MODERN PENTATHLON: Next to the marathon, no other sport is as Olympic... if only because the founder of the modern Games, Pierre de Coubertin, invented it as training for modern soldiers. Its five events were originally organized to tell a sporting story.

As the story goes, a young French officer in Napoleon's army was sent on an unfamiliar horse to deliver a message into hostile territory. He was first greeted by an enemy soldier with his sword drawn. The two dueled. The French officer won the duel and continued on his horse until it was shot out from under him. He fired a shot with his pistol and killed the enemy but his horse didn't make it. He swam across a river and ran the rest of the way to deliver his message. When he arrived, his commanding officer greeted him with, "What took you?"

Constantly faced with expulsion from the Games by IOC members disrespectful of history, the MP's events have been reordered and and are now contested in a single day instead of several. The order is now shooting, fencing, swimming, horse riding and cross-country running. There are a lot of pitfalls and pratfalls, most notably the equestrian portion, in which Coubertin's "unfamiliar horse" is taken literally. Horses and riders are introduced by random lot 20 minutes before the event, which can result in spectacular spills like the refusal suffered by Hungary's Viktor Horvath (above).

Horvath came in 25th of 36 competitors in the riding portion, essentially ending his chances. No pentathlete excelled in all aspects, but Russian Andrey Moiseev defended his gold medal from Athens 2004. As he did last time, he finished first in the fencing and placed poorly in riding. But Moiseev nearly squandered his large lead in the running portion by finishing 27th. Despite all that, his 5632 points were an Olympic record.

EQUESTRIAN: The Hong Kong-based competition went into a latter phase of the show jumping discipline today, but the horse sport is in the news for all the wrong reasons. Four horses have tested positive for the painkiller capsaicin, which may end up costing Norway a team jumping bronze.

The four positive tests are as follows: Coster, the horse of Christian Ahlmann of Germany; Chupa Chup, the horse of Brazil's Bernardo Alves; Latinus, the horse of Ireland's Denis Lynch; and Camiro, the horse of Norway's Tony Andre Hansen.

This would not be the first time non-human competitors have returned positive dope tests -- this blog detailed the short history of horses on drugs in the run-up to Beijing. At Athens 2004, Cian O'Connor of Ireland was stripped of his country's only gold medal of those Games for applying sedatives to his horse, Waterford Crystal, and allegedly tried to cover it up afterwards. This round of positives represents the first real test of the FEI's new guidelines, as the equestrian governing body no longer keeps results under wraps until after the event.

Perhaps Beijing and Philadelphia, the American city known for its unruly supporters, should consider sister-cityhood.

"The primary noise from Chinese fans — who have been notably respectful of opponents at most venues — was to boo Lithuanian possessions from the outset," wrote USA Today after China's men's basketball team's quarterfinal loss. The Wall Street Journal described a China-Italy men's volleyball match.

The enthusiasm seems to wane a bit after China gets roundly beaten in the first set, but is soon replaced by another passion—loudly booing the Italian team on their serves. Before the game, there was an announcement reminding the house of the "Olympic spirit," telling people not to heckle or disrupt the play, but it doesn't get repeated once the jeering takes off in earnest.

There were other instances noted as well.

"Several times during the match, when a band of about a dozen Americans high in the stands began chanting 'U.S.A.,' Chinese fans responded with loud booing. By the standards of professional baseball, basketball, or soccer, the reaction was mild, but it was an unusual breach of the graciousness China has shown at the Olympics," said the New York Sun whilst describing the badminton action last week. Later in that tournament, the South Korean pair of Lee Jae Jin and Hwang Ji Man received similar treatment, according to Channel News Asia. "The unseeded Korean pair, in contrast, quickly left the arena and refused to talk with waiting reporters. A small section of Korean fans, meanwhile, were booed and at least one object was flung into the arena."

Finally, Olympics watchers in Montana were treated to MST2008. For over an hour on Day 9, Great Falls-area station KTVH inexplicably overlaid the theater seats and characters from the defunct American series Mystery Science Theater 3000 over NBC's Olympic coverage. MST3K was a show that skewered bad movies with witty bon mots, and this blog can only imagine what they might have said about the Polish women's volleyball team.

Photo credit: Getty Images