Beijing Olympics filled with both highs, lows

BEIJING — It all started off as "One World, One Dream."

But as the curtain closed on the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the memorable numbers are more than merely those two "ones."

They'll be remembered for Michael Phelps' eight gold medals, 16 days of competition, the 100 and 200 meters by Usain Bolt, 302 events, 10,709 athletes, some 20,000 journalists, a host city of 15 million, a host country of 1.3 billion and the Olympics budget of the People's Republic of China at an estimated $40 billion and counting.

The Beijing Games began with their highest of highs and lowest of lows, all within about 16 hours of each other. In the wake of the stunning, captivating opening ceremonies on Aug. 8 came the brutal stabbings of an American couple — with close ties to both the U.S. men's and women's volleyball teams — at the Beijing Drum Tower at noon the following day.

By the time the Olympics were over, the global audience had witnessed Phelps' unprecedented eight-medal run at the equally unprecedented-appearing Water Cube venue, an impressive team performance by the Chinese women gymnasts (or girls, depending on their still-unconfirmed ages), "golden" individual outings by U.S. gymnasts Nastia Luikin in the all-around and Shawn Johnson on the beam, Bolt running true to his name at the Bird's Nest in three world-record sprints (including the 4x100 relay), dropped batons and pulled hamstrings among the track disappointments and the United States' net volleyball gains with a pair of beach-version golds and a gold and silver indoors.

And to no one's surprise, the United States swept both the women's and men's basketball golds, with the star-studded men's team redeeming the bronze-medal woes of the 2004 Athens Games and quickly figuring out just how popular NBA superstars are in adoring China.

But to nearly everyone's surprise, the U.S. men were challenged throughout their gold-medal game by short-handed but determined Spain.

Baseball and softball said goodbye in Beijing, with America's pastimes now dropped from the Olympics schedule. And the United States couldn't go out on a golden note in either, with the baseball squad of minor-leaguers settling for bronze and the softball team upset by Japan as the American women were oh-so-close to a fourth consecutive gold medal.

Making their Games debuts were a pair of BMX cycling events, the women's 3,000-meter steeplechase and swimming's open-water marathon, with table tennis and fencing retooling a couple of their competitions.