PyeongChang Packing Complete

About eight hours from posting this, it's gonna be wheels up for this writer heading west on a direct Delta Air Lines flight from Atlanta to Seoul, South Korea.

I'm tired of the buildup. Let's get this Games going!

Truth be told, it was uncertain PyeongChang 2018 would be in the cards. 

This is to say I always knew I'd go, but thought perhaps for only a few days of this Olympiad.

With thanks to the U.S. Olympic Committee Media Relations team, a full media credential was, of course, a massive tipping point to book three full weeks for the winter sports experience. 

Now the pins are packed, the AirBNB's are booked, a rental car is secured and a blog schedule, of sorts, is finally starting to gel. 

Here are some target activities on the books so far:

• Securing a coveted ticket to the Opening Ceremony (one event for which the media credential does not guarantee access)
• Checking out Intel's first Games as a worldwide sponsor
• Attempting to share a coffee date with one of North Korea's hand-picked female sports ambassadors
• Another presidential selfie like this one
• Trading pins with my longtime five-ringed friend Nippy F. in the Olympic Village (where he is helping Team Australia)
• Cartwheeling through Beijing 2022 House
• Interviewing as many of Team USA's 243 or so winter Olympians as possible!

The past six months were challenging both professionally and personally. 

While 2017 was the "best year ever" in my independent public relations business, on the home front, as my inner circle of friends heard ad nauseum, I kind of got my guts kicked in on the romantic side and in terms of a seismic shift in personal growth. 

It was tough. It remains challenging. There's a long road ahead. And PyeongChang 2018 may help make some great strides while affording a clean break from curious influencers and influences. 

Looking for the "Where's Waldo?" good in a forest of poo emojis, with the help of some real friends, not to mention close family members, things are already on the up-and-up in 2018. 

Snow Angel (left) with Nick (no saint)

In the last 10 days, I enjoyed a "do over" with one acquaintance (friend? meh? -- tough call much of the time) who visited the South, while later I was popping north for a day to visit former stomping grounds in Milwaukee, mostly to surprise a longtime bestie (see photo) who celebrated a milestone birthday. 

While in the land of "Laverne & Shirley" I also stopped in to the Pettit National Ice Center in West Allis, Wis., and got a nice surprise in spotting Olympic champion Bonnie Blair on the speed skating oval in training with her daughter (see photo). So slick!

Olympic Champion Bonnie Blair (left)

The Pettit staff were understandably all abuzz about Team USA's speed skaters who embarked that very morning (Jan. 30) for PyeongChang. The Olympic excitement is contagious. 

Looking forward to touching down in South Korea soon, and welcome questions, ideas, topics or other inquiries and suggestions for this site in the weeks ahead. It's going to be a great Olympics!

Images via NBC and Yahoo! with personal photos in Wisconsin by Nicholas Wolaver

Sochi-Milwaukee Trifecta

Some readers of this blog know my home base is Atlanta and home town/family are in Oklahoma.

Milwaukee is where my heart resides since my long-time girlfriend lives there in suburban Delafield, Wis.

Each time we drive by the Pettit National Ice Center in nearby West Allis, there's a five-ringed reminder of Milwaukee's ties to the Winter Olympics.

And it's good to see the Journal-Sentinel's Gary D'Amato in Sochi after shaking hands at the Team USA Media Summit last year.

The Sochi Games includes 15 Wisconsin Olympians, according to this Carnival Cruise Lines gallery of U.S. athletes (see photo atop this post).


The last 24 hours in Sochi yielded a trifecta of other big Milwaukee-in-Sochi connections.

Through our work for the Citi Every Step of the Way program, on Friday we hosted media at USA House to speak with speedskating Olympic Champion Dan Jansen. With a few clicks, anyone may support his charity of choice, Olympians For Olympians, and it was fun to learn more about his Sochi experience and current projects in the Carolinas.

Later that evening, another Milwaukee hero and a personal favorite athlete from Calgary, Albertville and Lillehammer -- Bonnie Blair -- arrived and cheerfully visited with colleagues, friends and fans.

After spotting Blair in the Vancouver Olympic Village in 2010 (she was so friendly then, too), I was very happy to help her snap a few photos with members of the Kellogg's team (for which I am a freelance contributor) who gave an enthusiastic Blair her own Tony the Tiger hat and mittens.

Visiting with Blair I learned she now resides only a mile from my girlfriend, and we've both frequented the same grocers, pizza parlor and Delafield steakhouse -- unbelievable!

Blair also wants folks to know she is new to Twitter and loving it. And her sister's favorite cereal is Frosted Flakes because "They're Gr8!"

Then came the most surprising Milwaukee-Sochi moment, this time with a Grammy Award winning jazz musician.

With the Cultural Olympiad underway across Sochi, the centrally located Winter Theater -- a 75-year-old historic venue at which the International Olympic Committee Session took place -- hosted a Russia-USA cultural exchange concert tied to the U.S. Department of State.

The theatre is down the road from my hotel, so I bought a ticket and enjoyed a great balcony seat similar to the upper rows of Milwaukee's historic Pabst Theater.

Between songs, Milwaukee-born jazz trumpeter Brian Lynch introduced his band then gave a shout-out to Wisconsin.

His on-stage expression was surprise and smiles when the mostly Russian audience reacted to my cheer of "Go Milwaukee!" from the back row.

Who knew two would-be cheese-head Americans were in the house?

We both learned later a young couple from Chattanooga, Tenn., also attended.

After the show, which included mostly new works by Lynch set to debut in a stateside tour this spring, Lynch posed for photos and spoke with a few reporters, sharing that his agent got the call about the Sochi gig awhile ago but he did not plan to attend Olympic events (according to his website he has a Moscow concert on Monday). We agreed to connect again in Wisconsin, and jazz fans there are in for a treat.

Only at the Olympics do these connections seem common and "normal." It will be fun to see a fellow Georgian, bobsleigh Olympic bronze medalist Elana Meyers, compete later this week.

No Oklahoma athletes spotted yet, but on the lookout. Borrowing from Lynch's catalog, "It Could Be" there is one Okie athlete somewhere in Sochi.

Photos by Nicholas Wolaver

Ohno Skating Into Vancouver

USA Today's Vicki Michaelis had a good report this morning regarding Apolo Anton Ohno's preparations for Vancouver 2010. It would indeed be thrilling to see him skate victorious in Canada after witnessing his gold medal feat in Torino a couple of years back.

Speedskating is among my favorite Winter Games sports (both long and short track). After following Bonnie Blair and Dan Jansen during the late 1980s and 1990s, interest waned until experiencing the Olympic Speedskating Ovals, first in the Milwaukee suburb of West Allis, Wis., home of the Pettit National Ice Center, and the 2002 Olympic speedskating venue (the Utah Olympic Oval) around Salt Lake City (a curiously simple venue by comparison to the training facility up North).

During travels to Chicago for work this past week, I drove past the Pettit Center a few times and was surprised (well, maybe not that surprised) to spot a giant inflated pumpkin -- some sort of temporary Halloween superstore -- across the parking lot from the front door to the rink. One must wonder whether there are costumes for young trick-or-treat fans who aspire to be Ohno, Jansen, Blair or other Olympic speedskating greats.