More Olympian feats

 You can have your U.S. women's hockey team -- swatted nemesis Canada 5-0 yesterday, yes, the ladies did -- and your latest American figure skating phenom, Illia Malinin. My two favorite Olympians in these Winter Games so far are a German and a Norwegian.

The German is named Philipp Raimund.

The Norwegian is Sturla Holm Laegreid.

Raimund is a ski jumper who'd never won an international event until he won Olympic gold the other day. Laegreid is a biathlete who finished third in the 20-kilometer event this week.

What makes Raimund one of my faves is -- I swear I'm not making this up -- he's publicly admitted he's afraid of heights.

Wait, what?

Here's a guy whose chosen profession is sailing off a ramp 15 feet in the air at 60 mph or so, and he's AFRAID OF HEIGHTS? Really? So why on earth would he choose ski-jumping as his sport to pursue?

Raimund hasn't told us that, nor has he explained how he got so good at it he's now an Olympic gold medalist. But for sure he's now the best Olympic ski jumping story since Eddie the Eagle, the British jumper who was so bad -- and yet so cheerful about it -- he became the most unlikely Olympic icon in history.

Good on you, Philipp. You the (petrified) man.

And now, on to Sturla Holm Laegreid. Or Days Of Our Skiin' And Shootin'. Or The Young And The Over-Sharing.

Our man Sturla, you see, turned the 20-kilometer event into a soap opera when, in the immediate aftermath of his third-place finish, he confessed to a Norwegian TV reporter (and thus the world) that he'd cheated on his girlfriend.

"It was the choice I made," Laegreid said, choking back tears. "We make different choices during our life, and that's how we make life. So today I made a choice to tell the world what I did, so maybe, maybe there is a chance she will what she really means to me. Maybe not."

Me, I'd put some coin on the latter. That's because the girlfriend in question -- to whom Laegreid had earlier 'fessed up -- told a Norwegian tabloid she was mucho pissed about not only the cheating, but that her float-brain boyfriend chose to tell God and everyone about it at the freaking Olympic Games.

Later, Laegreid admitted to the same tabloid that perhaps she had a point.

"I deeply regret that I brought up this personal story on what was a joyous day for Norwegian biathlon," he said in a statement. "I am not quite myself today, and I am not thinking clearly."

Gee. Ya think?