Vancouver Opening Ceremonies Start Betting On Winter Olympics

Sports News - February 12th, 2010 - Written By John Ritter

Despite a string of setbacks, the Winter Olympics finally begin when the flame reaches Vancouver on Friday night. For the first time in the games' history, the opening ceremonies will be held indoors as over 80 nations begin a two-week competition in Canada

Colombia, Ghana, Pakistan, Montenegro, Peru, Serbia and the Cayman Islands are all making their Winter Olympics debut.

Organizers have been rapidly working on the grounds because it has been an unseasonably warm winter in the western part of the country. For about three weeks, trucks have been delivering snow while man-made snow has been pumped out hourly.

The American team comes into the games with plenty of questions as several of their stars fight injuries, and another battles his own demons. They are favored behind Germany and Canada to come home with the most gold and overall medals.

Only a handful of USA stars are favored to medal in their respective sports, including skier Bode Miller, who's fallout with the American team two years ago was chronicled by many media outlets. He has since reconciled and will race in five events, although he hasn't won an slalom event since 2005.

"I think if I do ski well in every event, I have the speed right now to be on the podium," Miller said.

Miller came in seventh during a training run, still a ways out from Switzerland's Didier Cuche, who posted the fastest time. Cuche is favored to win the downhill by Bodog, with 5/1 odds. The U.S. team will field four skiers in the event, including 23-year old Andrew Weibrecht of Lake Placid, who will be making his Olympics debut.

Miller's best odds to medal is in the Super G, where he is the fourth-horse at 7/1, but he's a 50/1 longshot to win the men's slalom outright, according to Olympic Betting Lines.

But there was no bigger story leading up to the games than that of Lindsay Vonn's shin. The two-time World Champion severely bruised her right shin two weeks ago during a training run in Austria, and has been battling the clock to get healthy. She told reporters on Thursday that she will probably be okay, but nothing will be certain until her first run in the Slalom super-combine on Sunday.

"People said it was a good tumble, but she got up," U.S. skier Steven Nyaman told the Hawaiian NBC affiliate. "Hopefully she's doing alright."

She is favored to win gold in the downhill, but is the projected runner up in the super-combine behind Germany's Maria Riesch.

Aside from her, the most comfortable American choice will probably be showboarder Shaun White, who is the reigning gold medalist from the 2006 games. Specialists believe the winner of the competition will be the one who pulls off the famed double corked move, a spinning double flip that is considered to be the trickiest maneuver in snowboarding, and White has pulled it off before.

Hockey will likely be dominated by the Canadians and Russians as both roster the two best players in the NHL. Sidney Crosby and the Canadians benefit from a home crowd and are the leading candidate at 1/1, but will have their hands full as a powerful and stacked Russian team is led by rival Alex Ovechkin (21/10).

The Americans have last year's Rookie of the Year, however, in Patrick Kane, and have reasonably good odds to medal at 13/2.

Bettors can also wager on the winners of each preliminary group.

Viewers of the Colbert Report are probably already familiar with the U.S. Speedskating team, which is in the middle of the pack according the Olympic Betting Odds. Apollo Ohno needs just one medal to tie Bonnie Blair as the country's winningest-Winter Olympian, but is an underdog in the short track 1500m with 13/2 odds.

Shani Davis is the other American to look out for as he goes for five golds in individual meets.

Davis is a longshot to win the men's 5000m with 22/1 odds, but is an 8/15 favorite in the 1000m.