Watching the coverage of the Vancouver Olympics on NBC and CTV is comparable to watching the two different timelines on ABC’s “Lost” this season.

NBC tries to convince viewers that events haven’t happened yet when they have.

And around here, it’s a lot easier to know that they have happened because of CFTO, the CTV affiliate in Toronto.

Take Monday’s run of the men’s downhill in which American Bode Miller won the bronze medal.

It was carried on CTV at about 2 p. m., Buffalo time. At about 6 p. m., Channel 2 played an NBC preview telling news viewers that Miller would attempt to win a medal that night when he already had raced in the daytime. NBC ran the downhill shortly after 8 p. m.

Similarly on Tuesday night, NBC held Lindsey Jacobellis’ fall in the snowboard cross deep into prime time, hours after Canada’s Maelle Ricker won her country’s second gold.

Of course, NBC prefers to carry events when the most viewers are available, and that means prime time. It has been a successful strategy, done by necessity. Prime time is where the big advertising bucks are, and since NBC expects to lose $250 million over the two weeks in Vancouver, it isn’t about to waste big events in the daytime when many Americans are at work.

CTV, which pays a fraction of the $820 million rights fee that NBC paid, has never worried as much about prime time and isn’t about to change its strategy in Vancouver.

As the first week of the Olympics is about to end, the networks aren’t getting their money’s worth, largely due to weather in Vancouver that has been more unpredictable than the competition and has postponed key skiing events.

On Tuesday, NBC’s coverage was loaded with features that were badly needed because of the postponement of skiing events. Weather Channel reporter Jim Cantore even got a fair share of air time to assure viewers that the best weather is yet to come. When lengthy weather reports are in prime time, NBC is in trouble.

Prime-time ratings have been strong nationally, but have fallen slightly short of local expectations on Channel 2. The top local rating so far is a 20.4 for Friday’s opening ceremonies, the low a 12.8 on Saturday. Sunday’s coverage hit a 15.5, Monday’s a 15.8.

On Tuesday, Fox’s “American Idol” won the head-to-head battle here with a 15.3 rating on WUTV for a two-hour show. The Olympics on Channel 2 had a 13.4 opposite “Idol” and a 13.1 for the four hours. The 7.4 rating that “Lost” had at 9 p. m. on Channel 7, the ABC affiliate, is bound to go up substantially when the DVR figures are added.

Channel 2 estimated it would average a 17.3 in prime time, which means all those skiing events that were postponed will have to fuel ratings in the second week for it to catch up. (There haven’t been any local figures yet for CTV’s coverage.)

The prime-time coverage on both networks has concentrated on live figure skating, supplemented by taped coverage of high interest events that take place in the daytime.

NBC hoped that men’s skating world champion Evan Lysacek of the United States would boost ratings Tuesday when “American Idol” revealed seven of its Top 24 finalists. Lysacek skated brilliantly and is in second place going into tonight’s men’s final. But he didn’t skate until past 11 p. m., long after “Idol” was over.

NBC’s attempts to build drama can be comical. When CTV was running a tape of Seth Wescott’s dramatic snowboard cross win in the final Monday, NBC was carrying a tape of the semifinals in the event. It held the final until much later.

The one thing that both networks agreed on was the significance of the mogul skiing victory by Alexandre Bilodeau, who became the first Canadian to win a gold medal at an Olympics in which Canada was host.

It would have been a special moment even if Bilodeau’s older brother Frederic didn’t have cerebral palsy and didn’t provide inspiration for Alexandre. It was the kind of human interest story that seems to surface often during the Olympics. However, its treatment seemed a little overblown and condescending at times. That was especially true when a Canadian announcer said Frederic “suffered” from cerebral palsy. He was celebrating, not suffering, when his brother won.

Knowing and desperate for a good story, NBC even aired a CTV feature on the Bilodeaus before the Monday night award ceremony. And it carried the Canadian anthem celebration simultaneously with CTV. Understandably, the CTV announcers were a little more emotional in a ceremony that might have sent chills down the spine of viewers. “I’m still not sure how much Alexandre Bilodeau realizes how much his life has changed,” remarked a Canadian announcer.

Bilodeau needs a good public relations specialist. He might have been expected to sing the words to “Oh, Canada” as many across the nation did. Perhaps he was too overwhelmed with emotion, but his lips barely moved if they moved at all and he kept his ski cap on.

The Canadian announcers certainly can be overwhelmed with emotion when their country’s athletes are about to win medals. Monday, they were cheering on Mike Robertson before he surprisingly was passed by Wescott in the snowboard cross final.

“Stand up and cheer,” advised the Canadian announcer of Robertson’s silver medal performance.

The cheering for American short-track skater Apolo Ohno wasn’t quite as loud or as obvious on NBC. Ohno’s earlier achievement of tying speed-skater Bonnie Blair as the American athlete with the most medals in the Winter Games has been ridiculed by WGR’s Mike Schopp, who doesn’t view the accomplishments as comparable.

But Ohno doesn’t need a public relations specialist. During an interview with NBC, Ohno said he didn’t think the achievements were comparable, either.

Stand up and cheer for Olympic honesty.