I know nothing about snowboarding
I know nothing about snowboarding but I have been completely won over by Kelly Clark, the 18-year old from Vermont who was the first American to win the gold metal in this year’s Olympics. She won the Women’s Half Pipe a scant 48 hours after the games began.
I do not anticipate her showing up on Letterman or a bunch of commercials for unrelated products because A) She’s a snowboarder and B) She’s not conventially mediagenic. I don’t care. I think she’s adorable: real, quiet, and a world class athlete whose proof is out there on the snow, not in an add campeign for Mountain Dew. Athlete’s like her are the only, rapidly diminishing reason I pay attention to the Olympics at all.