New Yahoo! Sports Survey Reveals Americans Want to See Bruce Jenner Light the Olympic Flame for the U.S. but Not Snooki

Bruce Jenner tops the list of celebrities most adults would like to see represent the United States by lighting the Olympic flame, according to a survey released today by Yahoo! Sports, the No. 1 sports destination on the Internet. The survey of 2,000 U.S. adults ages 18-64 found that more adults would like to see Jenner light the Olympic flame (20%) than George Clooney (12%) or Jennifer Aniston (8%). The celebrity that adults would least like to see representing the U.S. is Snooki (32%), who beat out Jenner’s step-daughter Kim Kardashian (19%), Lindsay Lohan (15%), and Tom Cruise (5%).

Other key findings include:

• Best Opening Ceremonies Yet?
  Adults have high expectations for the London Opening Ceremonies, with half believing they will be just as good as those in Beijing and 39% thinking they will be better.

• Honesty Is the Best Policy
  Americans feel a gold medal is best won honestly, with 74% of adults saying they would not use a performance enhancing drug even if it meant they would win a gold medal. Women (79%) and adults ages 50-64 (80%) are most likely to say “no” to the drug.

• Olympics Over Work
  30% of adults plan on altering their day to watch the Olympics live, among which 44% plan to work from home in order to do so and 43% plan to watch while at work.

• Out with Badminton, In with Baseball
  1 in 5 adults agree that badminton should no longer be part of the Olympics, while 32% say they would most like to see America’s favorite pastime, baseball, reinstated as an Olympic sport.
  Top sports Americans do not want in the Olympics:
  • Badminton (19%)
  • Table tennis (15%)
  • Handball (13%)
• Fan Favorites
  While gymnastics is the event adults are most looking forward to watching (62%), women are much more likely to watch gymnastics than men (79% vs. 46%) and men are more interested in track and field (47% vs. 41%).
  Top sports Americans are looking forward to watching:
  • Gymnastics (62%)
  • Swimming (55%)
  • Track and Field (44%)
• Favorite Olympic Movie: Feel the Rhythm
  Along with the Games themselves, adults also like watching Olympic-themed movies, with 58% having a favorite.
  Favorite Olympic movies:
  • Cool Runnings (21%)
  • Chariots of Fire (13%)
  • Miracle (10%)
• Most Memorable Moments
  Michael Phelps winning eight gold medals in Beijing four years ago was voted the top moment in U.S. Olympic history, followed by Mary Lou Retton receiving perfect 10’s and being the first American to win the gymnastics all-around.

Full survey available upon request.
For more about this survey, please visit: http://yhoo.it/NU3ezZ

About the survey:

Yahoo! partnered with Ipsos MediaCT to conduct the latest consumer pulse study in May of 2012. The survey asked questions about how adults plan to watch the summer Olympics, favorite Olympic events and best Olympic moments. The online quantitative survey was fielded among 2,000 U.S. adults ages 18-64 who are representative of the U.S. online adult population.

About Yahoo!

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