Olympics Times – Sports Daily

Wang Meng won her third gold medal at the Olympic short track. Charles Hamelin got his first, then quickly made it two. Apolo Anton Ohno picked up a DQ, then pulled out his eighth career medal Friday in what could be the final Olympic event for the guy with the soul patch. Quite a closing night for roller derby on blades.

Wang will go down as the biggest short track star of the Vancouver Games, besting teammate Zhou Yang for that honor. Both had two golds apiece going into the final women’s event, the 1,000 meters, but Zhou was disqualified for a daring move with three laps to go and she finished last anyway.

Wang has been suffering from a cold in recent days. She had a hacking cough, was sweating heavily and drinking from a water bottle as she spoke to reporters, somewhat breathlessly.

“It was not an easy win,” she said. “I feel really tired, exhausted.”

Katherine Reutter gave the Americans something to cheer about after Ohno was disqualified in the 500 final, finishing just behind Wang to claim silver. South Korea’s Park Seung-hi earned the bronze.

Wang added to her golds in the 500 and 3,000 relay, while Reutter won her second medal of the Vancouver Games. She had been part of the U.S. relay team that won bronze.

“I feel like I’ve been initiated in this club and not really many people are there,” Reutter said, who giddily tossed her flowers into the crowd after the medal ceremony.

One problem, though: How to prevent her Olympic medals from banging together and getting scratched.

“I can’t think of a better problem to have,” Reutter said, still draped in the U.S. flag as she came through the mixed zone. “I put absolutely everything I had on the line and it paid off.”

Hamelin came into the Vancouver Games as Canada’s best hope for short track glory, but he had only finished fourth in the 1,000 and seventh in the 1,500. Meanwhile, his girlfriend and teammate Marianne St-Gelais had won two silvers.

Hamelin finally came through on the last night. He slipped by South Korea’s Sung Si-bak coming off the final turn, then held on when Sung lost an edge and crashed into the padded boards.

Right behind them, Ohno was trying to get inside Canada’s Francois-Louis Tremblay, but wound up knocking him into the boards – a move that got the American DQed, denying him a third individual medal at these games after he came across the line second.

Sung slid across the line and wound up with the silver. Tremblay got up to finish and received a bronze for his effort.

“It was just amazing,” said Hamelin, who hopped atop the padded boards to hug and kiss St-Gelais, cheering him on from the side of the rink.

Ohno said he didn’t deserve to be disqualified, claiming that he put his right hand out merely to protect himself as he surged on Tremblay, looking to make the pass.

“I thought I had eight,” Ohno said.

He did before the night was done.

Coming back for the 5,000 relay, he teamed with J.R. Celski, Travis Jayner and Jordan Malone to extend his own record for most decorated short track skater and U.S. Winter Olympian.

But this night belonged to the hosts.

Hamelin joined with his little brother Francois, Olivier Jean and Francois-Louis Tremblay to give the Canadians their second gold, sending the crowd at Pacific Coliseum into a frenzy.

The South Korean team of Kwak Yoon-gy, Lee Ho-suk, Lee Jung-su and Sung Si-bak held on for silver. Kwak got to the line just ahead of Ohno, who slipped inside for the bronze when China’s skater went wide coming off the final turn.

source: sports.yahoo.com
By PAUL NEWBERRY AP National Writer

South Korea’s Kim Yu-na has won the women’s figure skating gold medal at the Vancouver Winter Olympics – and did it by setting a record.
Kim shattered her own world mark by scoring 228.56 points, more than 18 higher than her previous record. She is the winner of South Korea’s first Olympic medal in the sport.
Mao Asada of Japan won the silver, but finished 23 points behind Kim.
Joannie Rochette, whose mother died four days ago, got the bronze, Canada’s first women’s medal in the games since 1988.
American Mirai Nagasu finished fourth.

Newly crowned men’s 10,000m Olympic champion Lee Seung-hoon of South Korea said on Tuesday he did not skate that well and counted his lucky stars that heavily favoured Dutchman Sven Kramer was disqualified.
The unlikely winner, whose finishing time was more than four seconds slower than Kramer, admitted he did not think his time would hold up against Kramer.
“I was very lucky to get the gold medal and if Kramer had not made the mistake he would have the gold medal and so I am very lucky,” said Lee.
The Korean, who only switched from short track to long track seven months ago, broke the Olympic record despite the track’s sea level altitude and sliced an astonishing 22 seconds off his personal best to clock 12 minutes 58.55 seconds.
Kramer, skating in the last pair, looked on track to add the 10,000m title to his 5,000m gold in Vancouver, but a costly lane infringement with eight laps to go saw him disqualified.
“I had prepared a lot for this race and I thought my performance was good enough for a spot on the podium but not the gold medal,” a smiling Lee told reporters.
“I did not think it would give me a gold medal. Sven is definitely one of the greatest skaters.”
Ivan Skobrev of Russia took the silver medal in 13:02.07, while Bob de Jong of the Netherlands, the 2006 champion, claimed bronze in 13:06.73.
South Korea have been hugely successful in long track speed skating at these Games with three gold medals two silvers. That is one less medal than traditional powerhouse Netherlands.

source: sports.yahoo.com

Muhammad Abbas has come a long way from the days when he and his friends would strap rough wooden planks to their legs with nylon rope and go skiing.
On Tuesday, the 24-year-old will become the first Pakistani to compete at a Winter Olympics when he starts in the giant slalom.
His is a journey that has taken him from a life below the poverty line in a northern mountain village to the bright lights and glamour of Whistler—by way of Iran, Lebanon and Austria.
Abbas, who in faltering English expressed to Reuters his excitement and delight on Monday, will be at something of a disadvantage against the mighty Austrians and Swiss.
Not only will he be 96th of 103 starters, but Tuesday will also be his first race of the year.
“In the last two years, we have trained only eight weeks,” his 55-year-old coach, Zahid Farooq, said after a team captains’ meeting. “We had two weeks in Austria in 2008 and six in 2009.”
“We have a very small slope in Pakistan that is only 500 metres long,” he told Reuters. “The vertical drop is only about 80 to 100 metres, so we can’t really train but we just keep ourselves in touch.”
Abbas competed in 10 races last year and is a beneficiary of camps organised by Alpine skiing’s governing body, the International Ski Federation (FIS), to help developing nations. He has also been assisted by the Pakistani Air Force contributing from their welfare fund.

HOME-MADE SKIS
The story began in 1996 when Farooq was posted to Naltar, near the town of Gilgit in the foothills of the Karakoram mountains, as a survival trainer.
“Muhammad started skiing on home-made wooden skis,” he recalled. “They don’t have much resources to buy equipment so this was their pastime, what they did in their free time.
“They would chop off some wood and chisel it, make it into thin bits to look like a true ski and they would tie it to their feet with rubber or with nylon rope.
“Once we saw their passion for skiing, on their small skis with no ski boots, we arranged about eight pairs of skis for them,” continued Farooq.
“We held a trial and we picked 16 so they could share the skis—one group in the morning and one in the afternoon. From there, we picked up these boys and started sending them to Iran for the junior championships in 1999.
“These boys hypnotised us,” he said. “We are so much in love with their passion that we actually just got together and thought this has to be done.”
The 2006 Turin Games came too soon for Pakistan and even now, resources are severely stretched. Where others have coaches, managers and ski technicians, Pakistan have Farooq.
“I also act as a physical trainer, I keep them on track and make sure they go to training…I am the cook as well,” he said. “And if some equipment is required to be repaired, I do that.
“I can ski reasonably well. Not competitive, but I can come down in one piece. That’s what I did today,” he said of Monday’s piste inspection.
Farooq has plans to add a female skier to the team for Sochi: “By the grace of God, we will by 2014,” he said. “And I hope to have some Nordic skiers as well.”

source: sports.yahoo.com

The Austrians have soared to the gold medal in the Olympic team ski jump, capped by 20-year-old Gregor Schlierenzauer’s final amazing 146.5-meter jump.
Austria defended its title from the Turin Games with 1,107.9 points Monday.
Germany won silver with 1,035.8 points, and Norway took bronze with 1,030.3 points.

Petter Northug finally got to show off his closing ability, and it was enough to give Norway the gold in the men’s cross-country team sprint at the Vancouver Olympics.
Northug blew past Germany’s Axel Teichmann shortly before the finish, parading down the final straight for his first Olympic gold. Northug partnered with Oeystein Pettersen to finish in 19 minutes, 1 second.
The German duo of Teichmann and Tim Tscharnke won silver, with the Russian team of Nikolay Morilov and Alexey Petukhov taking the bronze.
The freestyle event features a two-man relay, where each skier takes turns going three laps around a 1.6-kilometer course.

source: sports.yahoo.com

Canada is the No. 6 seed in the men’s Olympic hockey tournament and will play No. 11 Germany on Tuesday for a spot in the quarterfinals.

Canada missed a chance to skip the qualification round when it lost 5-3 to the top-seeded United States on Sunday night. If the host Canadians get past Germany, they will face No. 3 Russia in the quarters – a matchup many expected to occur with the gold medal on the line.

No. 8 Switzerland will play ninth-seeded Belarus on Tuesday with the winner moving on against the Americans on Wednesday. The fifth-seeded Czech Republic will take on No. 12 Latvia for the right to meet No. 4 Finland in the quarterfinals, and No. 7 Slovakia is scheduled to play No. 10 Norway. The winner will advance to face second-seeded Sweden.

source: sports.yahoo.com

Ireen Wust of the Netherlands made up for a disappointing start to her Olympics by claiming Vancouver speedskating gold in the women’s 1,500 metres at the Richmond Olympic Oval on Sunday.
Wust upgraded her 2006 Turin bronze with a blistering time of one minute 56.89 seconds in the 15th of 18 pairings and then watched as the other contenders failed to beat the time.
Wust, who became the youngest Dutch gold medalist ever in the Winter Games when she won gold in the 3,000m in Turin as a 19-year-old, finished seventh in last week’s 3,000 and eighth in the 1,000m before she struck gold in the blue riband event.
Top-ranked Kristina Groves of Canada repeated as silver medalist by finishing second in 1:57.14, adding to the 3,000m bronze she claimed last week.
The bronze medal went to Martina Sablikova of the Czech Republic, gold medalist in the 3,000m, in 1:57.96.
The Dutch all-rounder knew she had nailed her run, thrusting both arms in the air, pumping her fists in delight and pointing to the roaring orange-clad army packed into the oval after her finish.

Ireen Wust

Once second-ranked Canadian Christine Nesbitt failed to overtake her in the final pairing, the Dutch crowd erupted and Wust cried tears of joy.
On her victory lap, she paused to hug and kiss her girlfriend Sanne van Kerkhof, a member of the Dutch short track speedskating team.
“All the pieces came together today,” Wuss told reporters. “It’s so unreal. I can’t describe how happy I am.”
Wust said her golden moment made up for the earlier Vancouver results.
“The 3-K was disappointing and the thousand was disappointing,” she said. “But now I think I’m the happiest person on earth right now.”

source: sports.yahoo.com

This is the way Bode Miller always wanted it to happen, needed it to happen.
An Olympic gold medal may be the ultimate evidence of skiing success in everyone else’s eyes, but most assuredly not in his. If the willful Miller ever was going to earn one and truly embrace the accomplishment, this is how it had to be.
He conquered a tricky course with sometimes-spectacular skiing that reminded him of being a kid on the slopes. He overcame a big deficit by pushing himself despite a bum left knee and an aching right ankle. In sum, he turned in a performance that pleased him, regardless of what the clock said.
In this case, it just so happens, Miller’s total time from one downhill and one slalom was Sunday’s best, allowing the 32-year-old from Franconia, N.H., to win the super-combined event signifying all-around skiing ability – and that first career gold. He now has a record-tying three medals at these Olympics after only three races, quite a comeback from his infamous flop at the 2006 Turin Games and his near-retirement last year.
“The gold medal is great. I think it’s perfect. Ideally, that’s what everyone is shooting for. But the way I skied these last races is what matters. I would’ve been proud of that skiing with a medal or not,” Miller said after turning in the third-fastest slalom leg for an overall time of 2 minutes, 44.92 seconds, a comfortable 0.33 ahead of Ivica Kostelic of Croatia. Silvan Zurbriggen of Switzerland got the bronze.
“The way I executed – the way I skied – is something I’ll be proud of the rest of my life,” Miller said.
Whether he ever says so or not, it’s the Olympic gold medal that changes history’s view of Miller. What happened in Turin is now an aberration rather than the defining moment. Now he’ll always be seen by those outside the sport as one of Alpine skiing’s greats who frittered away one Olympics, not a should-have-been who never fulfilled his promise.
“I mean, Bode has now done everything you can in skiing. He’s won World Cups. He’s won World Cup overall titles,” said Will Brandenburg of Spokane, Wash., who finished 10th in his Olympic debut. “He’s won medals in every color. And now he’s got the gold. And I think that’s big. He’s one of the best skiers of all time now and no one can discredit that.”
Older and perhaps wiser – although good luck getting this guy to admit the latter – Miller is at the top of his game at the right time.

What a week.
He also won a bronze in Monday’s downhill and a silver in Friday’s super-G, adding to two silvers at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games. The five Alpine medals tie him for the second-most by any man in Olympic history, behind only the eight won by Kjetil Andre Aamodt of Norway.
At this point, who would doubt that Miller could keep going, maybe coming up with something special in the two remaining events, the giant slalom Tuesday and the slalom Saturday.
Miller was asked why he’s doing this now, and not in Italy four years ago, when he tuned out, partied hard and failed to live up to the expectations thrust on him by the media, by sponsors, by fans. Miller only finished two of five races back then, never better than fifth place.
In short, he said, what happened there was a reaction to all of those expectations. And what’s happening here is a reaction to enjoying a fresh sense of excitement after taking time away from skiing and thinking about quitting before eventually deciding in September to return to the U.S. Ski Team.
“In ’06, I didn’t really necessarily want to be there for a number of reasons … but, you know, I also didn’t want to not be there. So I was incredibly conflicted,” he said. “I think I had no intention really of blowing it, but I raced as hard as I could, but I didn’t have this motivation. I didn’t have the energy and the enthusiasm.”
Some of that comes from spending more time around his younger teammates. At the last Olympics, Miller stayed in his own RV, away from the rest of the Americans. At these Olympics, he’s living in a condo with everyone else, eating with everyone else, training with everyone else, feeding off the energy of everyone else.
“He’s been really motivated,” said Ted Ligety, the surprise 2006 Turin gold medalist who was fifth Sunday. “It’s cool to really see him win an Olympic gold. That’s what’s been missing from his resume.” Read the rest of this entry…

Germany’s Magdalena Neuner won the Olympic gold medal in the women’s biathlon 12.5km mass start at the Vancouver Games on Sunday. Russian Olga Zaitseva won the silver medal and Germany’s Simone Hauswald took bronze.
Neuner was trailing after the final shoot but the six-times world champion outsprinted her nearest rivals to finish in a time of 35 minutes, 19.6 seconds with two penalty loops. Zaitseva crossed the line 5.5 seconds behind, beating German Simone Hauswald in a battle for second place.
“I really wasn’t expecting anything like this at all, and then bingo another gold medal”, said Neuner.
The German biathlon queen now has won three medals at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics after taking gold in the 10km pursuit and finishing second in the 7.5km sprint to claim silver. The 23-year-old German will be hoping to win her third gold medal when she competes in the relay on Tuesday.
“She is not just a star but a true champion,” said German International Olympic Committee vice-president Thomas Bach.
Germany are the most successful nation in the Olympic biathlon with now 16 gold, 18 silver and 8 bronze medals. The team is on target to repeat the successes of the Turin and Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.
Bach paid tribute to the German biathlon stars. “The girls are just fantastic. That was a fabulous final sprint finish”, he said.
Three-times Olympic champion Kati Wilhelm had a disappointing race, missing the shooting target three times to forfeit any chance of winning a medal.

source: www.dw-world.de

Lee Jung-su said he was able win his second gold medal at the Vancouver Olympics in the men’s 1,000-m short track speed skating final thanks to a sudden burst of speed in the middle of the race by teammate Lee Ho-suk. The two Lees took the gold and silver medals for a perfect victory for Team Korea on Sunday.
The first part of the race was led by Charles and Francois Hamelin, brothers from Canada, and Apolo Anton Ohno of the U.S. But with three laps to go, Lee Ho-suk pushed to the lead with a remarkable surge from the outside, and Lee Jung-su accelerated behind him to take the second spot. With a last minute spurt, the 21-year-old Lee Jung-su passed his teammate to take his second gold of the Games.

In the women’s 1,500-m short track final, Lee Eun-byul and Park Seung-hi took silver and bronze. The gold medal went to Zhou Yang of China, who did not relinquish her lead from the middle of the race.

Korea’s new speed skating hero Mo Tae-bum finished fifth in the men’s 1,500-m with a time of 1:45;47, just 0.34 seconds behind bronze medalist Havard Bokko of Norway.

source: english.chosun.com

Before this past week, Bode Miller’s reputation and legacy seemed to be all wrapped up in what was missing. Fairly or not, the wide-angle view of Miller was dominated by one 13-day span in 2006, a span in which Miller’s talent dictated that he could win as many as five Olympic medals but his attitude yielded zero.
“I didn’t really want to be there,” Miller said, “for a number of reasons.”
On Sunday afternoon, Miller delivered in a way he failed to back in 2006, winning the gold medal in the super combined event at the Vancouver Olympics.. He did so by skiing in the kind of inspiring manner that he says he cares most about — results be damned — and thus added the first gold of his Olympic career to the silver he won last week in the super-G and the bronze he won four days earlier in the downhill.
Three races, three medals, one complete and thorough image overhaul. The Turin Olympics, during which Miller was physically in the Italian Alps and mentally seemed to be anyplace but, have been washed away in seven scintillating days. When these Games began, no U.S. skier had more than two medals — in an entire career. Miller, who won a pair of silvers in 2002, now has five and, with two events to go, could take more, perhaps because the most talented skier in the world is finally skiing, as he said, “free.”
“The level I skied at today is right at the very, very top,” Miller said. “You can’t get that just on call. It’s not like you just turn a key and magically ski at your absolute best. But when you’re at the Olympics, the energy and everything else, you can use that to bring your game up. . . . It feels absolutely amazing.”
The easy assessment of why such a transformation could take place would be to say that Miller has learned from his mistakes, that he has grown up. Miller, 32, largely dismisses such a notion. “I think I’ve actually been pretty consistent, ever since I was little,” he said in the days before the Games.
But there are stark contrasts between those dark days in Turin and now. Then, he flippantly said he was able to “party at an Olympic level” — perhaps his signature quote from those disastrous Games. Now, he is the father of a 2-year-old daughter, and he rises early and has his coffee, as he did at 5:45 a.m. Sunday. Then, he stayed in his personal motor home in the parking lot of the U.S. Ski Team’s quarters. Now, he shares a bathroom with teammate Ted Ligety — “surprisingly clean,” Ligety said — in the team’s condos.
Back then, too, he was at almost constant odds with the ski team’s coaches and officials, with whom he parted ways in 2007. Now, after rejoining the team last fall, he is thriving within that structure.
“Bode’s role is to challenge each other, push the limits of what we can do,” U.S. men’s coach Sasha Rearick said. “He helps inspire me.”
In 2006, unable to summon such inspiration, his effort was hollow. “I had no intention of blowing it,” Miller said Sunday. Yet that was how his results were labeled, a choke job by a prima donna who didn’t care. He is so talented — he is a two-time winner of the World Cup overall championship, perhaps skiing’s most difficult title — he was the obvious focus of the pre-Games coverage. He did not, he said, enjoy being the vehicle by which the International Olympic Committee promoted its product.
“The Olympics is definitely, in my mind, a two-sided coin,” he said. “It has all the best things of sport. It has amazing energy, enthusiasm, passion, inspiration. It’s what changes lives. In that sense, it’s the pinnacle of what sports and camaraderie and all that stuff is.
“On the flip side of that is the opposite, and that’s the corruption and the abuse and the money. I’m not pointing fingers, but that’s what was bothering me, and being thrust in the middle of that, and being the poster boy for that, when it’s the absolute thing I despise the most in the world was really draining on my inspiration, my level of passion. . . . I just had the plug pulled out on my most important fuel source, and it had been happening for a year, and it was just too much.”
He arrived here overshadowed by fellow American Lindsey Vonn, which was just fine. He won two medals, and spoke after each about how the Olympics had reinvigorated him. When he rose Sunday, he had that feeling again. “The shivers a little bit,” he said.
Read the rest of this entry…

Evan Lysacek shrugged off the supposed need for a showy quadruple jump when he won the Olympic figure skating gold medal on Thursday, focusing on artistry in a dramatic performance that brought spectators to their feet.
Lysacek, the first U.S. winner of the event for 22 years, came to the Vancouver Games promising not to attempt a dramatic but difficult quadruple jump and he made every second of his free-skating performance count.
“I think my program had a lot of difficult parts in it, and I worked really hard to make it look as easy as possible,” he told reporters a touch defensively. “I’m doing my job if I make it look easy.”
Lysacek, last year’s world champion, was the only medal winner who did not attempt a quad jump on Thursday. Bronze medal winner Daisuke Takahashi from Japan tried one and fell, while silver medalist Yevgeny Plushenko failed to match his near flawless display in the short program.
Lysacek concentrated on the in-between bits of his skating program, the spins, steps and transition moves that can — and did — make the difference between victory and defeat.
“My focus was getting every point out of that program I could and that’s what was important to me,” he said.

Evan Lysacek

The debate over quad jumps has been a key factor in the Vancouver Olympics, with the no-quad Lysacek camp pitted against those who say skating must move with the times.
“If you look at the Olympic motto ‘faster, higher, stronger’, the quad represents exactly that,” Plushenko’s coach Alexei Mishin said this week.
But Lysacek, his foot weakened after a stress fracture in 2009, managed to win without, wowing the crowd with a performance set to Rimsky Korsakov’s Sheherazade.
His costume, a dramatic all-black outfit with rhinestone snakes entwined around his neck, played to the music.
“They represent the good and evil in the story of Sheherazade,” he said.

source: www.reuters.com

For all the worry about her famously injured shin, it was a common skiing mistake that ended Lindsey Vonn’s bid for a second Olympic gold medal in two days.
Though Vonn’s bruised right leg was “killing me,” she said she simply failed to get her ski around a right-hand gate and fell in the slalom run of the super combined.
“The shin wasn’t the reason why I didn’t finish the race,” Vonn said. “It was just because I hooked a tip, and that happens in ski racing all the time. I just wish it wasn’t at the Olympic Games.”
Maria Riesch of Germany won the event.
Riesch had a total time of 2 minutes, 09.14 seconds to beat Julia Mancuso of the United States by 0.94 second. Mancuso got her second silver medal after being runner-up to Vonn in the downhill. Anja Paerson of Sweden took the combined bronze.

Lindsey Vonn

BIATHLON: Norwegians Emil Hegle Svendsen and Tora Berger won the men’s 20-kilometer individual event and the women’s 15-kilometer individual race, respectively.

CURLING: John Shuster apologized for his inconsistent shot-making, a performance that has all but doomed the winless American men curlers in the Olympics. “I’ve let my teammates and USA Curling down,” said Shuster, the usually dependable U.S. skip.
The Americans lost to Denmark, 7-6, in another extra end. They are 0-4 and will need to win their remaining five matches in the round-robin schedule to stand any chance of reaching the semifinals.

SPEEDSKATING: Christine Nesbitt earned Canada’s first speedskating gold, winning the 1,000 meters by two-hundredths of a second. Jennifer Rodriguez was the top American, finishing seventh.

source: www.freep.com

After skating a flawless program, full of nifty footwork, tightly-wound spins and just enough spotless triple jumps, Evan Lysacek pumped his fists and shouted, “Yes, yes.”
The first skater in the final six-man group at Thursday night’s free skating program, Lysacek might as well have been shouting, “Quadruple that, Evgeni.”
Under enormous Olympic pressure, Lysacek, the defending world champion who came into Thursday night in second place, was awarded a personal-best score of 167.37 and a total of 257.67.
He made it clear to defending Olympic champion Evgeni Plushenko that the Russian was going to have to back up all of his braggadocio and land every quadruple jump he attempted to win the gold. It was too much heat even for the usually icy cool Plushenko.
Although he had almost as many jumps in his program as an NBA All-Star dunk contest, Plushenko looked strangely mechanical. He bobbled the landing on a triple Lutz and looked uncomfortable landing his only quad.
And, without his usually sharp jumping, Plushenko didn’t have enough in his repertoire to win.
On this night, the better artist beat the better athlete. Lysacek, the more complete skater, won gold. Plushenko, who was attempting to be the first repeat Olympic winner since Dick Button in 1948 and ‘52, earned the silver medal and Japan’s Daisuke Takahashi won the bronze.
Lysacek is the first U.S. male skater to win gold since Brian Boitano in 1988 in Calgary.
His program may have been quad-free, but it was full of all of the difficult elements the judges demand. This isn’t a phrase used often in sports, but it was elegant.
“Certainly there was an awful lot of talk about the quad,” Lysacek’s coach Frank Carroll said. “But I think what still came out was the best skating.
“As I like to explain, there this up and down thing about Plushenko. There is brilliance and then there is not-so-good and then brilliance and then not-so-good. But with Evan there’s just this clean, straight line.”
The only flaw for Lysacek was a strand of flyaway hair that fluttered in the breeze like a feather. There are, however, no gel deductions in skating.
This was one of the most compelling half hours of the Games. A clash of cultures. A collision of eras. A forum for the direction men’s figure skating should take.
It was Lysacek’s feet against Plushenko’s flight. Lysacek’s art versus Plushenko’s aerials.
The question was whether their programs would be judged on degree of difficulty, or level of artistic excellence.
Plushenko is the best-ever leaper on skates. He believes in the quad, says, that in his sports’ biggest event, it is the jump that separates gold from everything else.
He believes bold equals gold.
“We have to change the rules,” he said after his silver performance.
Plushenko, who was the leader after the short program, takes the Olympic motto, “Faster, higher, stronger,” literally. Lysacek interprets the motto differently. He is plenty fast enough and he showed the world on Thursday that there is strength in skating cleanly and beautifully. He was stronger-minded.
“If this was about one jump, they would give you 10 seconds and no music to go and do your best jump,” Lysacek said. “But it’s about every step, from the time you take the ice to the time you’re finished.
“And that’s what my focus was tonight, was getting every point I could out of that program. I’ve been perfecting four minutes and 40 minutes of skating for the last year of my life. It’s taken more hours and more work than any quadruple jump ever could.”
Lysacek was cooler in the caldron. He was smooth in his jumps and he was as quick-footed as a Pro Bowl running back. He earned the gold medal.
He believed in his program. He stayed grounded and finished golden.

source: seattletimes.nwsource.com

Three Americans expected to be stars of the Vancouver Olympics delivered gold Wednesday.
As a result, the U.S. overtook Germany to lead the medal standings again.

Downhill skiing: Lindsey Vonn
If this is how Vonn skis with a bruised and swollen right shin, then the rest of the field has no chance. She showed few signs of discomfort in winning the downhill by more than half a second over teammate Julia Mancuso.
“Overwhelming,” Vonn said, her voice choked with emotion. “This is the best day of my life by far. …A huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders now.”
Vonn, although a two-time defending overall World Cup champion, hurt her right shin Feb. 2 during training in Austria and had hardly skied over the past two weeks.
“Olympic adrenaline is probably the best numbing cream there is,” said Thomas Vonn, her husband and coach. “I think she would have skied without a foot today and been OK.”

Speedskating: Shani Davis
With a furious kick on the final lap, Davis won his second straight gold in 1,000-meter speedskating. Four years ago at Turin, he became the first African-American to win an individual gold at the Winter Games. This time, he simply wanted to be known for his skating. Period.
“It’s always nice to go out there and do it again,” said Davis, a Chicago native who at times has trained and studied at Northern Michigan.

Snowboarding: Shaun White
White, who has enjoyed worldwide fame in snowboarding and skateboarding, captured his second straight halfpipe gold.
He posted the highest score in the qualifying (a 45.8 on a 50-point scale) On his first finals run, he scored a 46.8, again the highest score. He told NBC’s cameras: “I finally put it down. … The Olympics is pretty heavy.”
He didn’t need to take his final run, but he unleashed his Double McTwist 1260. He scored a 48.4.

source: www.freep.com

When David Backes is playing well, his nose tells the story. On Tuesday it was plugged with gauze to stem blood from a stick that hit him early in Team USA’s Olympic hockey opener, symbolic of the brawny forward’s bang-and-crash style.
“I’ll probably end up bleeding during the game and getting my face dirty,” said Backes, who plays for the St Louis Blues. “But you know it’s all for a good cause: winning as a team.”
His bloody nose was no surprise but his terrific, end-to-end goal in a 3-1 victory over Switzerland was a revelation for a young U.S. team that figures to have trouble scoring.
Backes’ goal at 5:52 of the second period, sandwiched between an opportunistic wrist shot late in the first period by Bobby Ryan of the Anaheim Ducks and a power-play rebound by Ryan Malone of the Tampa Bay Lightning at 8:25 of the middle period, proved the difference in launching the U.S. to a reassuring triumph over the physical but overwhelmed Swiss at Canada Hockey Place.
“We’ll save that video,” Team USA General Manager Brian Burke said of Backes’ goal. “When you get unexpected sources to chip in, that’s a very important part of being successful in a tournament.”
The 6-foot-3, 225-pound right wing from Blaine, Minn., gathered up the rebound of a shot by Ivo Ruthemann that had been saved by U.S. goalie Ryan Miller and dashed up the left side. He cut toward the middle and embarrassed defenseman Yannick Weber before shifting from his backhand to his forehand and slipping the puck past goalie Jonas Hiller.

It surprised the Swiss defense. “I surprised myself,” Backes said.
Everyone on the U.S. team chipped in, whether on the power play— Joe Pavelski was also screening Hiller when Malone rebounded Ryan Suter’s shot from the blue line — or in killing two penalties in the third when Switzerland, which has only two NHL regulars and a handful of players with NHL experience, was surging.
The Blackhawks’ Patrick Kane played 18:22 and had four shots on goal in his first Olympic action.
Ryan shed his nerves after he found the net. U.S. defenseman Brooks Orpik had taken a shot that the Swiss defense couldn’t clear, and Ryan swooped in to snap a wrist shot past Hiller, his Anaheim teammate, at 18:59 of the first period.
“I don’t think Jonas had a chance, just because of the screen the four guys put in, but I certainly knew where I was shooting, based on playing with him for so long,” Ryan said. “But he played a great game.”
Backes’ goal put the U.S. up 2-0, and Malone made it 3-0 after Suter’s shot from the blue line landed in front of the net.
“Get pucks on net with traffic and crash the net. It’s not rocket science,” Malone said.
Switzerland ended Miller’s shutout bid at 9:45 of the third, when Roman Wick’s centering pass glanced in off the goalie’s stick and thigh. It was a minor disappointment for Miller, who had won a major battle with International Ice Hockey Federation officials earlier in the day.
He had inscribed the words “Matt Man” on his mask in tribute to his cousin, Matt Schoals, who died in 2007 from complications of leukemia treatments, but IIHF demanded he remove the phrase. He protested and won, though he did have to cover the phrase “Miller Time” because it was considered too close to a commercial endorsement.
There are moral victories and victories that boost morale, and Team USA can savor that two-in-one gain until it plays Norway here Thursday.
“This is a fairly quiet team, which kind of surprises me,” U.S. Coach Ron Wilson said. “But quietly confident.”

source: www.chicagotribune.com

Comebacks make for great Olympics stories, and they come in many forms. Just look at what Seth Wescott, Bode Miller and Lindsey Vonn pulled off Monday.
Wescott came to the Winter Olympics as the reigning champion in snowboardcross, yet also as damaged goods. He hurt his leg and pelvis two months ago and it showed in the races since. He opened Monday’s event by finishing 17th of the 32 riders in qualifying, but found his stride to reach the finals.
Then he found himself way back with five jumps left _ only to make it up with a thrilling finish that snatched a gold from the host country.
Miller is America’s most decorated Alpine skier and the guy who let everyone down in 2006, failing to finish higher than fifth. He didn’t earn a medal at the two world championships since then and considered retiring before deciding to give the Olympics one more try. After several days of weather delays, he was one of the first guys down the mountain. The result: a terrific time good enough for bronze, just nine-hundredths of a second behind the winner and only the third-ever downhill medal for the United States.

Vonn was the headliner coming into Vancouver, then all the hype seemed for naught when she revealed a shin injury that made it painful to even wear a ski boot. But the bad weather was a blessing for her recovery and in her first training run early Monday, on the upper section of the course, she had the fastest time in the field.

Then there was a downturn. A bumpy afternoon run on the lower section left her hobbling again and hoping for more weather delays.

With Wescott’s in-race rally and Miller’s career redemption, the United States upped its medal collection to eight, double any other country. Americans have won two golds, topped only by Switzerland’s three.
Two finals remained Monday night, pairs figure skating and the men’s 500 meters in speedskating.
The speedskating event was delayed because both Zambonis were busted, leaving the machines in need of repair and the ice in need of cleaning.

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Men’s downhill

Miller’s nine-hundredths of a second behind winner Didier Defago of Switzerland was the smallest margin between gold and bronze in the history of an event that began in 1948.
“It’s such a relief to get a medal,” Miller said. “The fact that those other guys beat me to the hundredth of a second doesn’t bother me.”
The only other Americans to win a medal in the event were golds by Tommy Moe in 1994 and Bill Johnson in ‘84. Miller won silver medals in the giant slalom and the combined events in 2002, then went into the 2006 Winter Olympics as one of the headliners, only to make the wrong kind of history. A fifth-place finish in the downhill started his demise; it turned out to be his best finish. A rebellious, couldn’t-care-less attitude made things worse. This time, the big grin he flashed at the end of his run showed how much this meant to him.
“I was psyched,” Miller said. “I skied hard.”

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Lindsey Vonn

The most important thing about Vonn’s training run wasn’t her time. It was simply finishing, which fulfilled the requirement of running the course on the same day at least once.

With a starting spot waiting for her, Vonn will turn her attention to being there. The race is scheduled for Wednesday and there’s another training session Tuesday, although she’s now eligible to skip it.

“The course here is just so bumpy,” Vonn said. “It was a fight just to make it down the whole way.”

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Snowboardcross

When Wescott crossed the finish line ahead of Canada’s Mike Robertson, fans gasped and cheered while the 33-year-old champion fell to the ground, exhausted and exhilarated.
Tony Ramoin of France won the bronze.
American Nate Holland, a five-time Winter X Games champ, spun out early in the final foursome.

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Cross-country skiing

Switzerland’s Dario Cologna collapsed across the finish line after winning the men’s 15-kilometer freestyle cross-country race. Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla led from start to finish to win the women’s 10-kilometer freestyle race.
In the men’s race, Italian Pietro Piller Cottrer won the silver and Lukas Bauer of the Czech Republic took bronze. James Southam was the top American finisher at 48th.

In the women’s event, Kristina Smigun-Vaehi of Estonia, who won two golds in 2006 but has struggled this season, took silver and Marit Bjoergen of Norway got the bronze. Caitlin Compton finished 30th, the best by an American since 1984.

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Luge

A brief, private memorial service was held at a Vancouver funeral home for the Georgian luger killed in a crash during training, then his casket was taken to the airport to be flown home for burial.
Three Georgian athletes, including figure skater Otar Japaridze, wearing a black armband on his red team jacket, filed past the open casket to touch the body of their fallen teammate, Nodar Kumaritashvili. His uncle and coach, Felix Kumaritashvili, broke into tears outside the funeral home.
The president of Georgia’s Olympic Committee was accompanying the body back to Georgia, where the casket would be received by a spiritual leader.
Kumaritashvili’s father told The Associated Press in Georgia that shortly before the fatal run he spoke to his 21-year-old son, who said he was worried about the track’s speed.
“He told me, ‘I will either win or die,’” David Kumaritashvili said. “But that was youthful bravado, he couldn’t be seriously talking about death.”

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Bobsled/Skeleton

The head of the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation is OK with the track at the Whistler Sliding Center.

American skeleton athletes trained on the track Monday for the first time since Kumaritashvili’s death. They were among the majority of competitors who started at the top of the track, bypassing the option of starting from a lower spot. Luge events were moved down the track to make races slower and safer, and indeed there wasn’t a single wreck in the finals.

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Figure skating

Johnny Weir already has decided to drop fur from his costume. Now he’s thinking about adding a quadruple jump to his program.
“What do I have to lose?” Weir said. “I’m not a favorite for a medal here. If I feel like doing it, I will do it.”
The flamboyant three-time U.S. champion has rarely used the four-revolution jump. Urged to do it by his coach, Galina Zmievskaya, Weir pulled off a good one during practice Monday.

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Men’s hockey

Two goals and two assists for the Anaheim Ducks on Sunday convinced Canadian hockey officials that Ryan Getzlaf is ready for the Olympics.
Getzlaf was playing his first game since spraining his left ankle. Flyers forward Jeff Carter was flown to Vancouver in case Getzlaf wasn’t ready, but Getzlaf was included on the roster submitted Monday.

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Women’s hockey

Forward Erika Lawler didn’t break any bones or sprain any ligaments when she crashed into the boards Sunday. But she was bruised enough to skip practice Monday.
Coach Mark Johnson is optimistic Lawler will play Tuesday against Russia. He knows her pretty well, too. She played for him at the University of Wisconsin, winning three national championships in four years and captaining the 2009 team.
Canada beat Switzerland 10-1, another thumping but not as lopsided as the Canadians’ 18-0 win over Slovakia.

source: www.newser.com