Fall Olympics / The Slushy Games

Warm weather at the Winter Olympics played a major part in the $51 billion extravaganza. Greg Laden calls the Sochi games more of a "Fall Olympics" as competitors bit the slush on the slopes and the half pipe. At the Extreme Park, casualties among women outnumbered casualties among men by nearly 3 to 1. Why the gender imbalance? Greg wonders if the men's and women's courses are not suitably dimorphic, or if better training would make a difference. On The Pump Handle, Celeste Monforton takes the panoptic view with the official Olympic injury and illness surveillance system. During the last winter games, in Vancouver, 11.2% of all athletes were injured, 7.1% got sick, and a single person was killed. In Vancouver, as in Sochi, women were injured at a significantly higher rate than men. Is it possible to reduce the injury rate for women? And can the IOC predict a suitable venue for winter sports as Arctic air becomes increasingly motile?