Vancouver Blogger Sriseth

Most of Canadians have now forgotten "Own the Podium" campaign, which was aimed at winning highest total medals for Canada. With most Canadian athletes trying to go for gold and step on the top of podium, many perished and failed to win any medals while others achieved their target. This turned 'Own the Podium' into 'Top of the Podium or No Podium' kind of a result. With USA collecting record number of medals, Canada gave up their Own the Podium race mid way into the Olympics. But with only 2 more days to go and only 9 more gold medals to be given away, Canadians have found themselves closing in on a different way of winning the Olympics; by winning highest number of golds.

There is no standard way to determine the winner of an Olympics. Winner is not even officially announced. Some consider the winner as the country with total number of medals, while others only count the gold medals to decide the winner. Later is most commonly accepted so far in Olympics (eg: China won Beijing Olympics with 51 golds against USA's 36 golds, although USA had highest total medals). Until a weighed calculation is established, gold medal count is the most sensible way of deciding the winner. Which means, after a slow start on the medal hunt, Canada now has a realistic chance of winning the home Olympics.

By the end of Day 15, Canada has 10 golds compared to Germany's 9 and USA's 8. Canada has good chances of winning golds is men's curling, men's hockey and men's long track team pursuit in which Canada are favourites going into those matches. If successful, Canada can end up with 13 golds. Germany has the opportunity to add golds in ladies' team pursuit, 4 men bobsleigh and may be one of cross-country skiing races. That's going to be only 12 golds in total. But USA, though not going in as favourites in any of the remaining events, has the possibility to win most of the gold medals on offer. Americans are competing in all the events bar curling. It comes down to whether USA can spoil the party of the faourites of those 8 events. As we all know, Americans are the best at spoiling and coming up top. So I'm not going bet on Canada just as yet. By the end of Saturday we'll have a much better idea. The most interesting situation would be; men's hockey final - the last gold medal to be won - becoming the decider of gold medal race. That will add more spice to the dream finale between two fiercest competitors of the Winter Olympics.