CHARLOTTE, North Carolina (Reuters) – Michael Phelps was quickly back to his dominating best, powering to a pair of victories in less than an hour on his return to competition at the Charlotte UltraSwim Grand Prix on Friday.

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Michael Phelps returns to the pool after a ban already knowing what times he expects to achieve in the London Olympics.
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CHARLOTTE, North Carolina (Reuters) – A guarded Michael Phelps dives into the unknown on Friday when he makes his first competitive appearance since his record haul of eight gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

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RALEIGH, NC (Reuters) – Michael Phelps makes his first competitive appearance since the Beijing Olympics at the Charlotte UltraSwim Grand Prix meet on Friday, looking forward to the 2012 London Games and leaving behind a drug fiasco.

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American swimming star Michael Phelps says he expects to compete at the London 2012 Olympics, a month after threatening to retire.
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A promoter has flip-flopped on plans to bring U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps to events in Calgary and Vancouver in light of a photograph that surfaced of the Olympic gold medalist using a bong associated with smoking marijuana.
Power Within Inc., a Toronto-based company that organizes motivational speaking events and initially stood by the superstar’s involvement in next week’s engagements in Western Canada, has suddenly pulled the plug.
“Due to widely publicized alleged use of marijuana by Michael Phelps, the decision has been made to present the program without Mr. Phelps’ participation,” the company said in statement released to a local newspaper.
Both nonrefundable events were well on their way to selling out. Tickets for next Tuesday’s event in Calgary cost $229 and will now feature actor Martin Sheen as its keynote speaker.
Next Friday’s engagement in Vancouver, which costs $169, will still feature Mehmet Oz, a regular on The Oprah Winfrey Show.
The image appeared in a British tabloid earlier this month, but it was allegedly taken while Mr. Phelps attended a party last November while visiting the University of South Carolina. Last week, a state sheriff said he did not have enough physical evidence to charge Mr. Phelps.
Mr. Phelps, who won a record eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics in August, has apologized for his actions, but stopped short of admitting to using pot.
Days after the controversy surfaced, Power Within said it was standing behind the scheduled Canadian appearances by the swimmer.
“We’re not changing our position on it,” company founder Salim Khoja told a local newspaper. “His message and his accomplishments speak for themselves.”
Officials did not respond to requests yesterday to explain their change of heart.

source: theglobeandmail.com

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 4×100m 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.

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Relish the memories – 2008 was a special year for sport, and the outlook for the next few does not appear half so rosy.

Next year is thin in terms of big international events. The World Athletics Championships take place in Berlin, and it is left to rugby union – a minority sport globally – to provide another highlight when the British and Irish Lions tour South Africa, the world champions. And further ahead, the successor hosts of two of this year’s stellar events, the Olympic Games and the European Football Championships, have hard acts to follow, with fewer resources and the global economic crisis to combat.

The Beijing Olympics was the apex of 2008. China opened its doors to the world and demonstrated that it could organise a successful sporting extravaganza. It did so by hurling massive amounts of money and manpower at the Games, in a manner that perhaps only an authoritarian state could. The yin and yang nature of the event was symbolised by the happiness and pride of the Chinese people at hosting the world’s biggest sporting party on the one hand, and their government’s refusal to budge an inch over human rights on the other.

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The competition pool for a Chicago Olympics would last about as long as a swimming world record does these days.

Chicago 2016 organizers unveiled several venue changes Friday that they say will benefit athletes and the community, and make their bid more attractive in the highly competitive international field. In addition to moving the aquatic center and making the competition pool a temporary facility, the sailing, canoe/kayaking, track cycling and BMX cycling venues all will be moved under Chicago’s retooled bid plan.

“We worked very closely with international sports federations and national governing bodies,” said Doug Arnot, Chicago 2016’s operations chief. “This plan is better for sport, better for the games and, perhaps most importantly, better for Chicago’s youth sports legacy. This plan remains very financially responsible.”

The changes will add about 5% to the budget, which remains at $4.7 billion, Chicago 2016 chairman Patrick Ryan said. That’s a bargain compared with other Summer Games; London estimates its overall costs for the 2012 Olympics will be about $16.5 billion, three times the original estimate.

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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.

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For days, Albert Kirchmayr has been melting, molding and cooling gallons of milk chocolate, all for the glory of Michael Phelps. For as many mornings, Darlene Castle has lain in bed, composing rhyming couplets for her grandkids to chant in praise of Phelps and his eight gold medals from this summer’s games.
Others around town have been rehearsing songs and crafting everything from “Will you marry me?” posters to canvas oil paintings detailing step by step Phelps’s journey toward the Beijing Olympics. And yesterday, all of them converged on Towson, Md., to try to throw the largest and most extravagant parade ever for the swimmer.
It was a day of glory not only for Phelps, who looked relaxed in a hoodie and sunglasses as he rode in a military Humvee past the throngs of screaming fans, but also for the town he came from. As with any hometown parade, part of it — the fireworks, crowded streets and adulation — was about pride in claiming this hero as one of their own, as though to catch reflected glory for everyone around him.
“Towson’s pretty much still a small town,” said John Cadigan, who manages the pool where Phelps trained. “It’s a source of pride, a sense that one of us from little Towson went off into the big world and did something great.”

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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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Returning to the Baltimore pool where he honed his swimming skills, Michael Phelps accepted a $250,000 donation Thursday from Kellogg’s for his charitable foundation.
Phelps was home after a whirlwind journey that began with his record-setting performance winning eight gold medals in the Beijing Olympics.
Kellogg Co. will feature Phelps’ photo on Frosted Flakes, Corn Flakes, Club Crackers and Rice Krispies treats.
The Michael Phelps Foundation promotes water safety and youth swimming. It got started with a $1 million bonus Phelps earned from another sponsor, Speedo, for his gold-medal haul.
Phelps appeared for a news conference at Meadowbrook Aquatic Center, which he’s negotiating to buy. He began training there when he was 7 years old.
“This is my home pool, so I’m happy to be back,” Phelps said before accepting the grant. “I’m trying to get settled in a new house, and I kind of get lost from time to time because I have no idea what the roads are anymore.”
Phelps had not seen his image on the Kellogg’s products before they were unveiled in a ceremony at the pool. Seeing them for the first time, he smiled broadly and exclaimed, “Awesome!”

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from: ap.google.com

After he hosts NBC’s Saturday Night Live this weekend, there might not be much more the network can squeeze out of Michael Phelps.
For now, anyway. Phelps’ historic eight gold medals in the Beijing Olympics were the driving force behind NBC’s prime-time Olympic ratings, just as Phelps’ six golds in Athens were the key to NBC’s 2004 Olympic ratings. NBC Sports Chairman Dick Ebersol told The New York Times that after NBC gained Olympic officials’ support in its bid to have swimming finals moved from evenings to mornings so they could be shown live in prime time on the East Coast, the “first outsider” he consulted was Phelps, who was agreeable. After Phelps worked his way through various NBC outlets — this week giving Jay Leno his best rating in nearly three months — it was inevitable he’d end up on SNL.
But even though rehearsals have left Phelps “completely confident” about hosting SNL, he also says he’s “more nervous doing this than swimming in Beijing, I’ll tell you that.” Not to worry, says SNL executive producer Lorne Michaels: “No matter what happens, they can’t take those medals away.”
Phelps says he enjoys watching SNL when he can stay up to watch, adding he grew up as a “huge, huge fan” of the late SNL comic Chris Farley — who skated with Olympian Nancy Kerrigan when she hosted SNL— and that Farley’s Tommy Boy is his favorite movie.
Phelps says he has a funny side the public hasn’t seen: “In my group of friends, I’m one of the most sarcastic. … I’m actually a really, really sarcastic guy.” (And he didn’t sound sarcastic saying that.)
In hosting SNL, whose stage was used for NBC’s coverage of some Beijing Olympics action as announcers called events off TV monitors, Phelps joins a long line of athlete-hosts, including LeBron James and Peyton Manning in 2007. Charles Barkley mauled Barney the purple dinosaur on a basketball court. Tom Brady appeared in his underwear for a mock sexual harassment training video. Michael Jordan danced in a hula skirt. Says Phelps: “I’m just looking forward to having fun.”
Michaels says Amy Poehler played Phelps’ mother in rehearsals, although it’s still unclear which skits will appear on the show. Michaels added it’s possible Tina Fey will play GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. But don’t expect Phelps to perform anything that suggests his political preferences: “I’ve tried to stay away from jumping on political bandwagons. That’s something I try to keep to myself.”
Asked if future SNL shows might include Beijing Olympians, Michaels says probably not. Instead, “we’ll start thinking about 2010″ — meaning the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
Think NBC is asking Phelps if he snowboards?

from: usatoday.com

Michael Phelps

NEWS: Olympian Michael Phelps announced this morning that he will put part of his $1 million bonus for tying Mark Spitz’s seven gold medals into a foundation to encourage the growth of swimming.

Phelps earned the bonus from Speedo after he tied Spitz’s 36-year record of seven gold medals in a single Games. He then beat the mark, winning eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics last month.

This morning, the 23-year-old Baltimorean told NBC’s “Today Show” host Matt Lauer that he will travel to eight cities in the United States to promote swimming among children.

The brief TV announcement did not address whether his plans to promote swimming would involve buying North Baltimore Aquatic Club’s Meadowbrook pool. Last month, Phelps told NBC’s Nightly News that he and coach Bob Bowman had bought a pool in Baltimore and were looking to change the sport of swimming. Bowman was named NBAC’s chief executive officer and is expected to start the job this month.

from: baltimoresun.com

A shot for Olympic gold can be an opportunity of a lifetime for athletes. But for companies that spent heavily on advertising and marketing at the Olympics, the Beijing Games offered a different kind of golden opportunity: the chance to advertise their goods to a worldwide audience and for more exposure to consumer-rich China.
“Until China, never before has the market potential of the host country on its own been viewed as possibly worth the significant investment,” says Julius Roberge of branding company Siegel + Gale.
Twelve companies from a variety of industries acted as worldwide Olympic sponsors for the 2008 Games, while others sponsored individual teams or athletes.
Of the represented industries, three stood out as successes — sportswear, media and food and beverage — in their bids to seize worldwide recognition for their brands to boost sales and profit potential.
Every men’s swimming event was won by an athlete donning the Speedo LZR Racer suit, with 94 percent of all gold medals going to swimmers who wore one.
Speedo International is a unit of privately held Pentland Group, based in London.
Chinese sportswear brand Li Ning also got a boost after its founder lit the flame in the opening ceremony. Shares jumped as much as 13 percent during the Olympic Games.
“Li Ning might well have been the official sponsor for the games, in our opinion,” says Stifel Nicolaus analyst Thomas Shaw.
Audiences returned to watching broadcast TV to view their favorite events, even as Internet downloads of the competition surged.
General Electric (GE), the parent company of NBC, had the exclusive broadcast rights for the 17-day games. The network averaged 27.7 million viewers a night for its prime-time coverage, which was higher than the averages for both the 2004 and 2000 Olympics.
Food and beverage companies, meanwhile, were awarded with strong advertising and marketing relationships, including a Kellogg (K) deal with gold-medalist swimmer Michael Phelps and Coca-Cola’s (KO) unity-themed marketing campaign featuring Chinese basketball star Yao Ming.

source: seattletimes.nwsource.com

The real He Kexin’s age! two gold medal stolen by the cheating Chinese?
There has been a controversy as to He Kexin’s actual age. Her 2008 passport and the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique (FIG) list her date of birth as January 1, 1992, which would make her 16 years, during the 2008 Olympic opening ceremonies and therefore old enough to compete. However, before the 2008 Olympics, He’s age was reported by the Chinese press, including the state news service, Xinhua, as 13 in 2007 and 14 in 2008 in news articles that were later taken off-line. Her birth date has also been given on several registration lists of the General Administration of Sport in China, the Chengdu Sports Bureau and other registration sources as “1994-1-1″ (January 1, 1994), which would make her 14 years old during the Opening ceremonies, and therefore too young to participate in the 2008 Summer Olympics.In addition, in a November 2007 speech in Wuhan, Chinese sporting official Liu Peng introduced He as a 13-year-old.
Chinese officials have denied the allegations, stating in August 2008 that Xinhua had not confirmed He’s age before filing their news reports. He herself, speaking to reporters after the Olympic team final, noted, “my real age is 16. I don’t pay any attention to what everyone says.” On August 2, the International Olympic Committee stated that they would not investigate the discrepancy in He’s reported age, stating that the FIG’s own verification system would be acceptable proof of eligibility. The FIG, in responding to the situation, stated that they would not ask for additional proof of age beyond the passport already supplied by Chinese officials.

How old are you He Kexin?

However, the matter continues to be a source of controversy among members of the gymnastics community and the media. The Times reported that a computer expert “Stryde” working for a New York based firm called the Intrepidus Group was able to access cached pages on the search engine Baidu showing He to be underage after websites concerning the athlete on the search engine Google were blocked.
On August 21, the IOC announced that, in light of the new evidence, they had asked the FIG to reopen the investigation into He and her teammates’ ages. On Friday August 22, 2008, the IOC said they had not uncovered any evidence of wrongdoing “so far” and expressed confidence that the Chinese Federation’s documents were correct. However, the FIG held an emergency meeting about the situation on August 23 and requested additional documentation for every gymnast on the Chinese team, with the sole exception of team captain Cheng Fei. On August 24, a Chinese official addressed the registration lists found online, stating that the discrepancy was due to an administrative error which took place when He was transferred between teams while participating in the InterCity Games in 2007.The FIG has not set any official timeline on closing the investigation, stating on August 23, “this process may take some time, but in due course, the FIG will make a full report of our findings to the International Olympic Committee.” The IOC confirmed on August 28 that the FIG investigation was still active and in progress.

How hacker found proof of He Kexin’s age

In his spare time Mike Walker likes to find things on web servers that were never meant to be found.

On Monday, after curiosity got the better of him, the 33-year-old computer security consultant toiled for hours without success, as he tried to dig up more information about the allegedly under-aged Chinese gymnast He Kexin.
On Tuesday, after redefining the parameters of his Google Hack, he hit the jackpot. Bingo! The mother lode.
On Google’s cache he found evidence of a record of He Kexin’s birth on a spreadsheet belonging to the General Administration of Sport of China – the country peak sports body.
But the data had been removed.
On the Chinese search engine Baidu, he went one better. He found two caches of Excel spreadsheet which had been published on the web and both of them showed He Kexin’s birthday as January 1, 1994.
The cache is the snapshot of web pages crawled by search engine spiders which map the web and database their findings.
The following day on Google’s Chinese search engine, google.com.cn, he found yet more cached spreadsheets from the General Administration of Sport of China also showing the birth date as January 1, 1994.
This would make the tiny gymnast – who won two gold medals at the Olympics – 14 years old. Her Olympic credentials list her birth date as January 1, 1992, which would make her 16.
Regulations that were introduced in 1997 by the world gymnastics federation require gymnasts to turn 16 in the year of the Games to be eligible to compete.
“I spent a large amount (of time) failing (to find anything) and a small amount succeeding,” Walker, who works for the Washington DC-based Intrepidus Group.
“It takes a little bit of faith to believe that you can find something out there and sometimes it pays off.
“I put it on Blogger (a free Google blog service) and went out to dinner and the world came calling.”
As a direct result of Walker’s findings and the resulting press coverage that it sparked, the International Olympic Committee yesterday announced that it had called for a review of the age falsification allegations surrounding China’s dual gold medal-winning gymnast.
“We have asked the gymnastics federation to look into what have been a number of questions and apparent discrepancies on this case. And they’ve been working with the [Chinese] national federation … to have a full clarification on this topic,” IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies told a news conference yesterday.
Late last night, the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) issued a statement saying that it had widened its inquiry into the age falsification claims.
The federation said it had asked the Chinese Gymnastic Association to submit further documents testifying to the birth dates of He Kexin and four fellow gymnasts – Jiang Yuyuan, Li Shanshan, Deng Linlin and Yang Yilin.
“On receipt of these documents, the FIG will forward its conclusions to the International Olympic Committee. It is in the interests of all concerned, not least the athletes themselves, to resolve this issue once and for all,” the statement said.
Walker is still surprised by the reaction to his findings. “It’s become the centre of a maelstrom and international media attention,” he said.
“I never set out to change the course of the Olympics; I set out as I always do, a curious researcher, intent on the search for truth and the knowledge I could acquire along the way,” he said in a blog post.

The governing body of world gymnastics has demanded additional documentary evidence to prove that five gold medal-winning China gymnasts were old enough to compete in the Olympic Games.

The Chinese Gymnastics Association has been asked to supply further evidence to prove the birthdates of Jiang Yuyuan, Li Shanshan, Deng Linlin, Yang Yilin and He Kexin, after more questions emerged over the stated ages of He and Yang.
The five competitors won gold medals in the team gymnastics event, while He became the darling of the host nation after she won gold on the uneven bars and Yang picked up two bronze medals in individual events.
A US computer expert told The Times on Thursday that he had uncovered Chinese government documents proving that He and Yang were only 14. Both appeared to have been registered as two years younger in previous years.
The online documents were the latest pieces of evidence to have emerged in recent months suggesting that the two athletes were two years beneath the minimum age of 16, in a sport where younger gymnasts are thought to have an advantage, being more flexible and thus better able to perform more difficult routines.
In a statement issued last night, the International Gymnastics Federation said that it was demanding additional evidence from the Chinese association “to resolve this issue once and for all”.
The federation did not specify precisely what documents it would require to satisfy itself that the two gymnasts were eligible. However, Lu Shanzan, China’s coach, said that the documents that had now been passed to the federation included He’s present and former passport, her ID card and family residence permit.
Lu said that all of these documents showed her to have been born in 1992 and complained that coaching staff and the girl’s parents were indignant and upset at the investigation. “Surely it’s not possible that these documents are still not sufficient proof of her birth date,” he said. “The passports were issued by the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The identity card was issued by China’s Ministry of Public Security. If these valid documents are not enough to clarify this problem, then what will you believe?”
The investigation has not been reported in the state newspapers. Leading Chinese news websites also failed to cover the story, and yesterday sites running reports of the inquiry appeared to have been closed down. Even the debates of the issue in Internet chat rooms, which raged yesterday morning, disappeared in the afternoon as site-hosting companies moved to censor what could be a sensitive topic.
Some web commentators blamed the Americans for the inquiry and called for a retaliatory investigation of Michael Phelps, the US swimmer, who won eight gold medals at the Water Cube. Others were not surprised by the controversy. One wrote: “They will certainly now say that reports that she was 13 in 2007 were incorrect – so that she keeps her gold medal” – an apparent reference to a theory that He might previously have registered as younger than she was, in order to compete in a Chinese competition.
“Plank of Wood” commented: “Changing one’s age in China, especially in the past, is very common. When I was at school I changed my age to get into the class I wanted. Later I changed it back.” All of these comments had vanished from the web by the afternoon.
The latter point was repeated by a former Chinese sportsman yesterday. He told The Times that in his youth he had once changed his age to participate in competition with younger players. “It used to be very common, but it is getting less and less so,” he said.

How would you strip athlete of a medal?
Under statute of limitations rules, the IOC and other sports bodies can go back eight years to request the return of medals and nullify competition results. This means that even if the He Kexin case becomes a protracted affair, as is likely, the Committee has until 2016 to decide if it wishes to act on the findings of the investigation by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique.
However, once a decision has been reached, action is usually swift. When last year Marion Jones, the American five-time 2000 Olympic champion, admitted using steroids, she was officially stripped of her medals within weeks.
Given that the IOC is based in Lausanne, on the banks of Lake Geneva in Switzerland, the usual method of return once the Games have ended is by postal courier. Two athletes have handed their medals straight back in Beijing – Ara Abrahamian, the bronze-medal winning Greco-Roman wrestler from Sweden, and Jong Su Kim, the North Korean shooter who won bronze and silver.
After disqualification, standings are normally readjusted, with the second-place finisher moving up to gold, third to silver and fourth to bronze.

Michael Phelps 100M Butterfly Victory!!!
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