Here's a look at some past Olympic sports that are no longer in the games.

Several years ago, baseball and softball were pulled from competition. The American women dominated in softball, while in baseball Americans … well, they only got three medals in five tries. The Cuban team grabbed the gold. There’s not much else to do in Cuba, except play baseball and stare longingly toward Florida, where senior citizens have high speed internet and all-you-can-eat buffets.

In lacrosse, a medal event in 1904 and 1908, people in face masks hit their balls with big fly swatters. It died out in the early 1900’s because only the Canadians, British, and Americans were willing to take the punishment. Former lacrosse players are now employed as dog catchers and butterfly collectors.

Basque pelota was only a medal event in 1900, because nobody could figure out how to pronounce it. It’s played on a court with a ball, sometimes using a racket, but sometimes not.

In other words, it’s handball. If they’d called it that, basque pelota-ites would be on Wheaties boxes.

Downhill skiing initially fared poorly, with over a dozen cases of heat stroke before it was moved to the WINTER games.

Tandem cycling was popular in the Olympics, from 1920-72. It’s being considered again with more interesting rules: The guy in front steers, while the guy in back can lash out at other competitors with lacrosse sticks. It’s now a favorite of retired hockey players.

In 1948 winter pentathlon was put on as a demonstration sport, and consisted of downhill skiing, cross-country skiing, shooting, fencing, and horse riding.

All together. In the same event.

Cat Pool proved particularly popular with pooch preference people.

Sweden, which remained more or less neutral through World War II, had a whole army of young men just itching to shoot something: They swept all the winter pentathlon medals. However, the sport was discontinued after ski-clad Swedes on horseback shot all the competitors’ horses while jumping over the fencing.

Motorboarding--I initially thought this was something altogether different--was tried in 1908. It ended with only one boat finishing in each of three races. It turns out the Swedes used their winter pentathlon rifles to shoot up the other boat engines, leading officials to change to rowing.

Polo was a favorite Olympic event in the early 1900’s, but it was canceled after the Swedes sent in their entry forms.

The Olympics also tried an obstacle course … for swimmers. Competitors had to climb over a pole, go over a row of boats, and then swim under another row of boats. Luckily they had an excess of boats left over from the motorboat races.

Speaking of swimming, in 1984 they tried solo synchronized swimming.

Think about it.

Synchronized Ball Inflation preceeded most Olympic sports that included balls, but failed badly after the tennis event caused several aneurysms.

Then there’s the one Olympic sport I actually participated in: Tug of war. Not in the Olympics, but we won, and didn’t have to borrow Swedish rifles to do it. Between 1900 and 1920 the sport was dominated by Great Britain, which sent teams of police officers. And remember, their cops were unarmed. Good thing the Swedes didn’t have a team.

Distance plunging would have been interesting … or not. Athletes would dive into the pool and coast underwater, without moving.

That’s it. The winner is the one who drifted the longest in sixty seconds, or when they floated to the surface, whichever came first. An American won the gold, although it should be noted that this competition happened only once, in the 1904 St. Louis Olympics. It should also be noted that only Americans competed.

I’m not sure how they could tell whether the athlete was winning, or drowning.

Groundhog Racing was halted after a series of crashes--and rabies.

Also at St. Louis, another US competitor did an impressive job winning gold in a sport that still gives old gym class haters nightmares: the rope climb. Why was George Eyser so impressive? Because he had a wooden leg.

In 1906 they tried the sport of pistol dueling. No, it wasn’t won by a Swede. It wasn’t really dueling, either: Competitors shot at a dummy dressed in a frock coat, and by dummy I don’t mean the guy who planned the Sochi games. It’s a good thing, because it could have been the one sport where the silver and bronze medals were awarded posthumously.

Finally, here’s a sport they tried just once, at the 1900 Paris Olympics:

Live pigeon shooting.

When the feathers cleared, a Belgian named Leon de Lunden got the gold for downing 21 birds, none of which had a say in the matter. Then he celebrated with a steak dinner.

Once the onlookers got a look at the mess left behind, they decided the Swedes weren’t so bad.

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Remember, books can make your brain strong enough to win a Reading Gold.

(These aren't really Olympic sized thoughts--just small thoughts on the Olympics.)

It was nice that benevolent dictator Kim Jong-un let his cheerleaders out of the country to attend the Olympics, along with his sister. Isn't he a good guy? Hopefully they had a chance to grab a nice meal--or any meal--before heading back up to the Dark Country. (Literally dark, take a look at a nighttime satellite view.)

Probably the only downhill sport I'd have a chance of making it through would be sledding, otherwise known as luge or skeleton. That's because I'm incapable of standing on any moving object other than my own feet, and sometimes the feet part isn't easy.

But while I used to sled a lot, that was at, oh, ten miles per hour or so. Anyone who goes face first at seventy miles per hour ... well, there's a reason why it's called skeleton. Because "mangled body" seemed a little too obvious.

There is another kind of sledding in the Olympics, but apparently competitors are required to be named "Bob". There's only so much I'll do for my sport.

Speaking of sports in which I'd never made it to the end of the course, I've noticed that downhill skiiers seem to be flying as much as they're skiing. Let's make it more interesting and fit them with small wings, just to see what happens.

There's a skiing event that consists entirely of skiing down bumps. I can't stand to watch it: It kills my knees.

"Salchow" is pronounced "sow cow" ... and as such, just doesn't seem like a figure skating move.

That group snowboarding competition ... did some Olympic official happen to catch a NASCAR race and think, "That's what the winter Games needs: massive pileups!"

Figure skating has been a favorite of mine since I was a kid. But I'll be the first to admit that back then I was all about the ladies and the short skirts. Now that I'm older I'm still fascinated, because how the heck do they even--? I mean, try just standing on ice skates. Their routines are, according to the laws of physics, as impossible as me making it to the other end of the rink.

I never tried pairs figure skating because I don't like getting stitches.

 I just watched a pair figure skate to music from Star Wars, and it made me realize Jedi would be fantastic athletes. Luke skiing, Anakin throwing Padme through about fifty spins on the ice, Vader as a bad boy snowboarder ... Yoda as a coach. Emperor Palpatine ruling the evil land just to the north. R2D2 as a judge. I've just created a whole new subgenre of fanfiction.

Curling. It's indecipherable, and a joy to make fun of. Unless you seriously watch it for about an hour, then it becomes addictive to 80% of the viewers. What dark magic is that? It's shuffleboard on ice. And I'm watching it.

Every time I watch ski jumping, all I can think of it the Wide World Of Sport's "agony of defeat". This removes much of the fun for me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2AZH4FeGsc

In the end I'm not a sport fan so much as an events fan: Every two years I watch sports that I don't even think about the rest of the time. It's the same reason why I like to watch the Indy 500 even though I have no interest in racing, and I used to watch the Superbowl even though I haven't seen a non-Superbowl football game in twenty years. I've even caught a World Series game, or two.

But not basketball. For me, basketball is the rap of sports: to be shunned.

There's a petition going around to strip Bruce Jenner of all Olympic medals, what with Bruce actually being Caitlyn and all. (Why change the name? I know a woman named George--why not Bruce?)

Take medals away? Seems to me it should be the opposite. If Bruce felt he was a woman, but set records in sports where usually men get the faster time, then shouldn't he (or she, whatever) actually get an extra special medal? Like ... the platinum? Or the diamond medal? Diamonds are a girl's best friend.

If the medals should be taken away for anything, it should be for dumbing down America through participation in reality TV.

The big question is: Why do we care? As long as it's not being funded by taxpayers, let Bruce Jenner turn himself into a girl, a gorilla, a lemur, whatever. There are way worse problems in the world, such as ISIS, Congress … the other female Kardashians.

Deconstructing the Sochi Olympics:

http://markrhunter.blogspot.com/2014/02/deconstructing-sochi-olympics.html