Winter Olympics

I enjoy watching the winter Olympics. It is fun to see sports that you wouldn't normally watch. But it seems like the Winter Olympics are trying to hard for the most part? For the most part none of the sports are natural. And by natural I mean like running or swimming, basically the Summer Olympics. Even for basketball, all you need is a ball. It just seems like everything has to be perfect for the Winter Olympics to work.
The weather becomes the biggest factor in the winter Olympics. We've heard for days now that there wasn't enough snow to do certain skiing events, and then yesterday they had to postpone a skiing event due to too much snow. I find that odd.
Yesterday there was grumblings that the speed skating wasn't fair, because of Zamboni problems. Apparently they had two ice resurfacers, and they both broke down at one time. So it left long breaks in the middle of the competition, allowing certain athletes to rest for hours in between races, while the other athletes weren't allowed that luxury. It also created unequal ice conditions. As a person who's done hundreds of resurfaces in my life, I know that each resurface can be different, and each machine does a different job. Some lay more water than others, and can even cut at different angles. Although if that happens you've got a problem. But it sounds like that was happening in the speed skating. Depending upon what lane you were in, you either got hard ice, or soft ice. So that made a huge difference. If you look at the results the skaters who were expected to be near the top that raced in the bad lanes, didn't finish as well as expected.
I heard a good quote on the radio today. "The Winter Olympics are made for countries who have cash and mountains, or mountains of cash." So much of these events are based on the equipment that the athletes have. Obviously that can be said about most sports. The track athletes aren't wearing old beat up tennis shoes. But it just seems like the equipment matters so much more. The ski's that the mogul skiers have have electronic chips in them to reduce the vibration in the skis. These chips are used in US fighter jets. The blades the good lugers use cost $20,000 a piece, and the manufacturers won't reveal what they're made of.
And another note on the Olympics, isn't it weird to think that some of these people dedicate anywhere from 4 years to their lives to be good at something that might take less than 2 minutes. And all that can be negatively affected by uncontrollable forces like weather or equipment? You train for 4 years as a speed skater, and then a Zamboni breaks down right before your heat, and you have to sit for an hour and a half, only to resume on ice that is different than your competitors? That doesn't seem right.
I'll continue to watch the Olympics, especially the hockey, which is the most unnatural of them all. But it just seems like the Winter Olympics are forced upon the world, and try to hard to get it perfect. They race on hills with not enough and then too much snow for skiing. The sled down icy hills to death, and skate on artificially made ice. They are fun to watch, and it is nice to see some of the great stories every four years.