Boots on the ground in Paris: Jonathan Gault just attended the loudest sporting event of his life at the Olympics

just f**king tell us, don't make me read it

He was referring to Léon Marchand’s dramatic come from behind gold medal winning swim in the 200 fly.

Very cool that Gault got to witness such a memorable moment from these Olympics. Happy for him!

To give weight to calling it the loudest sporting event of his life, it would help to know what major sporting events he’s attended that he thinks weren’t as loud. Has he been to a Super Bowl? A high stakes college football game between rivals such as Michigan and Ohio State? World Cup? NBA Finals? World Series?

According to reports, there were 15,000+ fans in the arena for Marchand’s swim. While I’m sure it was loud (it definitely seemed that way on tv), it’s difficult to imagine it was louder than what one would hear in college and pro football stadiums that hold 6 or 7 times as many people.

Racewalking.

Nothing close to Cathy Freeman winning the 400m in Sydney or Mo Farrah 10k in London.

Pfff, back at the Richfield Coliseum in 1988 the Rockers Vs. Demolition. 20,273 in attendance. Of that you had at least 10,000 women with high pitch screaming for the Rockers. My ears have never hurt so bad. Michaels and Janetty must have gotten so much poontang.

If it was swimming it's only because of the echo of being in a small indoor pool.

You won't believe what happens next!

Kudos to Gault for taking full advantage of the Olympics experience and the credential pass. Good writeup as always, always enjoy reading his stuff.

I merely watched the men's 200 fly "live" on my computer screen, but it truly was an exceptional race. An instant classic. I'd suggest everyone pull up the video if you haven't already.

Unfortunately, watching a race later and knowing it's a classic usually isn't the same. In fact, you often end up disappointed since you expect even more drama than was really there (e.g. "What's so special? Tergat was leading and then Geb kicked past him and just barely won").

The Wanjiru-Kebede Chicago duel is another race I watched "live". One of the most incredible sport-watching experiences of my life, for sure. I've rewatched the thing and it's exciting, sure, but I sort of zone out since I know that none of Kebede's moves will stick. At the time, every move was like "Whoa! Kebede is pulling away! Wait, no he's not!"

All that said, go watch the 200 fly. Link below. Unfortunately, I can't find one without the result in the title:

Super Bowls (bowl games in general) aren’t loud. Rich people don’t get drunk and rowdy. College rivalry games get loud and rowdy. Especially hockey games. I imagine European soccer rivalry games (like El Classico) get out of hand.

Lazy Americans not wanting to understand context or reasoning.

Good point about the spectators at bowl games. The other limitation with bowl games is they are played at a neutral site. Pro football conference playoff games are probably louder than the Super Bowl when the home team scores.

Oddly enough, the record for loudest crowd roar recorded at a sporting event was set in Arrowhead Stadium during a regular season game. The crowd reached 142.2 decibels. According to this article, that is “a reading roughly on par with a jet engine taking off 100 yards away, or a shotgun blast from close range.”

sportingnews.com

How loud is Arrowhead Stadium? Details on record-breaking decibel level at Chiefs' GEHA Field | Sporting News

@sam_jarden

Kansas City's GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium holds the world record for the loudest sports venue, but just how loud does it get?

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