Amusing Story About Contestants Slouching Their Way Through The Olympics

Jerks:

All she did was ski up and down the halfpipe, slowly and carefully. The only flair she showed came at the end of her run, when she skied out of the halfpipe backward. Not very impressive flair!

This performance was not a surprise to anyone who knew Swaney. She has become infamous on the World Cup halfpipe circuit for attending as many events as possible. She performs no tricks. She rarely falls down. She always finishes at or near the bottom of the standings.

How, then, did this pedestrian skier make it into the Olympics? Loopholes! “Women’s pipe skiing World Cups rarely see more than 30 competitors, so it’s not hard to meet the Olympic requirement for a top-30 finish,” writes Jason Blevins of the Denver Post. Swaney, who has aspired since childhood to make it to the Olympics, chose the least popular sport she could find, so that even if she was the absolute worst international competitor, she had a chance to qualify for the games just by showing up at World Cup events.