1. Hedging bets on podium numbers. This has been the American Games so far and Canadian officials are doing their best to put a brave face on it.
While U.S. athletes are cleaning up on ice rinks and on ski hills, Canadian Olympic Committee officials made bold promises yesterday that Canada would own the second week of the Games, predicting our athletes would win between 11 and 13 medals in the last four days of the Vancouver Olympics.
"This week coming up is going to be Canada's week," said COC president Michael Chambers, noting that the U.S. team is having a tremendous showing.
So far, Canada has won 9 medals, including four gold. Many of the Canadian athletes expected to win medals have come up empty-handed.
But not everyone is willing to go out on a limb.
One smart politician not playing the numbers game is sports minister Gary Lunn. "I never put numbers on anything," he said in an interview.
At the halfway point in the Winter Olympics, Mr. Lunn will go so far as to say there are still "a lot of medals to win."
The big question is will they be won by Canadian athletes?
Mr. Lunn says the Canadian team has a lot of depth and he said that in sports the gap between winning and losing is almost minuscule - half the length of a skate blade.
He also defended the controversial Own the Podium program, which provides funding to elite athletes in a bid to ensure they would win medals on home turf.
Stephen Harper's government has contributed $11-million a year and Mr. Lunn has promised the federal funding will continue. But the program is losing its $11-million contribution from VANOC, once the Games end and the Vancouver organizing committee ceases to exist.
Mr. Lunn, meanwhile, is concentrating on other aspects of the Games. He says the streets of Vancouver are alive with excitement, pointing out spontaneous singing among strangers of O Canada and impromptu street hockey games.
The Games volunteers are first-rate, he says, and athletes are pushing themselves beyond their limits. And as for those Canadian competitors who are tearfully apologizing for not wining gold medals, Mr. Lunn says: "We love them and we are proud of them."
2. A sales job of Olympic proportions. International Trade Minister Peter Van Loan is using the Games as a venue to make deals. And he's using Olympians to help him seal those deals.
Today, he is the host of Global Business Leaders Day, which includes a discussion led by urban theorist Richard Florida, author of Who's Your City? and The Rise of the Creative Class.
As part of the entertainment, international CEOs and other businesspeople can get autographs from former Olympians: rower and gold medalist Marnie McBean; four-time Olympic medalist and speed skater Gaétan Boucher; and bronze medalist and figure skater Jeffrey Buttle.
According to a briefing paper, "two RCMP officers [are]also secured for photo-ops, meet and greet, etc."
The briefing notes says there are 25 business executives from 22 companies that are participating in the government's "CEO program" for the duration of the Games.
Some of them will be participating in today's day-long discussions, which also include a panel on The Next Big Thing with Bank of Canada deputy governor Paul Jenkins and Cirque du Soleil creative director Lyn Heward.
Other executives have been involved in similar business breakfasts and receptions. And they get to enjoy the Games.
(Editorial cartoon by Anthony Jenkins/The Globe and Mail)