Jul 12
For every athlete who participates in the Special Olympics,there is a story of how the Games have impacted their lives.
Originally posted here: Special Olympics changes lives of local athletes
Jun 17
ATLANTA, June 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — World Gold Medalist (Swimming) Special Olympics Athlete, Erin Hoffman, may not have won a prize with her adopted rubber duck in the 2009 Duck Derby, but that’s not going to stop her from trying again.
See the original post here: Special Olympics Athlete Says Duck Derby Is More Than a Race
Jun 09
Special Olympics Minnesota athlete Kris Bartz of Avon has been selected to Team Minnesota at the 2010 USA National Games in Nebraska. He is currently raising money to support his trip and asks the public to consider sponsoring him in competition.
More here: Avon athlete to participate in 2010 Special Olympics USA National Games
Jun 09
And then there were five: Neptune athlete Charles Davis is on board as the latest member of the 2011 Rutgers football recruiting class. Shore Sports caught up with him on the radio yesterday, so give that a listen. …
Read more here: Rutgers football recruiting update for the week of 6/8 – On the Banks
Jun 05
Nigeria’s 2008 Olympic bronze medalist Blessing Okagbare of University of Texas, El Paso (UTEP) is one of four track and field women athletes nominated for the Collegiate Women Sports Award presented by Honda to the top NCAA Division I female athletes in their sport.
Okagbare becomes the first UTEP athlete to be nominated for the [...]
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Apr 29
Bahrain athlete Rashid Ramzi, who won gold in the 1500m and Italian cyclist Davide Rebellin, who won a silver, are among the six athletes who are found positive for doping in retesting of Beijing samples.
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Mar 26
Amy Lyn Acuff (born July 14, 1975, Port Arthur, Texas) is an athlete from the United States. An aggressive high jump competitor, Acuff competed in the 2004 Summer Olympics as a member of USA Track and Field and is a three-time Olympian. Her personal best is 2.01 m, which she achieved in Zürich on 2003-08-15.
Acuff is also known for her career as a model, including multiple cover appearances.
The Omni Lie Millennium Calender of Champions 2000
Jan 10
Taxpayers in Vancouver may have to pay for building the 2010 Winter Olympics‘ main athletes’ village after private funding dried up amid rising costs and a slowing economy, officials said on Friday.
The city said it was committed to completing the C$1 billion ($840 million) project in time for the Games in February 2010, but was struggling to renegotiate financing for the complex that will house up to 2,800 Olympic competitors.
“The Olympic village is a billion dollar project, and the city’s on the hook for all of it,” Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson told reporters. “It’s a bitter pill for taxpayers to swallow.”
The project’s original financing called for the athletes’ accommodations to be built by a private developer on city land, with the units converted into regular housing that would be sold off after the Olympics to pay for it.
The facility near Vancouver’s downtown is being built by privately held Millennium Development, which would also buy the land from the city after the Olympics.
The project lenders, led by U.S.-based Fortress Investment Group, stopped advancing money to Millennium in September amid rising construction costs and fears that Vancouver’s slowing housing market meant real estate sales would not pay off the loan.
City officials said Vancouver may now end up paying for the project because it agreed in 2007 to guarantee the loan to Millennium. The city did so by promising Fortress it would complete the project in time for the Olympics if Millennium was unable to do.
Robertson, who was elected mayor in November, accused the city’s previous administration of trying to hide that agreement from the public.
The funding cut-off in September forced the city to lend Millennium C$100 million ($84 million) so construction could continue. That money will be exhausted in mid-January.
City officials said they did not question Fortress’ decision to cut off funding and added they believed a new financing deal could be reached with the lender.
Fortress officials were not available for comment.
The amount of money the city eventually loses on the deal would depend on how much real estate prices have recovered in 2010, city officials said.
Fortress also owns resort operator Intrawest Corp that runs the Whistler ski area north of Vancouver where alpine ski events will be held in 2010. The Games will have a smaller athlete village in Whistler that is funded separately.
($1 = $1.19 Canadian)
source: reuters.com
Dec 31
As athletes stroke the sporting gold at the Beijing Olympic Games, those big-name sporting brands hope that the effort or cash spent in preparation for the Games would also be proved lucrative. However, sometimes, things are unpredictable, just like “anything is possible”.
Being one of the of ficial sponsors, Adidas, involved with the Games since 1928, determined to secure a bigger slice of the Chinese market, where it is in strong competition with Nike.
“The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games will serve as a platform for the brand to become the leading sports brand in China,” said Erica Kerner, director of Adidas’s Beijing 2008 Olympic program me. Through a combination of TV, pr int , outdoor, public relations, digital, point-of-sale and roadshows across the country, the”Im possible is Nothing” Olympic marketing campaign aims to bring sport engagement with Chinese consumers to a new level”.
Especial ly on July 5, Adidas opened its largest Brand Center worldwide, with a size of 3,170m² occupying four floors, inside the new Sanlitun Village Shopping Center in Beijing, featuring a range of unique interact ive elements that will provide consumers with a truly special retail experience.
Dec 28
IT’s a strange world in which Michael Phelps can win a record eight Olympic gold medals and still be challenged for pre-eminence in the year of the Beijing Games.
But a bolt from the blue Caribbean, in the shape of Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt, managed to drag the spotlight from the Water Cube to the Bird’s Nest, as two of history’s greatest athletes framed the Games of the XXIX Olympiad.
International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge declared the two men the “icons of the Games”.
In a record-breaking year for records, the pair were also the foremost exponents of the art of going where no athlete has gone before.
Appropriately for the first Olympics staged in China, Phelps and Bolt represented the Yin and Yang of great champions — the swimmer and the runner, water and earth, a diet of 12,000 calories a day versus chicken nuggets for breakfast. Phelps lit up the Games by day (thanks to NBC’s insistence on morning finals in the pool) and Bolt by night.
But where Phelps’ triumphant march was expected, even demanded (NBC was counting on it), Bolt’s sudden rise to superstardom was a joyous gift for his troubled sport, beset by doping scandals which had tarnished its credibility along with some once-great names.
It takes a huge talent to hold 90,000 people in thrall but Bolt captured them at the Bird’s Nest from the moment he dashed down the straight to win the 100m in a world record 9.69sec, becoming the fastest man on the planet, despite a side-stepping celebration over the last 20m that may have cost him up to 0.1sec.
But Bolt’s Calypso rhythm and youthful exuberance brought much-needed star quality to the main stadium.
The only time that 21-year-old Bolt was deadly serious was when he stepped onto the blocks for the 200m final. A 200m specialist as a junior competitor, he was desperate to break his hero Michael Johnson’s lauded world record of 19.32sec from Atlanta in 1996.
Bolt ran the half-lap with his eyes only on that mark and every fast-twitch fibre straining forward, stopping the clock in an astonishing 19.30sec.
And he wasn’t finished there. The showman of the Games then combined with former world 100m record-holder Asafa Powell and his Jamaican team-mates to set a third world record in the 4x100m relay.
His name was attached to three of the five world records to fall at the Bird’s Nest.
If Bolt was the king of the track, Russia’s Yelena Isinbayeva was the queen of the air, after she soared to a world record of 5.05m in the pole vault to clinch her second successive Olympic gold medal.
Dec 23
Usain Bolt let those long legs loose at the Bird’s Nest, and he left Beijing with three Olympic gold medals, three world records and hundreds of millions of new fans around the world.
Virtually unknown at the start of the year, the Jamaican sprinter was the star of the track in 2008, first setting a world record in the 100 meters at the end of May and then lowering the mark to 9.69 seconds at the Olympics. A few days later, he set a 200 record of 19.30, taking two hundredths of a second off the mark set by Michael Johnson at the 1996 Atlanta Games.
To cap it off, the 1.96-meter (6-foot-5) Bolt helped Jamaica win gold in the 4×100 relay — again in world-record time.
“I’m Lightning Bolt. I’m not Flash Gordon or anybody,” Bolt said after the 200. “My name is Lightning Bolt.”
Two of the greatest distance runners of all time also had stellar years, with Kenenisa Bekele winning both the 5,000 and 10,000 at the Olympics. In the longer race, the Ethiopian great beat 1996 and 2000 Olympic 10,000 champion Haile Gebrselassie, who only competed in that event after opting out of the marathon because of pollution fears.
But Gebrselassie’s sixth-place finish in Beijing didn’t stop him from breaking his own world record in the marathon, lowering that mark to 2:03:59 in Berlin in September.
“I knew I can do something here in Berlin because since I started running, Berlin is my lucky city,” said Gebrselassie, a three-time Berlin Marathon champion who had set the previous world record at the race in 2007.
In women’s competition, Yelena Isinbayeva was undefeated outdoors in 2008, defending her Olympic pole vault title in Beijing with one of her four world records this year — three outside and one inside.
“I love to be alone at the top,” Isinbayeva said after raising the outdoor world record to 5.05 meters in Beijing.
Nov 30
Olympic champion Christine Ohuruogu was named athlete of the year by the British Olympic Association on Saturday, a year after she overturned the organization’s ban for a doping violation.
The 24-year-old Londoner beat favourite Sanya Richards at August’s Beijing Games to become Britain’s first ever female Olympic gold medallist over 400 metres.
Ohuruogu was banned for 12 months after missing three out-of-competition doping tests from October 2005 to July 2006, and had to win a court battle to overturn her lifetime BOA ban.
UK Athletics had said she was guilty of a technical offence and welcomed her onto the Beijing team, but Ohuruogu’s achievements have consistently been overshadowed.
She won the world championship in Osaka, Japan, in August 2007 barely weeks after returning to competition.
source: google.com
Nov 30
taly’s triumphant Olympic fencers are using their fighting skills to stay in the limelight and promote their sport now that interest has waned after the Beijing Games.
The fencing team drew wide attention after it brought home two individual gold, two individual bronze and three team bronze medals.
The swashbucklers have used media appearances at home to great effect, knowing that soon the focus will return to more traditionally popular sports like soccer and auto racing.
Diego Confalonieri, who won bronze in the team épée, wants to avoid the fate of most smaller Olympic sports that must wait until the 2012 Games in London for another 15 minutes of fame.
Nov 19
Few people know about Lindsey Van, just as few had heard of Stacy Dragila before she became famous at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
The U.S. Olympic Committee named Van athlete of the month for October. The ski jumper had just won her 13th national championship on Oct. 11. She holds the record for longest jump among men or women.
Unfortunately for Van and for the USA, ski jumping is the only sport in which women will not be competing at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics. Van says it is her last shot at the Olympics and that her sport would draw a following as passionate as women’s pole vault did when Dragila was first permitted to compete in on the Olympic stage eight years ago.
Nearly everyone involved, except members of the International Olympic Committee, would like to see Van stand at the gate at the top of the hill, slide down the runway and get her shot at a gold medal in 2010. The IOC executive board said no in 2006, citing “their development is still in the early stage thus lacking the international spread of participation and technical standard required for an event to be included.”
Nov 18
Michael Phelps was named Athlete of the Year last night by USA Swimming at the annual Golden Goggle Awards, which recognize outstanding achievement in the pool for American athletes.
Phelps was something of a shoo-in for the award after winning eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics, but the 23-year-old Fells Point resident was happy to take a night off from his busy traveling schedule to celebrate the honor.
He also received an award for Performance of the Year for his victory in the 100-meter butterfly, as well as one for being a part of the men’s 400relay.
“It’s been an awesome run,” Phelps said. “I’ve had so much support, from my family, my coach and my friends. My coach, in particular, has put up with a lot. I look forward to seeing what we can do in the future.”
Phelps took some time to talk about his business partnership with his coach, Bob Bowman, and the recent announcement that the duo had purchased the business side of the Meadowbrook Aquatic Center, as well as control of the North Baltimore Aquatic Club. It’s something Bowman and Phelps had talked about for more than a year before deciding to go forward with their plan.
Oct 05
A group of women ski jumpers who are suing to have their sport included in the 2010 Winter Olympics received a boost from a Canadian athlete on Wednesday.
Zoya Lynch, a 17-year-old member of Canada’s national team, joined the lawsuit that includes 10 female athletes, most from the United States and Europe, who want women’s ski jumping included at the 2010 Games in Vancouver. No other current members of the team are part of the lawsuit.
Marie-Pierre Morin, 26, a retired ski jumper, is the only other Canadian involved in the lawsuit against the Vancouver Olympic Games Organizing Committee.
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“As a Canadian, I don’t want to stand on the sidelines watching the boys compete. The Olympics is where I want to be,” said Lynch, as she stood outside the Vancouver courthouse where her name was added to list of women ski jumpers suing VANOC.
“I just feel we’re being discriminated against because we’re girls,” Lynch said.
At issue is whether women ski jumpers are being discriminated against by being barred from competing at the Games. The plaintiffs argue that allowing men’s ski jumping but not women’s violates their equality rights under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The International Olympic Committee has said its decision to exclude women’s ski jumping at the Vancouver Games is based on “technical merit” and isn’t discriminatory. In 2006 the IOC voted not to allow women’s ski jumping into the 2010 Games, saying the sport has not developed enough and that it didn’t meet basic criteria for inclusion.
Oct 05
A tournament field of 204 golfers from 24 U.S. Special Olympics programs was joined by family, friends, volunteers, local dignitaries and golf organization executives from across the country to amass nearly 500 participants in Friday night’s Opening Ceremony of the Special Olympics Golf National Invitational Tournament. The ninth annual tournament will be conducted at PGA Golf Club in Port St. Lucie through Monday, Oct. 6, 2008.
The PGA of America is a five-time host of the national tournament at PGA Golf Club and a 20-year sponsor of the Special Olympics golf program.
Tonight’s program began with the “parade of athletes” where team mates from 24 U.S. Special Olympics chapters marched into the opening ceremony in a tradition synonymous with the Olympics Games.
Emcee responsibilities for the event were shared by Special Olympics global messenger and Port St. Lucie golfer Alex Perry who was joined by Jupiter resident Tim Rosaforte, who is a senior writer for Golf Digest, on-air contributor for the Golf Channel and NBC Sports and a New York Times Best-Selling author.
Oct 02
Michael Phelps who claimed a record eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympic Games said it was harder for him to learn Chinese than to win swimming races.
Before the American came to China for the 2008 Games he seriously took a few Chinese lessons. A popular online video shows how hard he tries to imitate the voice of a Chinese learning multimedia software in saying such basic words as “guo zhi” (juice), “nan hai’er” (boy) and “nu hai’er” (girl).
But still, the 23-year-old rated his Chinese language studies as the most difficult thing he had tried in his life. “Learning Mandarin is even harder than winning eight gold medals in the pool.”
In primary school Phelps took French and German courses, but the swimming ace said, “all the words, characters and pronunciations in Mandarin are so different. All of them are hard to manage.”
He was not the only star athlete trying to learn some Chinese language and culture. When gymnast Nastia Liukin arrived back home in Dallas, Texas, with five medals around her neck, the Russian-born blonde appeared in front of her reception wearing a black T-shirt with two big Chinese characters “Beijing” in the front. (blog)
“The Beijing Olympics have brought world attention to the Chinese civilization and further enhanced the utility of the Chinese language worldwide,” said Zhao Guocheng, the Office of Chinese Language Council International (OCLCI) deputy director general.
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