Some Interesting and emotional Olympic stories - no trolling please

[Sashan]

Harrison grabs first U.S. Olympic judo gold


Kayla Harrison says she almost quit judo because of sexual abuse by a coach. Instead, she’s now the first American to win Olympic gold in the sport.

Harrison, 22, won the women’s under-78-kilogram division in London on Thursday, beating the United Kingdom’s Gemma Gibbons in the finals of a 21-woman tournament.

Harrison, a Middletown, Ohio, native training in Massachusetts, became the United States’ only Olympic champion in the sport – woman or man. Ranked No. 4 in the world, she had upset top-ranked Brazilian Mayra Aguiar in the semifinals.

She started judo at roughly age 7. But to get to this point, she has said, she needed to overcome sexual abuse – starting at age 13 – by the person who was then coaching her.

“When I was 16, I told a close friend of mine, who immediately told my mother, and she immediately went to the police and pressed charges. The FBI got involved, and he’s actually serving 10 years … in prison,” Harrison told CNN’s Ashleigh Banfield on July 9, weeks before the Olympics began.

“Every day was a lie. Inside, I was in constant turmoil, but on the outside I was supposed to be this golden girl and so happy,” Harrison said.

Harrison said she almost dropped judo because of the abuse. She said that it was not only “hard to deal with to be normal, but also to compete in the sport.”

But she decided to stick with judo, going on to win gold at the 2008 Junior World Championships and the 2010 World Championships.

“You get to the point where you decide that you don’t want to be a victim anymore and that you’re not going to live your life like that,” she said.


Harrison grabs first U.S. Olympic judo gold – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs

 

[Raja.Pakistani]

there are already many topic about Olympics here..why dont post it there?

 

[Sashan]

'Eric the Eel' dreams of Olympic return

(CNN) -- The English commentator veered from disbelief to anger and then, finally, to mirth.
There had been two other swimmers to compete with -- one from Niger, the other from Tajikistan -- but both had jumped the gun, dived in to the pool and been disqualified.
The crowd cheered, the gun fired and the 22-year-old dived in.
Suddenly he was on his own.
What followed was one of the most memorable two minutes in Olympic history, one that would embody something far away from the podiums that honor the motto of the modern Games: "Faster, higher, stronger."
During the first 50 meters Moussambani appeared to be holding his own, but by the turn things had gone very wrong. At one point he appeared to stop, treading water to catch his breath before continuing.
"This guy," remarked the commentator for British TV, who was none other than Adrian Moorhouse, gold medalist in the same discipline at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, "he's not going to make it ... I'm convinced this guy is going to have to get hold of the rope in a minute."
'Me against the swimming pool'
Looking back today, Eric Moussambani is hard pressed to disagree with him.
"It was me against the swimming pool," he recalls with a laugh.
"I didn't care about anything else, I just wanted to finish the race ... When I went to Australia that was the first time I had seen an Olympic swimming pool. I was scared of the dimensions."
Somehow he managed to crawl to the end, posting a time of one minute 52.72 seconds. The man who would eventually win gold in the event, Pieter van den Hoogenband of the Netherlands, would finish the final in 48.30 seconds,
His swim made him an instant star of the Sydney Olympics -- dubbed "Eric the Eel" by the world's media -- and lampooned around the world for posting the worst time in the history of the sport. But it also reminded the world that there's far more to the Olympic spirit than just victory.
A voice on the radio
Moussambani didn't start out as a swimmer. Growing up in Malabo, the capital of Equatorial Guinea, he excelled at soccer and basketball. But one day, three months before the start of the Sydney Olympics, he heard an advert on the radio with an intriguing offer.
"I heard on the radio that they (the Equatorial Guinea National Olympic Committee) needed swimmers, so I went and put my name down," he recalls.

He may not have wanted to be an Olympic swimmer but, having practiced in a local river, Moussambani decided to give it a shot. When he arrived at the hotel in Malabo where the trial was to take place, he soon discovered that the competition was nonexistent.


"We were called for the selection, and I was the only person who was there!" he says.
"So nobody came. For two hours we were waiting. I was the only one. That was in the only hotel that had a pool, a 12-meter swimming pool. They told me to get in and asked if I could swim."After proving that he could swim, Moussambani was told that he would be heading to Sydney after securing a place on the Equatorial Guinea Olympic team, a place that had been gifted by the International Olympic Committee's wildcard system that gave less developed nations a chance to send athletes to the Games to gain experience.
"They just told me to get my passport and a picture ready so they could send me to the Olympics. They said to me, 'Keep on training.' I asked them, 'With who? I don't have a trainer.' They said: 'Do what you can. Keep training because you are going to the Olympics.' "
Preparations were tough for Moussambani. There was no Olympic-sized pool in Equatorial Guinea and the hotel pool was only of limited use. Still, he left for Australia for the first time knowing that, if nothing else, it would be an adventure.
"The Olympic Games was something unknown for me," he says.
"I was just happy that I was going to travel abroad and represent my country. It was new for me. It was very far from Africa."
The terror of the pool
It wasn't until he turned up for training on the first day that he saw an Olympic-sized swimming pool for the first time. Reality quickly dawned on him.
"When I arrived I just went to the swimming pool to see how it is. I was very surprised, I did not imagine that it would be so big," he says.


"My training schedule there was with the American swimmers. I was going to the pool and watching them, how they trained and how they dived because I didn't have any idea. I copied them. I had to know how to dive, how to move my legs, how to move my hands.
"I learned everything in Sydney. I didn't know how to dive, anything. While they (the U.S. swim team) were training I was watching them. I was alone. I didn't have a coach."
When the day of the race arrived, Moussambani sat in his seat with his goggles on, going through everything he had learned from the American swimmers.
"I was just thinking, 'Do whatever you think you can do.' I was thinking how the American swimmers were training," he explains. But when his two competitors were disqualified for two false starts, Moussambani suddenly felt very alone.
"At first I was thinking that I was the one who was disqualified!" he laughs.
"They told me I was the only one that was going to swim, so I was very nervous. Everybody was screaming: 'Go go go!' "
Out on a limb
Most athletes can only a recall a blur of memories when remembering their time at the Olympics, but Moussambani remembers every second of that race: the pain, the fear, the exhaustion and finally the relief.
"The first 50 meters I did very well. I did it with a lot of energy. When I was coming back to complete the 100 meters I was exhausted. If you watch the video, I couldn't feel my legs. I was feeling like I wasn't going to go any further. I was moving in just one place.
"The crowd was singing, 'Go go go go!' So I did my best to complete it. But once I completed it I was exhausted. I thought, 'Phew, my god!' All my muscles were tired. So when I went in to the changing room I just collapsed on the floor and lay there. I couldn't even breathe."

The anti-hero


It is unlikely that any swimmer will ever get close to Moussambani's time, which is more than a minute slower than the women's 100m record and not even as quick as the best men's 200m effort. But once he picked himself up off the changing room floor he had become a worldwide celebrity.
"The media attention was, phew..." he remembers.
"Everyone in the media was asking about me. Oh, where's Eric the Eel? I didn't know how to speak English back then. People were saying I was a star. But I didn't know what to do. A lot of people were making fun of me, others were congratulating me.
"But what they didn't understand was that it was my first time in a swimming pool. People were making fun of me. But some said you are a good example of the Olympic spirit."
While most people saw the true values of the Olympic movement in Moussambani's Quixotic swim at Sydney -- heart, determination, a never-say-die spirit -- his performance sparked much hand-wringing elsewhere. Elite athletes were offended that more talented swimmers were denied a place at the Olympics to accommodate developmental athletes.
As Moorhouse said in a later interview: "It was quite a defining moment for the Olympic Games as to whether that level of performance should be in Olympic competition."
The end of Eric the Eel?
Sure enough the International Olympic Committee tightened up the rules on wildcard entries to prevent other "Eric the Eels" from turning up. But they still slip through the net. Only this week Hamadou Djibo Issaka, a rower from Niger, was hailed as the "new Eric the Eel" after finishing 100 seconds behind his nearest rival in the men's single sculls repechage.
Britain's five-time Olympic gold medalist Steve Redgrave criticized the decision to allow Issaka to compete. "There are better scullers from different countries who are not allowed to compete because of the different countries you've got," he said.
Yet it was Issaka, and not the winner, who was roared across the finishing line. Likewise with Moussambani. Few outside of the swimming world will remember Sydney champion Van den Hoogenband, but "Eric the Eel" has become an Olympic euphemism. "They even took my trunks to display in an Olympic museum in Sydney," he happily boasts.
An outside bet for Rio 2016?
But if swimming development was a key aim of the IOC's decision to give Equatorial Guinea a wildcard at the Sydney Games, then the move can be seen as a roaring success.
After the cameras left, Moussambani continued to swim. His last competition was the World Championships in Japan in 2002 and his times have steadily improved. And although he didn't make it to Athens four years later, nor Beijing, he is now the national swimming coach of Equatorial Guinea and hopes to still have one last shot at next Olympics in Rio in 2016 before he retires.
"My last time was 55 seconds, that was only last year," the 34-year-old explains hopefully.
"Right now I'm the coach of the country but I've asked my Olympic federation if I can swim at the next Olympics.
"I still have a dream. I want to show people that my times have improved, that we have swimming pools in my country now and that I can now swim a hundred meters."


'Eric the Eel' dreams of Olympic return - CNN.com




Blind archer posts first world record of London Olympics


(CNN) -- The first world records of the London 2012 Olympics have been set by a blind South Korean archer -- hours before Friday's much-anticipated opening ceremony was due to begin.

Im Dong Hyun is legally classified as blind and cannot see out of his right eye, but it did not stop the two-time gold medalist bettering his own leading 72-arrow score in the qualification competition at Lord's cricket ground in the British capital.


The 26-year-old, who struggles to read a newspaper, scored 699, which put him top of the standings ahead of compatriots Kim Bubmin and Oh Jin Hyek.

The efforts of the trio also delivered a second world record, as South Korea registered a landmark combined total of 2,087 for the team event -- a discipline the Asian nation has won gold in at the last two Games.


The event at the home of English cricket was held behind closed doors, but it did not stop fans queuing in an attempt to gain entry to the stadium.

"Tickets have not been advertised or sold by (Olympic organizers) LOCOG for the archery ranking event," read a statement from the venue. We have always made it clear that the preliminary rounds are not open for spectators.

"There are a number of unofficial websites claiming to sell tickets, we therefore advise people to be extremely cautious and vigilant when attempting to buy tickets and only purchase from an official source."

A non-ticketed event that people can attend is the cycling road race, which is a 250-kilometer trek from Box Hill in the English county of Surrey to the Buckingham Palace in the heart of London.

Spectators will be able to line certain areas of the route free of charge to cheer on British hopefuls such as Tour de France winner Bradley Wiggins and sprint star Mark Cavendish in Saturday's men's race, while the women compete on Sunday.



Blind archer posts first world record of London Olympics - CNN.com

there are already many topic about Olympics here..why dont post it there?

Notice that this thread is not about winning or losing. Let me know of similar thread and I will request mods to merge it there.

 

[Sashan]

Olympic swimming: The amazing adventures of the USA's Anthony Ervin

Ricky Berens has raced for the final time. Berens, who is 24 years old, won gold in the 4x200m freestyle relay on Tuesday night and now he has had enough. "I'm done," he told the press, explaining that has not had more than two weeks off since he was in high school. It is not unusual. Swimmers tend to retire early – Michael Phelps will retire soon and he is only 27. Berens, like Phelps, wants to find out what the world is like when you do not spend five hours a day ploughing up and down a pool, six days a week. Berens's first stop? McDonalds, where he took down a Big Mac, a quarter pounder and a portion of fries. After that, he wants take a masters in sports management.

Well, that is one way of doing it. There are other paths too, like the one taken by Berens's USA team-mate Anthony Ervin. You may remember Ervin. He won gold in the 50m freestyle back in Sydney in 2000, tying in a dead heat with the great Gary Hall Jr. Ervin was only 19 at the time. The next year he won the sprint double at the World Championships in Fukuoka. It was not long after that he decided he wanted to see a little more of what life had to offer. "When you strive for something and do well, it's always going to be a double-edged sword," Ervin explained. "You reach your goals but you get cut in the process." He did one more major competition – the Pan Pacific Swimming Championships in 2002 – and then he dropped out, from stardom, from sport and from Berkeley, where he had a swimming scholarship.

Pretty much the first thing he did was sell his Olympic gold medal on eBay, for $17,101. He gave the money to Unicef. "In order to kind of cleanse myself," he told The Star Tribune, "I wanted to do something I thought would help, to kind of give myself away."
In the next eight years, Ervin grew some dreadlocks, played lead guitar in a heavy metal band called Weapons of Mass Destruction, took a job in a record shop, and another in a tattoo parlour, became an alcoholic, experimented with hallucinogens, fractured his shoulder on a motorcycle while he was trying to escape from the police, tried to kill himself with a tranquilliser overdose, spent time studying Sufism became a committed Buddhist and, finally, went back to Berkeley to complete a degree in English.

Now, twelve years on, he has come full circle. At the age of 31 he is back for his second Olympics, swimming in his favourite event, the 50m freestyle. He will be in the final on Friday night, having been third-fastest in the semi-final. Afterwards, he bounded up to the press in the mixed zone, his hair a messy tangle of curls, his eyes bright with excitement behind a pair of clear Ray-Ban sunglasses, his arms swathed in long, swirling, dragon tattoos.

So how does it feel to be back, Anthony? "You know," he said. "Twelve years was a long time ago. It may be the same kind of venue and I may be working with the same kind of institution but I have grown a lot over the last 12 years. The difference between then and now? I don't even know, it is hard to explain."

Ervin, it would be fair to say, took a unorthodox route to these Olympics. But then he always was a little different. His parents enrolled him in a swimming class because, he told Rolling Stone recently, "I was a little ****. A troublemaker, disobedient, no discipline." He started winning races but he hated it. He was always running away from home trying to duck out of lessons and training sessions. Soon enough he was diagnosed with Tourette syndrome and started taking heavy tranquillisers. It did not slow him down. By his senior year he was ranked second in the USA for his age group, which is how he got that scholarship. He even turned it to his advantage, playing around with his dosages, trying to make himself as aggressive as possible because he thought it would give him an edge in the pool.

After his gold medals in 2000 and 2001, things began to fall apart. He started drinking more, taking more recreational drugs. He once woke up in jail with no idea how he got there. A succession of one night stands meant that he began to see women as "objects to destroy at will," he told Rolling Stone. "There were so many phases of casual sex, which now seems repugnant." Depression struck deep. Soon after he tried to take an overdose and "woke up the next morning only to find I had failed to even kill myself." After that, he remembers thinking: "If I can't destroy myself, maybe I can't be destroyed." He began to collect tattoos because "after being forced to constantly abuse my body with labour ... I was also reclaiming my body with the tattoos. I was giving myself a new skin. I wanted to re-create myself."

Soon after, stony broke, Ervin took a job at a swimming school set up by a friend of his. There, among kids who did not take things too seriously, he began to rediscover his love for the sport and straighten himself out. "My real bane was smoking pot and cigarettes," he says. "It's really been my Kryptonite." Buddhism helped him too. He had grown sick with other people's attempts to put labels on him. Ervin is half black, half Jewish and he found himself labelled as the "first swimmer of African-American descent to make the US team". He hated it, "I didn't know a thing about what it was like to be part of the black experience," Ervin says. "But now I do. It's like winning gold and having a bunch of old white people ask you what it's like to be black. That is my black experience."

Ervin re-enrolled at Berkeley in 2007. He was still struggling with depression and he started training seriously again in 2010 in an attempt to cure another attack of it. The university swimming coach, Teri McKeever, told him she would take him back on the program if he enlisted in the U.S Anti-Doping Agency's drug testing program. He did and soon his times were good enough to put him in contention for a spot on the US team. And at the US trials this summer, he finished second in the 50m freestyle, in a new personal best of 21.60sec. These days he says the pool is a sanctuary for him, when "for most of my youth. It was a prison."



Olympic swimming: The amazing adventures of the USA's Anthony Ervin | Andy Bull | Sport | guardian.co.uk




Wladimir Klitschko Sold His Olympic Gold Medal; So He Could Help Others He Cares About


By James Slater: It’s been written and its been said a number of times how the educated, talented, generous and ultra-professional Klitschko brothers are great, great role models. The two big men never attract negative headlines and neither sibling ever seems to put a foot wrong. Even those fans who say they do not care too much for their somewhat cautious fighting style (Wladimir especially labelled safety-first by some fans) agree that Wladimir and Vitali are fine ambassadors for the oft-controversial sport they represent.

And, in a recent interview with CNN, Ring Magazine, WBA, IBF, WBO heavyweight king Wladimir spoke about a selfless act he committed earlier this year; one that will lead yet more people to say how great a guy the 36-year-old is: “Dr. Steel Hammer” sold one of his most prized possessions - his Olympic gold medal. Why? So he could raise funds to help children.

The highest achievement for any athlete is representing their country at the Olympics and winning the gold medal. Wladimir achieved this at the L.A games in 1996 when aged just 20, yet earlier this year he sold the gold he fought so hard to win for $1 million; the money a boost to the funds of he and his brother’s Foundation.

“I did sell the medal in March and 100-precent of the funds, which is $1 million, went to The Klitschko Brothers Foundation,” Wladimir told CNN this week. “We care about education and sport, that is the key in any child’s life. If they have knowledge they can succeed with that in their adult life and sport gives them rules - how to respect your opponent, how to respect the rules.

“It is always in life like that, you go down but you have to get up, and sport gives you this great lesson.”

Name another Olympian who would part with their prized possession in the name of charity! What Klitschko did must have been hard (and I wonder who now owns the medal Wladimir had to sweat and bleed for) and he must be commended for his charity - after all, he will never get the opportunity to win another Olympic medal in his entire life.

Klitschko doesn’t look like parting with his treasured pro titles any tome soon, though. Looking about as unbeatable as any active fighter this side of the soon to be released from prison Floyd Mayweather Junior, the younger of the two Klitschkos hasn’t even been tested in his recent fights. Already, Wladimir is looking forward to his next defence; having seen off mandatory challenger Tony Thompson with apparent ease just a few weeks ago.

“I’m a seasoned fighter and that means I have to stay busy, so I fought twice this year (defeating Jean Marc Mormeck and Thompson) and by the end of the year - November, December - I’m going to defend my titles again,” Klitschko said.

The 58-3(51) king who has not tasted defeat since way back in April of 2004, said he does not yet know who he will fight at year end, but there are a number of possibilities. Chris Arreola is said to be in the frame, as is Seth Mitchell (if he feels ready this year, probably not) and Tyson Fury, another young up and comer. There is also soon to be an IBF elimination tourney that will hopefully provide a suitable challenger for Wlad. But that won’t happen until next year.

Arreola looks like the best available challenger right now, although some fans say they would like to see the unbeaten Alexander Povetkin rise to the massive challenge. Wladimir can pretty much pick whoever he wants, however - nobody looks close to capable of beating him and taking his titles. Maybe Wladimir will retire as champ and then just hand over his many belts?


Wladimir Klitschko Sold His Olympic Gold Medal; So He Could Help Others He Cares About

 

[Sashan]

Pistorius Advances to 400-Meter Semifinals

LONDON — Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee runner from South Africa whose athletic achievements have stirred an international debate over the distinction between disabled and able-bodied athletes, made Olympic history on Saturday morning when he became the first amputee to compete in track at the Games.

Oscar Pistorius
South Africa, Track and Field.
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Running in a preliminary heat for the men’s 400 meters at the Olympic Stadium, with nearly 80,000 fans cheering for him, Pistorius finished second, in 45.44 seconds, and advanced to the semifinals.

Trailing only Luguelin Santos of the Dominican Republic in the final 50 meters, Pistorius slowed as he neared the finish line, knowing he had done enough to qualify for Sunday’s semifinals, scheduled for 8:40 p.m. in London. Santos was first in the five-man heat, in 45.04.

Since Pistorius emerged several years ago as a world-class runner, questions have been raised about whether his J-shaped, carbon-fiber prosthetic blades give him an unfair advantage. Track and field’s world governing body, known by the acronym I.A.A.F., challenged his eligibility at one point and ruled that he could not compete against able-bodied athletes. That decision was overturned by an appeals court.

Pistorius’s status for the London Games was uncertain until a month ago because he had failed to meet South Africa’s Olympic qualifying standard, which is more strict than that of many countries. But his country’s Olympic committee ultimately deemed him worthy of a spot on the team for the individual 400 meters and the 4x400-meter relay. He is considered a long shot to win a medal in either event.

Other disabled athletes have competed at the Olympics, including Natalie Du Toit of South Africa, a swimmer whose left leg was amputated above the knee. She finished 16th in the open-water swimming event at the 2008 Beijing Games. In her case, unlike Pistorius’s, there was no suggestion that she had a competitive advantage.

Pistorius, 25, was born without fibulas and had his lower legs amputated when he was 11 months old. He runs on carbon-fiber blades known as Cheetahs.

In 2007, the International Association of Athletics Federations, the world governing body, spent more than $50,000 on a research project that examined Pistorius’s performance on the blades, in an attempt to determine whether he should be allowed to compete against able-bodied athletes.

In 2008, the track federation declared Pistorius ineligible, citing advantages derived from his “bouncing” movement and his need for less oxygen and fewer calories than able-bodied athletes running at the same speed.

Pistorius challenged the ruling, appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, in Lausanne, Switzerland. The court voted unanimously to reverse the I.A.A.F. decision and criticized the group for its handling of the case.

Some scientists are not convinced that Pistorius’s current J-shaped blades don’t give him an advantage. One argument is that because the blades are so much lighter than a human leg, Pistorius can turn over, or reposition, his prosthetic legs unnaturally fast.

Since he was cleared to run against able-bodied athletes by the court in May 2008, Pistorius made it his mission to compete in the Olympics and Paralympics in the same year. He failed to qualify for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, but won three golds at the Paralympics in Beijing — to add to the gold and bronze he won at the 2004 Paralympics in Athens. He has qualified for the London Paralympics in the 100, 200, 400 and 4x100 relay with his times at last year’s world championships.

The 400 final is Monday. The preliminary heats for the 4x400 relay are Aug. 9, and the final is Aug. 10. Pistorius plans to compete in four Paralympic events, too. The Paralympic Games open here on Aug. 29.


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/05/s...advances-to-400-meter-semifinals.html?_r=1&hp

 

[Sashan]

US Olympic gold medal winner Gabby Douglas's mother facing bankruptcy


Court records show that the mother of the Olympic gold medal winning gymnast Gabby Douglas filed for bankruptcy earlier this year in Virginia.

The filing was first reported by TMZ, a day after it was revealed that the parents of her fellow US Olympian Ryan Lochte were facing foreclosure in Florida.

Documents filed in January in Virginia show Douglas' mother, Natalie Hawkins, filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy, which allows people to reorganise their finances and pay down debt over several years.

Douglas has been one of the most popular athletes at the Olympics in London, becoming the first African-American woman to win an all-around gold medal in gymnastics. The 1.5m (4ft 11in) 16-year-old has taken home two gold medals so far and has become an international superstar, winning over fans with her smile and the nickname "Flying Squirrel."

The gymnast's agent has fielded hundreds of emails from businesses, talk shows and magazines interested in Douglas, and she's already slated to appear on the cover of a Corn Flakes box. She stands to earn millions of dollars from endorsement deals and other ventures. Douglas has been training for two years in Iowa and hasn't been home to Virginia Beach since then.

The bankruptcy filings list Hawkins as having assets totalling $163,706 (£105,186), with a townhouse in Virginia Beach and a 2007 Nissan Maxima accounting for the bulk of it. Other possessions include miscellaneous books and clothing valued at $600 (£385).

Hawkins also lists roughly $80,000 (£51,396) in debts. The bulk of that is from her mortgage. Other debts include: a $4,300 (£2,762) student loan, about $1,800 (£1,156) in credit card purchases and a $400 (£257) medical bill. Hawkins is separated from her husband and lists about $2,500 (£1,606) in income per month, which comes from Social Security disability benefits and child support, according to the documents. Douglas also has three older siblings.

An order issued in March says Hawkins is to pay $400 a month toward her debts over a nearly five-year period. Her attorney declined to comment on Sunday in an email.

The bankruptcy filing was the latest report of financial woes associated with an Olympian. CitiMortgage is suing to foreclose on the Florida home owned by Ryan Lochte's divorced parents, Ileana and Steven. Both have been in London to cheer on their son, who has won two gold medals of his own.


US Olympic gold medal winner Gabby Douglas's mother facing bankruptcy | Sport | guardian.co.uk

 

[T90TankGuy]

there are already many topic about Olympics here..why dont post it there?

what is your problem ? its in the members section .

@ op NICE ARTICLE MAN .

 

[Sashan]

- Picture from Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/...-poland-one-armed-table-tennis_n_1723586.html)


Table tennis player shrugs off disability


By MICHELLE KAUFMAN

McClatchy Newspapers


LONDON -- The Olympic track and field competition got underway Friday, and one of the most talked-about stories will be the tale of Oscar "The Blade Runner" Pistorius, the South African double-amputee who is racing at 400 meters with the aid of prosthetic legs. What most people don't realize is that Pistorius is not the only disabled Olympian at these Games.
There is another.

Far away from the glare of television cameras, at the ExCel table tennis hall Friday morning, was the equally compelling but lesser-known Natalia Partyka, a one-armed table tennis player from Poland. She was born without a right hand or forearm, and is competing in her second able-bodied Olympics after winning gold medals in the 2004 and 2008 Paralympics. She will also compete in the London Paralympics.

With four matches going on simultaneously, and the dizzying speed of the game at the world-class level, it would have been easy upon first glance to overlook the fact that Partyka is missing half her arm. It is most noticeable when she serves. She cannot toss the ball with her off hand, so she cradles it in the crook of her right elbow and drops it onto the swinging paddle. Once the ball is in play, Partyka, 23, is as quick and graceful as anyone out there.

She reached the third round of the singles competition last week before losing to a Dutch player. On Friday, she played in the team competition against Singapore. Poland lost the match 3-1 (2-3, 3-0, 3-0, 3-0), but Partyka won a lot of hearts in the audience. The Polish fans in the building already knew Partyka, as she is very well-known back home. She received the Order of Polonia Restituta, one of the nation's highest honors. Those who didn't know her now do.

She shrugs off the disability, calling it "nothing" when reporters ask. "I am playing the same lines as the others. And I have the same dreams and goals. It is not an issue. My coaches expect the same from me as from everyone else."

She admits it can get tiresome being asked about her missing hand, but she smiles and politely answers every time the topic comes up. She hopes the publicity can serve as an inspiration to others. After her opening-round singles matches here, she received fan letters from India, the United States and all over Europe. Many were from disabled kids and parents of disabled children, thanking her for being a good role model.

"I can show people that nothing is impossible," Partyka said. "Maybe being disabled makes things more difficult than for able-bodied people, and maybe we have to work a little harder. But we can do anything we want to do if we just try. Maybe someone will see me and realize their own disability is not the end of the world, that they can achieve bigger dreams than they imagined."

Partyka began playing table tennis at age 7 out of a burning desire to beat her older sister, Sandra. She followed Sandra to the neighborhood table tennis hall in their seaside hometown of Gdansk, and began taking lessons. Four years later, she beat Sandra for the first time.

"One of the most beautiful days of my life, the first time I beat my sister," she said Friday.

At 11 years old, she qualified for the 2000 Paralympics in Sydney, and was the youngest athlete to compete in any sport. She didn't win, but was inspired to keep training for the 2004 Games in Athens, where she won a gold medal at age 15. Four years ago, in Beijing, she competed in the able-bodied Olympics and won a gold medal in the Paralympics.

Partyka is widely admired among her competitors worldwide.

"I remember the first time I saw Natalia was four years ago, at the Jr. World Championships in Stanford (Calif.), and I was amazed at how good she was," said U.S. player Lily Zhang after the Americans lost 3-0 to Japan Friday. "She is such an inspiration to all of us. She doesn't let her disability slow her down."

Ariel Hsing, also of the U.S. team, added: "Natalia is absolutely amazing. I really admire her and respect her. She is so brave for putting herself out there and playing with the best in the world. I don't think she knows me, but I definitely know her."

Her Polish teammates said Partyka has made the sport more popular in their country.

"Because of Natalia's story, the television and media are paying attention to table tennis now," Katarzyna Grzybowska said. "They take notice in our big tournaments and our results and we get a lot of fans at our competitions. Everybody supports her and wants to see her play. But she personally never makes a big deal of it. She hasn't had a hand her whole life, so she's used to it. And we're all used to it, too. When I play against her in practice, I don't even notice."

Partyka has been particularly interested in the Pistorius story because she can relate on some level.

"It's different because he has no legs, but he is a Paralympian competing in the able-bodied Olympics like me, so that we have in common," she said. "I think both of us can make a difference, especially with disabled people, to prove we can be top-level athletes and compete against the best. There is no need to feel inferior."


Read more here: LONDON: Table tennis player shrugs off disability - Other Sports - MiamiHerald.com

 

[Sashan]

Guor Marial: An Olympian without a country

LONDON (Reuters) - South Sudan marathon runner Guor Marial will officially compete under the Olympic flag at the London 2012 Games but deep down he will represent his new nation and its long-suffering refugees, he told Reuters.
Marial, 28, who has lived in the United States since he was 16 having fled Sudan during the long civil war, could not join the U.S. team as he does not have citizenship.


South Sudan, the world's newest country which was recognized only last year, has not yet established a national Olympic Committee and so was not able to send a team to the Games.

Olympic chiefs had suggested Marial run for Sudan but he refused, saying it would be a betrayal of his country, his family and all those who died in the war that lasted decades until a peace deal was signed in 2005.

Marial lost 28 family members during the conflict and was kidnapped twice.

"I will be wearing the Olympic uniform, but inside I will be holding the South Sudan flag in my heart, and the people of South Sudan and the refugees," he said in a telephone interview before he flew to London.

"These are the people I will be representing at the Olympics."

Marial, who arrived in England on Friday, only learnt a fortnight ago that he could compete as an independent athlete, one of four at this year's Olympics.

"I'm very excited and very happy that South Sudan got independence and within one year has got to where it has. And I'm very grateful that the name of South Sudan is coming to the Olympics," he added over the phone.

"It's great to see a lot of people out here, being moved by my story, my case. I love the support and I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of support here," said Marial on arrival at London's Heathrow Airport on Friday.

Marial achieved the Olympic qualification time in October last year and improved his personal best in San Diego, California last month, finishing in two hours 12 minutes 55 seconds.

The world record is over nine minutes faster so Marial is a long shot for a medal, he is targeting a top 15-20 finish in the August 12 marathon, but the fact he is even here is his biggest achievement.

NIGHTTIME ATTACK

Marial was born at the start of the war, which claimed almost all his siblings. The second time he was kidnapped he was forced to work for a year as an unpaid servant for a Sudanese soldier's family.

He fled Sudan at 14 following a night-time attack by Sudanese soldiers on his aunt and uncle's home in Khartoum where he was staying. Marial was knocked unconscious when a soldier smashed his jaw with a rifle.


He initially fled to Egypt and was then accepted as a refugee by the U.S. where his talent for running was spotted by his teachers. He is a chemistry graduate and works with people with mental disabilities when not training.

Marial, who now lives in Flagstaff, Arizona, has not seen his parents since 1993. He said they live in a remote village in South Sudan with no electricity or telephone.
He hopes someone will be able to take them to a nearby town so they can watch him compete on television.

South Sudan gained independence last July after the peace deal seven years ago ended the war between the mostly Christian south and Arab north.

Tensions remain high following clashes in contested borderlands and rows over oil payments. Sudan and South Sudan came close to all-out war in April, the worst violence since South Sudan seceded and declared its independence.

"South Sudan may not be able to raise the flag at the Olympics, but I consider myself as symbolic of the flag of South Sudan being raised in the Olympics," said Marial.

Marial is not the only refugee from Sudan to be competing in the Games. Chicago Bulls player Luol Deng, who grew up in London after fleeing the war-torn African nation, has been playing for Britain's basketball team.

Lopez Lomong, who has U.S. citizenship, is competing in the men's 5000 meters.

Marial joins 400 meters runner Liemarvin Bonevacia, judoka Reginald de Windt and sailor Philipine van Aanholt, all from the former Netherlands Antilles, to compete under the Olympic flag.

(Additional reporting by Tom Bartlett, Writing by Tom Pilcher, Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Ed Osmond)


Guor Marial: An Olympian without a country - Los Angeles Times

 

[KRAIT]

Nic posts buddy.....PM any mod if you find anyone trolling. I am with you. Keep posting such threads.

 

[Sashan]

Nic posts buddy.....PM any mod if you find anyone trolling. I am with you. Keep posting such threads.

Mate - Thanks for the support. I don't believe anyone is going to troll with the kind of stories I post.

 

[Sashan]

Lopez Lomong: From war child to U.S. Olympics star


(CNN) -- From escaping bullets in South Sudan as a young boy to becoming a track and field Olympics star, U.S. athlete Lopez Lomong has been running and defying odds

nearly all of his life.

Lomong, who carried the American flag into the 2008 Olympic Opening Ceremony in Beijing, was among the thousands of refugees known as "The Lost Boys," victims of

Sudan's long and brutal civil war.

At the age of six, Lomong, who is competing for a medal in the 5,000-meter race at the London Games on Wednesday, was separated from his family when he was kidnapped

by soldiers during a Sunday morning mass in his native country. Lomong was taken along with several other children to a prison where they would be trained to become child soldiers.

"I saw kids dying every day and I would say, 'OK, maybe next time it's going to be me,'" remembers Lomong, 27. "That basically changed my life and from that moment I'm no longer six years old -- I became an adult."

But a few weeks later Lomong managed to escape from the prison camp with the help of three older abducted children. Barefoot but determined, Lomong and his friends

went a through a hole in the prison fence and started running as fast as they could, in what Lomong describes as their "race to freedom."

After running for three days and nights the boys finally reached Kenya, where Lomong spent the next 10 years of his life in a refugee camp.


In 2001, Lomong's remarkable life journey took another turn. Aged 16, he was among the nearly 4,000 "Lost Boys" who were resettled in various cities across the United States as part of a U.N. and U.S. government program.


He was adopted by a family in Tully, a small town in upstate New York, where he went to high school and first started thinking of running as a career.

He became a U.S. citizen in July 2007 and one year later he made the national Olympics team, taking part in the 1,500-meter race in Beijing. Lomong didn't make it to the finals but was honored by his fellow athletes who selected him as the as flag bearer for Team USA.

"That is the most incredible thing I take away from the Olympics," he says. "It's not only track and field. There are swimmers; there are wrestlers; there is everybody united and we are all walking together to bring as many medals to our country. Those are the things that I will never forget -- I was very excited to be part of that and carry America's flag into the opening ceremony."


This week, he returns to the Olympics for the second time. This time his goal is to achieve Olympic glory.

"I want to go back to do what I didn't do in 2008," says Lomong, a graduate of Northern Arizona University. "I want to win the medal. Yes, I was a flag bearer in 2008;

I don't want to be a flag bearer anymore, I want to bring the medal back home."


Determined to win a medal for his adopted country, Lomong is also focused on making a difference in South Sudan. He has established a foundation in his name to help people in his native country, focusing on four pressing issues.

"We need to be able to go back and give these people education, clean water, nutrition, medicine," says Lomong, who also reunited with his family in South Sudan in 2007. "To live, to see another day, to think there is someone out there in the world caring for them so they can be able to pursue their dream."

Lomong has also written a book, called "Running for My Life: One Lost Boy's Journey from the Killing Fields of Sudan to the Olympic Games," where he narrates his long and epic life journey.


He wants to share his inspiring story with the world so that people know where he comes from and understand why he is running.

"I want to be the one telling that story to the people who never had a voice before because there are a lot of kids out there right now that are still going through the things I went through. They are still getting kidnapped. They are still going hungry for days, they don't have families," he says.

"We need to be able to tell the world to stop those things and let's educate kids instead of giving them AK-47s to go to fight. Let the kids go and play [and] do anything they need to do to be able to see their future."


Lopez Lomong: From war child to U.S. Olympics star - CNN.com

 

[Sashan]

London 2012 hurdles: China’s Liu Xiang shows ‘true Olympic spirit’

LONDON — Among a group of Chinese journalists at the moment Liu Xiang’s extended left heel knocked over the first hurdle Tuesday morning, the collective intake of breath and exhalation of a mournful “Ohhh!” were all but simultaneous.
He sat on the track of the London Olympic Stadium then, as the race clattered away from him, and it was impossible not to think of Canada’s Perdita Felicien sitting in a similar spot in Athens — one hurdle down, and an Olympic quadrennial gone.
A Chinese TV commentator wept on-air, reporting Liu’s misfortune. Another urged his countrymen to be sympathetic, and to be grateful for what Liu had given China. It was, all in all, goodbye.
For this wasn’t the first time.
Liu won the 110-metre hurdles in 12.91 seconds (still the Olympic record) at Athens in 2004 as a 21-year-old, followed it with a world championship in 2007 and became a Chinese sporting icon so luminous that by the time the Beijing Olympics rolled round, he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated’s preview issue.
But he broke the host nation’s heart, and his own, when he was forced to withdraw with an Achilles injury, just two strides into the hurdles in Beijing. Two Olympics in a row, and not a single hurdle cleared.

It was that same right Achilles he clutched Tuesday as he sat on the London track, his cheeks puffing with the pain, struggling to get up, wearing the same “lucky” number on the back of his singlet, 1356, that he had worn in 2008.
After a couple of attempts, he finally dragged himself to his feet. While those who had finished the race were bending over to catch their breath or glancing back at the Chinese legend, Liu hopped off toward the tunnel where the athletes enter the track, refusing the offer of a wheelchair.What happened next is the stuff of highlight reels, of indelible Olympic moments.
And if part of it was Hollywood histrionics — the Chinese love NBA basketball, after all — the rest was as real as it gets.

Almost under the stands and gone from sight, Liu suddenly stopped, faced the track as if it were an opponent he would not allow to defeat him, and returned, on his left foot, to within a few feet of the outside lane.

Some say a volunteer stopped him and directed him to return to the track for medical attention. It didn’t look that way on TV. He seemed to make his own decision and brushed past a volunteer on his way back.
He finished the rest of the 110 metres on one foot, but before he got to the end, he veered in to Lane 4, where he had begun, and bent to kiss the last hurdle, then continued to the finish line where Hungary’s Balazs Baji braced him with one arm and raised the Chinese hurdler’s hand aloft with the other.
“I respect him. I like him,” said Baji, who finished fifth in the heat. “It must be really bad for him. I’m really sorry. I didn’t say anything. I just couldn’t say anything.”The sellout crowd in the 80,000-seat stadium had begun cheering as soon as Liu had reappeared from under the stands. Now many were on their feet, as Andrew Turner of Britain and Jackson Quinonez of Spain helped Liu off the track, where medical personnel took over.
“I regard him as the best hurdler in history and I have so much respect for him,” said Turner, who won the heat.

“I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. It was horrible to see him limp off like that, so I had to go and help him. When you medal with someone you have a connection with them and, after last year [at the world championships] in Daegu, we always say hello and try and have a chat. He’s a nice guy.”
Turner had seen him warming up and sensed that the Achilles was a problem. Indeed, Liu’s coach Sun Haiping had admitted last week that the 29-year-old had experienced problems with the leg at a training camp in Germany. He had pulled out of a Diamond League meet in London in July, citing a back problem.
Then came Tuesday, and the final heat began badly all around.
In Lane 5, to Liu’s immediate right, Poland’s Artur Noga pulled up out of the blocks, clutching his right quad, while in Lane 2, Shane Braithwaite of Barbados also struck the first barrier and went down. But even as the remaining hurdlers were crossing the line, most eyes returned to the sad tableau in Lane 4.
“We’ve all seen how hard it is for him,” the Chinese track team leader, Fenn Shuyong, said in a news conference at the stadium. “It’s such a pity, but his spirit is there. It is the true Olympic spirit, that winning is not so important, participation is what matters.”
So is finishing, as injured Canadian triathlete Paula Findlay had also done despite her pain a few days earlier, which perhaps is why Liu was determined not to leave without at least that small victory.
He is not thinking of retiring, said the team leader.
`
“The injury is the same one he had in Beijing. He has had good medical care, but it is still there,” said Fenn. “An Achilles injury is almost impossible to fully recover from.”
Almost? Liu Xiang is 29. In the context of an Olympic future, the adverb was only there out of respect.

London 2012 hurdles: China’s Liu Xiang shows ‘true Olympic spirit’ after suffering injury in qualifying | London 2012 | Sports | National Post