Continuing from the previous post, I shot 1,217 frames as Steven Holcomb’s Night Train won the gold medal in Four-Man Bobsled at the Whistler Sliding Centre.

I was looking for an iconic shot of his win, and chose to shoot from the pit next to the finish line. As the final run came closer the pit got crowded with photographers. At that point all the thinking about angles was over and all I could do was what I could do. I knew I would have to leave some angles to the wires and focus on what I thought would result in the best frame capturing the emotion of the moment. Feels like I’m rambling so let’s go to the pictographs…

This is my first frame as the Night Train came in.

The sled stopped a lot shorter than its previous run. I was blocked from the head on, but again, it wasn’t the shot I was after. And to tell you the truth, it didn’t look like much of a shot. Maybe someone got something out of it from the other position.

Sled exit commence.

Someone hands Holcomb a flag. Still no shot.

One of the crewman gets a flag from the fans.

I see an embrace and I shoot this frame while moving up the slot behind a few photographers. Luckily it was all cool people in the pit, so no one threw any elbows as I moved up.

now I’m across from the hugs.

this is all happening very quickly

so you just fire away

This must have looked good from the head on.

you just keep shooting, not thinking. loose…

… and tight.

focusing more on getting Holcomb in the frame

now the team has a flag

Holcomb pulls off his helmet and it’s go time…

This is the series, with my pick highlighted. I’m pretty sure it was somewhere in this sequence that my camera’s buffer was full as it choked on megapixels. I just held the button down and it would fire as soon as it could catch up, like hiccups.

Here’s the frame I picked.

this was an almost

the moment breaks up

and

crewman starts to lean into the crowd. Look at the chaotic photog scene. I must be holding the camera over my head just like Murray Bowles taught me.

another hail mary shot, camera over my head

I moved a few slots down and up onto the raised platform, shooting between a bunch of photographer’s heads.

but you can see that by now the initial emotion is fading.

now it’s the flower ceremony. look at how many people are in front of us. a few athletes crept in with pocket video recorders and point and shoot cameras. no one is controlling the situation. I ought to just climb over the rail at this point

a volunteer creeps in (he’s off frame), and asks, “Am I in your way?” I answer him with, “You are all in our way!” He politely yells out to a colleague holding a point and shoot and has her move back up a bit. Still the scene is beyond repair, even though I’m in a bad spot to shoot the ceremony

here’s the long shot as Holcomb steps up to the podium. Flower girls are in my frame, nothing I can do about it. Can’t move to a better spot— they’re all full. Just have to shoot

I shoot a bunch of these but never get one that has all four faces.

they walk off, you can see how crowded the photo position is, two deep.

one crewman climbs through the photogs to head into the stands. not that I don’t have his name, just in a hurry to get this up.

another shot showing how many people crowded into the finish area in front of us. After two weeks of enforcement (“Anyone who leans over the rail will be kicked out!”), the rules are thrown out when it counts.

Holcomb goes along the row of fans, shaking hands. I can’t get to it so I shoot it long.

OBS, we love you. Thanks for ruining countless photographs with your over-produced wide angle approach.

again the team poses with the flag. we’re going through the motions now. as I’m shooting this I’m thinking “I don’t need these. I have much better stuff.” But you shoot it anyway.

and finally a closeup on Holcomb.

That’s how it looked from the photo pit.

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