Wednesday broke sunny and sultry, a sky of bluish gray with the water a greenish gray. Olympic history was about to be made, and your correspondent was there.

By day’s end, said correspondent was virtually everywhere. The task at hand: attend as many Olympic events as possible. Goal: eight different sports. Methods of transport: official Beijing Olympic buses and human feet.    Read More  >

I am not a haggler. I don’t like to shop. I know what I want. I go to Target or Office Max and I get my white socks and printer ink. If I need dressy clothes, I have a favorite store that’s a bit pricey, but I know the salesman and he knows what I want.

That’s my shopping style.

So, it was with a great deal of discomfort that I embarked into the Chinese world of shopping Tuesday morning, my first foray into hand-to-hand commerce.    Read More  >

I was IM-ing from Beijing to St. Paul, Minn., with my lovely wife today. She asked the probing question: How do these Olympics rank in your scheme of things?

You gotta understand. I’ve been married to Ann for 22 years, but I’ve been engaged to the Olympics since 1984. I’ve often been asked my favorite Games, and the two that always come out of my mouth first are the 1992 Barcelona Summer Olympics and the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Games.

But her question gave me pause.    Read More  >

Believe it or not, Week One has come to a close. So here are seven random thoughts, one for each day of Week One:

Most Laughable Moment:
The claim from BOCOG that all the tickets are sold. I went to field hockey today right on the Olympic Green. Two popular teams, U.S. and Germany, were playing. Half the seats were empty. There is something wrong with this picture.    Read More  >

In Olympics past I’ve written and reported on the notion of an Olympic Truce. I consider myself a peaceful guy. Some organizing committees have taken the ancient concept seriously.

BOCOG and its backers in the Chinese government don’t seem to. Nor, apparently, has Russia. With its recent assault on neighbor Georgia, the Russians shattered the traditional, dreamed-for Olympic peace.    Read More  >

He is a coach. That was obvious.

Before he addressed the journalists sitting around the conference table, U.S. Olympic men’s volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon grabbed a pen and drew a chart. He placed each reporter’s name at his or her spot on his little map.

A coach. Organized. Prepared.

He is a son-in-law, a husband. That’s clear, too. He is the face and voice of the Bachman family in China for now.    Read More  >

I was trying to be so cool. The place demanded it.

We were in the very fancy Raffles Beijing Hotel, the sort of posh hangout where no SportsBusiness Journal Olympics correspondent had gone before and lived to tell about it.

On relatively short notice, Gerhard Heiberg, the chairman of the International Olympic Committee’s marketing commission, said he would sit for an interview with SBJ Olympics beat reporter Tripp Mickle and me. (It will appear soon on this very same Olympic microsite.)    Read More  >

Pollyanna I am not. Awestruck fan … not since I was 12 and wanted to grow up to be the Phillies’ right fielder.

But Sunday in Beijing, if you didn’t appreciate what was unfolding on the various playing surfaces, you were not a lover of sports. You weren’t even an appreciator of profound pop culture.    Read More  >

The e-mail came at 6:48 p.m. Saturday night, Beijing time. It was from a friend who is an editor at a prominent national publication.

It read: “Just checking to see if you know anything or can help us at all with the in-laws of the volleyball coach who was attacked today. We think they are from Minnesota. I’m sure you know what’s going on by now.”    Read More  >