Going for Gold by Ivy Smoak Page A

that I was your favorite
athlete." Kristen made a dramatic sad face. "By the way, did you ever
figure out why it was called Operation Red Rip? I mean, I know you froze some
guy's underwear, but what does that have to do with the color red or the word
rip?"
    "Right, since all of their codenames make so much
sense," I said. "Pink Ocelot probably named the mission."
    "Pink Ocelot," said Kristen with a laugh.
"What a weirdo." She looked strangely happy about him.
    "Oh my God, do you like Ocelot?"
    "What? Psssh. No." Kristen turned away from me so I
couldn't see her expression. "What time do the highlights usually come
on?"
    I checked the time on my phone. "I think around now.
Let's see..." I clicked on the ITA broadcast app on my phone and Owen
Harris popped up.
    "We have some new developments in the Yao Kai incident,
but first let's take a look at the updated medal count."
    Yao Kai incident? Is that the guy whose underwear I froze?
    A chart popped up on the screen. The US had 19 gold, 13
silver, and 19 bronze, for a total of 51. Brazil had 20 gold, 16 silver, and 16
bronze, for a total of 52. It didn't matter if they ranked it by gold medals or
total medal counts. Either way, Brazil was ahead.
    "The US had a strong showing today in wrestling to pick
up a pair of golds and a bronze, but Brazil had an even better day, racking up
a total of 10 medals and bringing their total ahead of the US for the first
time in these games. To analyze the significance of this, let's bring in our
medal analyst, Chip Nickels."
    The shot panned out to show Chip sitting next to Owen at his
desk.
    "Well Owen," said Chip, "I don't think anyone
saw this coming. I know I didn't. And the sports books in Vegas certainly
didn't either. A few weeks ago you could have bet on Brazil winning the medal
count with 30 to 1 odds. If Brazil can keep up this performance, Vegas is going
to be paying out a lot of money to a few very lucky people."
    "Do you think Brazil will be able to sustain this
success for the next few days?" asked Owen.
    "You know, I actually think they can. I just looked at a
list of events that they could still medal in, and they could potentially get
50 or 60 more medals."
    "Right, but most of those athletes are only in because
Brazil is the host nation and got automatic qualification for all the
events."
    "Well, regardless of how they got in, the Brazilian
athletes are really performing at these games. As a sports geek, I'm kind of
hoping that they continue to do well and end up tying the US in overall medal
count so that we can see our very first tiebreaker."
    "Can you walk us through the rules for the
tiebreaker?" asked Owen.
    A new graphic popped up on the screen and slowly started
scrolling up.
     
    Article IV, Section 8 - Medal Count Tiebreaker
    1. At noon GMT of the final Tuesday of the games, the
committee will calculate if it is mathematically possible for two or more
nations to end up with the exact same number of gold, silver, and bronze medals
based on the current count and the number of athlete's still yet to compete.
    2. If a tie is possible, the host nation will have 24 hours
to choose a tiebreaking event. The event can be any event that is not currently
featured in the 2016 games. The host nation must specify if it is a men's,
women's, or coed competition.
    3. The top five nations in overall medal count at noon GMT on
Wednesday may select one (or a team, if required) of their current athletes to
compete. Only athletes that have competed in the games are eligible.
    4. If the medal count ends in a tie, the tiebreaker event
will take place before the closing ceremony.
    5. If there is no tie at the end of the games, the tiebreaker
event will not be held.
     
    "It's pretty simple, really," said Chip. "It
will happen in three phases. First, tomorrow the ITA committee will calculate
if it's mathematically possible for the Brazil and the US to tie based on how
many athletes they have left to compete. I'll tell you right now, it's going