16 photos that prove even when you’re at the Winter Olympics, crashing is no fun
Germany’s Severin Freund crashes during ski-jumping on February 9, 2014 at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
We shouldn’t revel in others’ misery, but when Olympians crash it’s hard to look away.
The Winter Olympics are all about strapping yourself into — or onto — something sharp and trying to go as fast as you possibly can along an icy surface (usually downhill).
Not surprisingly, Olympians of all stripes experience spectacular slips, spills, falls, and crashes.
Well, except those curlers.
When they fall, it's just sad. Really, really sad.
Here are 16 photos from the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi that appeal to our schadenfreude.
1) Shaun White's snowboard didn’t break… anything but American hearts.
(Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)
2) Let’s hope this snowboard “guitar” plays some soothing country music.
(Franck Fife/AFP/Getty Images)
3) After crashing as the world watches, don't you wish the ground would swallow you whole?
(Alain Grosclaude/Getty Images)
4) Freestyle skiers have such novel nicknames for their tricks. This is known as the “face plant.” It’s not worth any points in the Olympic scoring system.
(Franck Fife/Getty Images)
5) Sometimes, watching these crashes is hard to stomach.
(Javier Soriano/Getty Images)
6) Those little black things on your skis flip down after you crash, preventing them from sliding away and making the “walk of shame” easier.
(Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images)
7) You lose a ski, probably two, and then both your poles. Your goggles go flying. You’re having a bad day, and a yard sale.
(Javier Soriano/Getty Images)
8) A meeting of the minds, but hopefully not the skate blade.
(Javier Soriano/Getty Images)
9) Maybe there are no “good” places to land when you fall on a sheet of ice.
(Yuri Kadobnov/Getty Images)
10) But there are more painful ways to land on that sheet of ice.
(Damien Meyer/Getty Images)
11) This just looks plain dangerous.
(Franck Fife/Getty Images)
12) The nets only stop you from getting more hurt. They don't spare your pride.
(Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)
13) Shouldn’t these guys look more concerned?
(Damien Meyer/Getty Images)
14) When ABC's old Wide World of Sports coined the phrase “agony of defeat,” it was in reference to ski jumping. It still holds true today.
(Lars Baron/Getty Images)
15) Strapping yourself onto a shiny metal surface and sliding downhill made perfect sense, until this very moment.
(Adam Pretty/Getty Images)
16) There’s something beautiful about this photo, all those lines sweeping down. Beautiful for us, of course — we’re not the ones face-first at the bottom of a half-pipe.
(Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)
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