Judd's Olympics Notes: Venues on schedule

TURIN, Italy — It begins.

Seems like only a short time ago we fled the heat and exhaust of Athens (actual time: 17 months), knowing we would be following the bouncing Olympic flame all the way to the cold and exhaust of Turin.

And here we are, right on schedule for Friday's Opening Ceremonies.

The Games are on schedule, too, no thanks to the official Italian Preparation Motto: "If Greece can pull it together, anyone can."

Unlike Athens, which was still planting plastic shrubs and spray-painting walls 4.5 seconds before the Opening Ceremonies, things have been ready to go here for a good day and a half, at least.

That's an eternity, in Olympic years.

The flame, in all likelihood in the back seat of a '72 Fiat convertible, is approaching the city as we speak. So let's get right to business:

Peek at the village

Just a couple weeks ago, we were grousing in print that we never get into the Olympic Village, where all the athletes stay and sleep and eat and do whatever they do at odd hours of the day and night.

Somebody was listening. Or maybe we just got lucky. But Monday, a limited number of us mouthbreathing journos were allowed to slip through the gates and run partially amok in Turin's Olympic Village.

One of the Village's cool features: It's connected by a long footbridge to the Lingotto, a massive, former Fiat factory that houses the International Olympic Committee hotel, the press center and other office space for similar Olympic Family freeloaders.

We walked across this footbridge, which spans a very large and very unsightly rail yard, gingerly, because we sort of expected IOC President Jacques Rogge to wait until we got halfway across, pull a giant lever, and watch us all fall into boxcars like sugar beets from Moses Lake.

Didn't happen.

The Village is somewhat utilitarian, but highly functional — a large, central plaza with cement-arched walkways and buildings containing everything you need if you're an elite Olympic athlete: Hair salon, gift shop, bar, coffee shop, massage parlor, World Anti Doping Association office (practice pee jars, five for a buck!), grocery store and post office.

A couple unidentified smug Europeans are zipping around the Village on Segways, for no apparent reason other than to get people to write that people are zipping around the Village on Segways. Resisting strong urges to knock them over, we popped inside the nearest building and found, on a sofa, Seattle's Kelly Stephens, our hometown forward on Team USA's women's hockey team, checking her e-mail back home at the Internet cafe.

Stephens, 23, gave away a bit of the kid still inside her when she confessed that her favorite Olympic freebie so far is a little rubberized zipper-fob doohickey that will make any Coke machine in the building begin belching free sugary product anytime you wave it near the front.

Hey, it's amateur sports, folks. It doesn't get much better than that.

Touchy seating

An interesting bit of semi-drama unfolded Monday afternoon, when the deputy mayor of the Olympic Village (and the real mayor was, what, too busy? Out of town visiting a sister Olympic Village?) officially welcomed the U.S. team. At the same time, he also welcomed the delegations from Armenia, and the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Iranians have five athletes: four alpine and one cross-country skier.

Village staffers raising the flags of the three nations put Armenia between ours and theirs. Not sure if that was on purpose. But, befitting the spirit of the Olympics, no ill will was shown between the two Iranian athletes present and the dozen or so U.S. athletes. Women's hockey coach Ben Smith was among a handful of Americans posing for smiling photos with the Iranians.

Oops!

It may give a whole new meaning to "sticking the landing."

In practice ski jumps up at Pragelato on Wednesday, more than one leaper noted a flaw on the "Normal" Hill: The landing zone was a bit short.

"Some of the athletes ... had difficulty stopping before reaching the padded barrier at the end of the out-run," the official Games News Service reported, putting it politely.

A committee of veteran ski-jump writers, both of them, concurred at the Press Center that this unexpected Splat Factor could be dangerous, but would make for nothing short of fantastic TV.

Apologies to Apolo

Special note to the official Games News Service: Program your spellchecker to get it right. Those quotes issued Wednesday were from Apolo Ohno, one "L," not Apollo.

The confusion is understandable, but keep it straight this way: Apollo was a god and a rocket. Apolo is a god, a rocket — and a speedskater.

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or rjudd@seattletimes.com