Rings
I don't think I watched any winter Olympics since moving here, so I'm a little intrigued this year to try to catch some and compare the coverage I'm used to - it's all about the women's figure skating - although given that this year we're pretty well assured of being constantly reminded of the dangers now, I reckon it'll be hard to judge. Shame about the luge guy, but aside from ski jumping, and apparently these other new X-Games entries, flying around the ice like that is pretty reckless.
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We are watching quite a bit of it. Last night we watched a major part of a match between Japan and US women Curling. No hair was involved. the US lost but it was actually ;lots of fun to watch. sort of like a cross between shuffleboard and bocce ball only on ice with weird equiptment.
Figure skating might be better if there weren't constant interruptions by the announcers screaming stuff like "He nailed it!" or, "Oh, that was a huge mistake", etc. We can tell without the stupid interjections if it is a good performance or a bad and they show how the judges score at the end.
As for the dangersin some of these winter sports, well, that seems to be why the competitors like to do it and, sadly, why people like to watch. That's the thrill for those who like watching NASCAR races, too. And there there isn't even any real athleticism involved. The cars do the work.
According to Hemingway, there are only 3 sports: bull fighting, mountain climbing, and car racing; everything else is recreation. I think it had something to do with the imminence of death.
The sport of luge , as you noted, killed one unfortunate guy but the sport of skeleton which is the same as luge except they go down the same track head first seems to qualify by Hemingway's definition.
As for bull fighting, my money is on the bull rather than the bullfighter for ending up dead but I've never really thought much of Hemingway as a model of bravery in the face of death, anyway.
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