just it's it's fun seeing those guys that you see doing the bobsleigh stuff from my side anyway.
• 33:47
  also doing the CFL thing, but also if you're a CFL person, it's cool seeing them.
• 33:50
  You turn on the Olympics, there's Keaton Broglin pushing a sled.
• 33:54
  So again, I love that there's a back and forth of it.
• 33:57
  like that it's continually a thing now for the last 16 years or whatever now.
• 34:02
  It would love it if it just kept being a thing, you know?
• 34:04
  So what's our chances here in the Olympics?
• 34:08
  Men's, well you know what, it's just not men.
• 34:09
  Women are also sliding.
• 34:11
  So how are we doing for going into Olympics for Canada?
• 34:16
  hasn't been a great World Cup season for the Canadians.
• 34:19
  However, the women came on real strong right at the end.
• 34:23
  Cynthia Appiah did not have a great World Cup season, but she is she's a big game performer and she is I expect a lot out of her.
• 34:31
  Melissa Lutholz can always surprise.
• 34:34
  She also like.
• 34:36
  didn't have any like big standings.
• 34:38
  She had a couple big races at the end.
• 34:39
  All the Canadian women did very well at end of the season.
• 34:43
  and that's when you want to be good, right?
• 34:44
  It's just like going into the Grey Cup playoffs, right?
• 34:47
  You go to the CFL playoffs and you want to be playing.
• 34:52
  It doesn't matter if you're a third seed.
• 34:54
  If you're playing better than the other teams ahead of you at that time, you got a good chance.
• 34:58
  Cynthia, especially in Monobob is phenomenal.
• 35:01
  Melissa is very good as well.
• 35:02
  Bianca Ribbe is another North America Cup person who came in, had a great NAC season, won most of her races, and then went to the final race
• 35:10
  of the season and out slid a lot of sliders.
• 35:16
  She did very well and kind of solidified with her run.
• 35:20
  It was her and one of the Swiss women contending for that.
• 35:23
  X number of nations get three sleds in the Olympics for
• 35:26
  Women's bobsleigh, believe, for two women, it's three, three nations get three slides.
• 35:31
  And it's between Switzerland and Canada.
• 35:32
  And Bianca just came, not out of nowhere, but it was close with her and one of the Swiss girls.
• 35:38
  And she put down a monster second run, picked up four or five spots, and basically slid her way into the Olympics.
• 35:44
  ah Yeah, she's also, she's a Calgary firefighter as well.
• 35:49
  Is that right?
• 35:50
  any of the women's teams to have a football background?
• 35:53
  Like are they playing any of you know, from the various women's tackle programs?
• 35:58
  Are there linebackers or receivers or anything that have made the transition?
• 36:03
  I don't believe so.
• 36:04
  think had one, think Skyler Steven, I believe, you got one of them has a hockey background.
• 36:09
  And then I can't remember the backgrounds of the other ones.
• 36:12
  Simply everyone else, especially on the pilot side have been around for a while.
• 36:18
  Cynthia and Melissa were both very accomplished break women before going to the front of the sled.
• 36:24
  And I really expect a lot out of the Canadian women for these Olympics.
• 36:28
  I think it's going to be a tough battle for medals.
• 36:31
  Especially in two women, the three German sleds are very, very good.
• 36:36
  The three American sleds are very good.
• 36:38
  We have Kaylee Humphreys who won a bunch of...
• 36:42
  Yes.
• 36:44
  I feel like she's been racing for like...
• 36:48
  Yeah...
• 36:50
  Yeah...
• 36:51
  And so she took a year off to have a kid, came back and just got progressively better and has been crushing it the last few races.
• 36:58
  Really this whole season she's been sliding very well, but she's another that's peaking at the right time.
• 37:02
  So Kayleigh is gonna be right there again.
• 37:04
  She's your reigning Monobob Olympic champion.
• 37:07
  And she just had a great last few races.
• 37:10
  Expect her to be in it.
• 37:11
  So it's going to be really like Germany, United States.
• 37:15
  Australia's got someone in Manobah that'll be very good.
• 37:17
  Walker.
• 37:18
  Austria's Cotty Barrel is going to be very good.
• 37:20
  So it is a really stacked field.
• 37:22
  But the three of them, Cynthia, Bianca and Melissa are all.
• 37:28
  really good pilots that can put down a few runs and have a shot at an Olympic medal.
• 37:34
  I don't see why it wouldn't happen.
• 37:36
  The men's side is going to be a little more tricky.
• 37:38
  Just as far as medals go, Germany's got three guys that have dominated the World Cup this year.
• 37:43
  Absolutely dominated.
• 37:44
  Hansi Lager.
• 37:46
  won the most gold medals this year.
• 37:48
  Francesco Friedrich is the most decorated bobsledder of all time.
• 37:52
  He's won the other gold medals that the other guys didn't win.
• 37:55
  He won.
• 37:56
  He's just been there most of the season.
• 37:58
  Adam Amore is the third pilot who is all of a sudden just winning gold medals.
• 38:02
  He's been winning medals but been behind these two greats of the sport and has come on strong.
• 38:07
  Taylor Austin is going to be here.
• 38:09
  is going to be probably a better bet in the fourman He had a really decent last few races in fourman bobsled.
• 38:15
  And he'll have a shot.
• 38:18
  Again, I don't know if there's maybe one or two guys outside of the Germans, they're going to have a shot at the medal realistically.
• 38:25
  But I think you're going to see at the very least a top 10 run out of the Canadians.
• 38:30
  Jay, a little don't really know as much as far as he just doesn't have a lot of what I'm going to call big game experience.
• 38:38
  He just hasn't been under the lights and camera.
• 38:41
  It's just different when you get to a World Cup event from like a lower tier event.
• 38:46
  So to kind of jump into the Olympics where you have literally the whole world watching you.
• 38:50
  You have all the lights, the cameras, all the TV, all the media, everybody there.
• 38:54
  But I mean, he knows how to win races.
• 38:58
  He's got a great team behind him.
• 39:00
  I think he can definitely surprise some people at the Olympics.
• 39:03
  I would be shocked if there wasn't one at least, not two Canadian slides in the top 10.
• 39:07
  But yeah, think crack of the metals and men's bobsled is, it's gonna be hard for anybody not from Germany at this point.
• 39:13
  Brad Hall from Great Britain's got a shot.
• 39:15
  Frankie Del Duca in the two man especially has got a shot.
• 39:18
  Chris Horn from the United States in the four man might have a shot.
• 39:21
  Marcus Treichel for Austria and there's.
• 39:23
  Michael vote from Switzerland.
• 39:24
  There's a there's a handful of guys that contended for medals this year, but again that aside from Brad Hall and Patrick Baumgartner won a medal from Italy, but that's it like
• 39:35
  otherwise it was Germany had the podium on lockdown all season so But I think on the women's side.
• 39:39
  There's a legitimate chance there for that to happen
• 39:42
  Okay, have you got more questions folks or?
• 39:45
  well, I just want to know when we we watch Bobsled?
• 39:50
  Next week.
• 39:52
  So not this coming week.
• 39:53
  It'll start on, I'm going through my head here.
• 39:55
  I don't have the schedule in front of me.
• 39:57
  We start off with luge every time and we run through luge right through about the middle to end of the week.
• 40:02
  And then we'll hit Skeleton on the weekend.
• 40:05
  And then I believe it's Sunday, we start with Monobob.
• 40:08
  If you give me one second, I'm gonna pull it up here.
• 40:10
  But it's coming up here sooner rather than later.
• 40:13
  But yeah, Lose always starts off.
• 40:15
  And actually for Lose you've got to...
• 40:17
  Amber Lee Susco is a young talent who has been phenomenal.
• 40:22
  I think she's going to surprise some people this year that haven't been watching the sports.
• 40:26
  She's really young.
• 40:28
  The whole Canadian team for Luge is wildly young.
• 40:32
  I think their oldest slide was like 21 or 22 and it feels like she's been around forever.
• 40:37
  Let's see.
• 40:37
  Looking at right here we have Bobsleigh starts on February 15th.
• 40:43
  Women's Monobob will start 4 a.m.
• 40:45
  East Coast time.
• 40:46
  If you want to watch it live, it'll be on TV later on, obviously.
• 40:49
  And then 2 Men is on the 16th.
• 40:52
  Women's Monobob.
• 40:53
  Metal runs is at 1 p.m.
• 40:56
  on the 16th.
• 40:57
  And then we go to two-man metal runs on the 17th.
• 41:00
  There's a little bit of a break for training for four-man and two-woman.
• 41:04
  Two-woman starts back up on the 20th, and then they run the 20th and 21st.
• 41:08
  21st and 22nd is four-man, and then we have the closing ceremonies.
• 41:12
  Bing-bing-bong, yeah, flying right through it.
• 41:14
  Yeah, there's a permanent sliding every day except for two.
• 41:17
  uh Yeah, so get it on early, get it on off.
• 41:21
  There's gonna be a lot of great sliding going on.
• 41:24
  the other thing I was going to ask you, Ken, is if somebody's been inspired by what you're saying here and wants to learn more about it, is there a resource you can suggest or where
• 41:34
  do they go to?
• 41:35
  if you're interested in a combine or anything like that and you're in Canada reach out Bobsliegh Canada skeleton is the official name of if just Google them I forget I think
• 41:44
  it's I forget their actual website I think it's BCS or something like that.
• 41:48
  look up Bobsliegh Bobsliegh Canada skeleton.
• 41:50
  They'll have combines they'll have trials things like that here in the States.
• 41:54
  They have a virtual combine they do or least you submit all your stuff and they kind of get you in and get you in for like an in-person deal or whatever.
• 42:01
  But
• 42:01
  There's never enough sliding athletes.
• 42:04
  you're in, especially if you're a woman or a man and you want to get into the sliding sports.
• 42:11
  Every nation needs to be, unless you're Germany, Germany's got plenty.
• 42:15
  But like Canada.
• 42:18
  Well, it is.
• 42:19
  So Germany has four tracks.
• 42:21
  You know, they've got four tracks of their own.
• 42:25
  Canada has one, the United States has two.
• 42:29
  Again, if I hit the Powerball, Canada will have two.
• 42:32
  Yeah, that is my pledge on this show right now.
• 42:35
  If I ever happen upon millions of dollars, one of the first things I'm doing is getting that track rebuilding Calgaryu I'll you right now.
• 42:41
  But yeah, there's never enough sliding talent.
• 42:44
  And I think people don't know that's an option.
• 42:46
  know growing up as a kid, I had no idea I could just become a bobsledder when I got done with baseball.
• 42:51
  You know, no one tells you that kind of thing until you just see it on TV and they bring it up.
• 42:55
  That's how British bobsleigh and skeleton have gotten so good at skeleton is they saw Amy Williams win a gold medal.
• 43:00
  People got inspired by that.
• 43:02
  And now the British Skeleton Program alone has hundreds of people sending stuff in wanting to try to get into skeleton and they pick them.
• 43:10
  They whittle them down from there.
• 43:11
  And that's how why they have such a good program in part.
• 43:13
  They get the top of the top of hundreds of athletes.
• 43:16
  If you're if you're
• 43:17
  top level athlete at whatever it is you do.
• 43:20
  There's a chance you could be good at pushing a sled, maybe go to skeleton or what, know, luge you usually got to get in a little younger, but bobsled and skeleton both, most of
• 43:28
  those sports, the people involved came from somewhere else.
• 43:31
  And if you're into, if you just want to give it a shot, reach out again, just Google bobsled Canada skeleton, they'll, they'll be glad to have you out and at least talk to you
• 43:41
  about what's involved in the sport.
• 43:44
  or like watch for Jesse Lumsden at your training camp.
• 43:47
  Yeah, if you just happens to show up, just go talk to him.
• 43:50
  He'll be glad to talk.
• 43:51
  He'll be glad to go over everything with you.
• 43:53
  I'm sure he'll get you the number of who you need to talk to.
• 43:56
  I'm gonna finish this off with one why question for you because almost all the sliding sports make sense to me.
• 44:04
  But the one thing I've never understood, two-man luge.
• 44:09
  Why?
• 44:10
  It was the thing.
• 44:10
  it's just, was a, your sled's, I've got a flyer sled downstairs.
• 44:16
  You put four people on it.
• 44:18
  So it just, it was the thing.
• 44:19
  You'd have two people on the sled.
• 44:21
  Eventually just kind of turned into what it is now.
• 44:25
  But you used to slide with two people on a bigger sled back in the day when you were a kid.
• 44:29
  Why not do it now?
• 44:31
  So why was skeleton banned but not luge?
• 44:34
  It wasn't banned.
• 44:36
  just wasn't a thing.
• 44:38
  So the first two Olympics that we're in were both in Samaritans.
• 44:41
  In 24 or 28.
• 44:44
  And then again in 48.
• 44:46
  And it was in part because they have something there called the Cresta run, which is a separate track from the bobsleigh track that they used to that they still to this day run.
• 44:59
  It's called Cresta.
• 45:00
  It's a lot like skeleton.
• 45:01
  It's not exactly skeleton, but
• 45:04
  It came from there and it was a thing.
• 45:06
  so it was in the Olympics then and then but only there.
• 45:10
  then after then it just wasn't for a long time.
• 45:13
  then 2002, it just there had been a World Cup skeleton tour forever.
• 45:20
  And if or since there had been a World Cup tour, the people have been doing skeleton like that forever.
• 45:27
  And it just kind of they got a back.
• 45:30
  IBS got get into the Olympics.
• 45:32
  And then it's been a thing ever since.
• 45:34
  Luge broke away from the, Bob said, the Skeleton Federation back in the 50s, I Their first Olympics was, I believe, 64.
• 45:45
  And that was, they became their own federation with their kind of their own stuff, which kind of makes sense when you think about the differences between Luge and then Bobsled and
• 45:54
  Skeleton as far as the start areas and things like that.
• 45:58
  So yeah, but that's why the Skeleton took a little bit longer.
• 46:00
  They kind of had their own thing going on.
• 46:04
  But once it made sense to get them in, they got them in in 2002.
• 46:08
  it's been, it's weird.
• 46:10
  It would be weird not having them now, you know?
• 46:12
  Yeah, they're very exciting.
• 46:15
  Oh, very much, yes.
• 46:16
  One of my favorites.
• 46:17
  Yeah, well, thank you for bringing that all that information to us Ken.
• 46:21
  That's great.
• 46:21
  oh anytime you hopefully some of our fans with if we have any will maybe enjoy the Olympics.
• 46:31
  The slidesports a bit more from what you told us.
• 46:34
  And that's great.
• 46:35
  understand.
• 46:36
  our families are now well informed.
• 46:38
  All right, so what we normally do now is we basically we're pretty much done.
• 46:44
  So we say our goodbyes and any last thoughts.
• 46:47
  then if there's anywhere that you do any social media that you want people to be able to follow you and get even more of the wisdom that you've been, that's been flowing forth
• 46:57
  tonight.
• 46:58
  So MJ, you go first.
• 46:59
  Well first of all I just want to say well thank you to Ken for coming this has been such such a treat and I'm so excited for Olympics.
• 47:07
  I also want to say that it's Black History Month and a lot the CFL teams have put together really good social media videos there's lots of players posting about it.
• 47:17
  Watch a video, read an article, read a book by a black author, buy something from a black creator
• 47:25
  And then you can find me tweeting, tweeting, no, I'm not tweeting.
• 47:30
  What am I doing on Blue Sky?
• 47:32
  I am just skeeting about, I'm just posting, posting away about heated rivalry and Olympics and CFL free agency over there.
• 47:45
  You can find me at Sports and Plants.
• 47:47
  I'm posting.
• 47:48
  free agency frenzy on Instagram and the dead zone that is threads, I guess.
• 47:56
  Alrighty, but you can.
• 48:00
  At the Ken Childs dot com on blue sky at the Ken Childs pretty much everywhere else there was somebody else had Ken Childs when I first got on Twitter.
• 48:08
  So like I just that was a Ken Childs.
• 48:10
  am the Ken Childs.
• 48:11
  So that's how that happened.
• 48:12
  So at the Ken Childs dot com on blue sky is where I post most of my stuff.
• 48:15
  It's where I post all of my live stuff for uh bobsled Skeleton, Luge that will start Saturday, 11 a.m.
• 48:22
  Eastern Time is when the first runs of Men's Luge kick off.
• 48:26
  but all winter long, every season, got three and a half, we got three years and 50 weeks where there's not the Olympics.
• 48:33
  And during those times, we still have sliding sports stuff happening.
• 48:37
  Even during the off season, I'll have probably a dozen athlete interviews going on during that time as well.
• 48:42
  I will also start randomly posting about Stampeders games and other CFL games as they're happening just because it's what I do.
• 48:49
  Yeah, and then slidingonice.com is the website where I have all my stories, my, this is where all the interviews will go and all that.
• 48:55
  I linked to that pretty much everywhere I can.
• 48:56
  So yeah, at thekentiles.com, I'm blue skies where you can find me the most.
• 49:00
  Good, thank you very much.
• 49:01
  And back to what MJ said, thank you for joining us and letting us know all about this stuff.
• 49:07
  It's fantastic to find out.
• 49:10
  I'm also right at the end here, I'm gonna put you on the spot.
• 49:12
  You said that the men are a long shot, but the women might be able to uh medal So yes or no, are Canadian women on the podium this Olympics?
• 49:20
  I think you're gonna get one.
• 49:22
  Good stuff.
• 49:23
  I like it.
• 49:23
  You heard it here first, folks.
• 49:25
  Okay, GT, how about you?
• 49:28
  I've got nothing to finish it off.
• 49:30
  It is a great time to be alive with sports.
• 49:33
  Everything's going on.
• 49:35
  Our league just changed every player it seemed like over the course of the last four days.
• 49:39
  And then I was following all of that and then the NBA happened and I was like, I'm overwhelmed.
• 49:45
  So if you haven't followed that, it makes the CFL look like nothing because the amount of movement there is unbelievable.
• 49:53
  ah Anyways, that's me and I'm at GT Barnum on Blue Sky and ah occasionally you'll find me there and that's the best I can give you.
• 50:03
  Okay, thank you much for another month there.
• 50:06
  And I of course am Old Man, Shoutingatclouds You get me on bluesky at oldman-sac.blu, bluesky.social, da da.
• 50:16
  The show is on X and on bluesky.
• 50:20
  And it's been long time since been doing this.
• 50:22
  We're on Instagram now, all as the CFL outsiders.
• 50:25
  And threads now as the CFL outsiders.
• 50:27
  You can also catch me on the CFL subreddit as old man shouting clouds and please on any of those spots or right here.
• 50:35
  If you've got something to say, leave a comment.
• 50:36
  We love to hear them.
• 50:38
  If you haven't subscribed yet, now's a great chance because we're probably have two more of these monthly ones and then we'll all basically be back into the preseason and, go on
• 50:49
  every week again.
• 50:50
  And we don't want you to miss any of that.
• 50:53
  You know, we, we, feel.
• 50:54
  We are so concerned about you and making sure you get your weekly dose of the best football podcast in the universe here.
• 51:02
  So that's about it.
• 51:04
  Until next time for our special guest Ken and for MJ and GT, this is Old Man saying, get the hell off my lawn.