Turin Olympic Winter Games Blog (Home)

Sofia Presents Application Logo for Hosting 2014 Winter Olympics
SOFIA, Bulgaria — It is necessary to want it very much and then — to believe in success, 2014 Winter Olympics Application Committee Vice Chair Svetla Otsetova said.
Full Story (Source: Focus News)

No Short Memories
Korean fans made death threats after his ‘02 win, but Ohno retains an edge.
Full Story (Source: Time)

Police Tighten Security at Olympic Sites
TURIN, Italy - Italian police tightened security at Turin’s Olympic venues Monday and said preparations were going smoothly, though some residents complained they were not receiving the same protection given the Winter Games sites.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Winter Olympics venues guide
The Turin Winter Olympics will be shared between seven venues in the north-west part of Italy.
Full Story (Source: BBC Sport)

Cheek, Davis Win at Speedskating Worlds
COLLALBO, Italy - American Joey Cheek edged Dmitry Dorofeyev by .02 seconds in Sunday’s 500-meter race, capturing his second straight win in the event at the World Cup meet.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Problems magnified as Olympic Games near
The allure of an Olympic Games, Winter or Summer, is that they never overstay their welcome. They pop up on us all of a sudden (will the opening ceremonies in Torino really be just five days after the Super Bowl?), drop into our lives for 16 days, then slink away as quickly as they entered.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

The Ice Storm
After a judging scandal tarnished its luster, figure skating got a new scoring system. The competition could be brisker than ever.
Full Story (Source: Time)

Turin’s Olympics Strike Gold
Just a few months ago, the games’ financial success was in question. But expanded TV coverage and sponsorships have proven a winning formula.
Full Story (Source: BusinessWeek)

Torch marks 50th anniversary of Italian Olympics
The Olympic torch returned to Cortina D’Ampezzo on Thursday (January 26) as organisers of next month’s Winter Olympics in Turin marked the 50th anniversary of Italy’s only other hosting of the Games.
Full Story (Source: Zee News)

‘American Idol’ favored for gold over Olympics
TV’s February sweeps, usually a hotly contested month full of specials and stunts, is an Olympic feat this year.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Lehtonen out of Finland squad for Turin Games
HELSINKI, Finland — Atlanta Thrashers goalkeeper Kari Lehtonen withdrew from Finland’s squad for the 2006 Winter Olympics, saying he needed time to recover from a groin injury.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Alitalia workers agree to end strikes ahead of Olympics
ROME — Workers at Italian airline Alitalia on Thursday ended a week of wildcat pickets that have forced the airline to cancel hundreds of flights and put the company’s future in question.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

NBC News sends top talent to Torino
NEW YORK — NBC News will bring out its big guns to help cover the network’s huge investment in the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Snowboarding’s top guy prepping for Torino
Shaun White is everything one would expect in an X Games athlete competing in this weekend’s anti-establishment sports festival in Aspen, Colo.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

Kwan’s Olympic Hopes Rest on Two Programs
COLORADO SPRINGS - Michelle Kwan’s hopes for that elusive Olympic gold medal rest in a rink half a world away from Turin.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Dating Kiwi costs US coach his job
US skeleton coach Tim Nardiello was dumped from the American Olympic squad mainly because of his relationship with South Canterbury schoolteacher Kelly Moffat, one of two New Zealanders he was coaching.
Full Story (Source: Hawkes Bay Today)

Danielle Goyette named flag-bearer for Turin
CALGARY — Veteran national women’s hockey team forward Danielle Goyette will be Canada’s flag-bearer for the Turin Olympics.
Full Story (Source: Slam! Sports)

Lack Of Snow For Olympics
There may still be concerns over the amount of snow in and around Turin for next month’s Winter Olympics but organisers are at least confident that security measures will ensure a safe Games.
Full Story (Source: Newswire)

Torino-bound teen boarder Teter energized for big trip
Hannah Teter is a Belmont, Vt., native who grew up with three older snowboarding brothers, including fellow pro riders Abe and Elijah. Hannah first got on a board at age 8, rose steadily through the U.S. team ranks and has in recent years won several World Cup halfpipe competitions.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

WINTER OLYMPICS: Awesome Opening
Salt Lake City, UT — At 8:05 p.m., as a soft snow began to fall, eight American athletes walked slowly into Rice-Eccles Stadium holding a tattered American flag. Kristina Sabasteanski held a corner. She’s a member of the U.S biathalon team. She’s also a soldier.
Full Story (Source: Huntington News)

Olympic flame hijacked by anti-capitalist protesters
Italian demonstrators have hijacked the Olympic torch on its way to the Winter Games in Turin in unprecedented protests targeting the event’s sponsors, Coca-Cola.
Full Story (Source: The Independent)

Australia expands team for Turin
A record 40 Australian athletes, including 22 men and 18 women, will be travelling to Turin for the Winter Olympics next month. Nine of the athletes were selected for snowboarding, and nine others for freestyle skiing. Australia sent 27 athletes to the Salt Lake Games four years ago.
Full Story (Source: NDTV)

Snipers, armed skiers help guard Turin Games
TURIN, Italy — Snipers, policemen and armed skiers will watch over the Winter Olympics next month, helped by information from intelligence services around the world, Turin’s security chief said in an interview. Prefect Goffredo Sottile, who is in charge of public security in Turin province, said he met FBI Director Robert Mueller on Tuesday to discuss the situation two weeks before the Games, which will run from February 10-26.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Germany drops three from Turin team due to secret police ties
MUNICH, Germany — Germany dropped three officials from its biggest ever Winter Olympics team on Wednesday because of ties to the former East Germany’s secret police.
Full Story (Source: Slam! Sports)

Hop on board for the Winter Olympics
VERNON, N.J. — When Andy Finch reaches the bottom of the hill, finally still enough to be discerned as anything more than a blur of tumbling color, he grins broadly, his hair unfurling from beneath his helmet like wisps of chestnut smoke.
Full Story (Source: CSMonitor)

Winter Olympics: NZ team biggest ever
New Zealand’s largest ever Olympic Winter Games team will compete in Turin, Italy next month after the addition of another seven athletes in the disciplines of skeleton and bobsleigh today.
Full Story (Source: NZ Herald)

The Challenge of NBC’s Winter Olympics
The Winter Olympics will begin a little more than two weeks from now and they will run for 17 days. NBC - and three of its other cable networks - will show 416 hours of programming.
Full Story (Source: SportsFan)

U.S. Olympic Snowboarders Look Super
Early Sunday morning, during the last Olympic qualifying event for the U.S. snowboard team, medal favorite Hannah Teter lounged at the bottom of the half-pipe— the sloping channel where boarders do their tricks— at Mountain Creek Resort in Vernon, N.J.
Full Story (Source: Time)

U.N.’s Kofi Annan Urges Olympic Truce
LAUSANNE, Switzerland — U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Tuesday urged all groups engaged in armed conflict to respect an “Olympic Truce” during next month’s Turin Games.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Legend Lemieux finally ends career
PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania — Hall-of-Famer Mario Lemieux retired from ice hockey for the second time on Tuesday, ending a glorious National Hockey League career in which he led Pittsburgh Penguins to two Stanley Cup titles.
Full Story (Source: CNN)

China, Taiwan squabble over Olympic torch
BEIJING, China — China says the Olympic torch relay can pass through Taiwan as part of its “domestic route” to Beijing in 2008, an offer Taiwan has flatly rejected.
Full Story (Source: United Press International)

Snowboarder Klug files appeal for Torino slot
Snowboarder Chris Klug, a two-time Olympian who won a bronze medal in the 2002 Winter Games after having a liver transplant in 2000, is challenging his exclusion from the U.S. Olympic team in the parallel giant slalom event.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

The ‘Godfather’ of luge
KONIGSSEE, Germany — Imagine you are Georg Hackl, the most decorated luger ever, with five Olympic medals, three gold and two silver, plus three world championships. You are a winter sports icon in your native Germany, you live comfortably in the town of your birth with nothing left to prove as you approach your 40th birthday.
Full Story (Source: USA Today)

Recovering from two knee injures makes Olympics more special for Brydon
A hint of bitterness creeps into ski racer Emily Brydon’s voice when she talks about her first Olympic experience four years ago.
Full Story (Source: Slam! Sports)

Practice proves vital to Olympic success
Companies with good emp-loyment practices will have an edge in bidding for contracts under the £3.4bn procurement bonanza from the 2012 London Olympics, the minister responsible has indicated.
Full Story (Source: Financial Times)

Winter Olympics: Do you have a connection?
The News & Record is looking for residents in the Triad who have a connection to next month’s Winter Olympics in Italy.
Full Story (Source: News Record)

Khabibulin to miss Olympics after knee injury
NEW YORK — Chicago Blackhawks netminder Nikolai Khabibulin will be sidelined for four to six weeks because of a knee injury, the team said on Sunday, ruling the Russian out of the Turin Olympics. Khabibulin, who helped the Tampa Bay Lightning to the 2004 Stanley Cup, sprained the knee during a loss to the Minnesota Wild on Friday.
Full Story (Source: Reuters Canada)

Lund only warned after failed drug test
Top American skeleton racer Zach Lund will compete in next month’s Turin Olympics after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency on Monday issued him only a public warning following a failed drug test.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo! Sports)

Kostelic wins super-combi; Dorfmeister avoids collision
ST. MORITZ, Switzerland — In a World Cup race that renewed concerns about course safety, overall leader Janica Kostelic of Croatia won a super-combi and American Lindsey Kildow finished third.
Full Story (Source: CBS Sportsline)

Plushenko, Slutskaya look to Turin as Russians sweep Europeans
LYON — Yvegeny Plushenko and Irina Slutskaya stole the show as Russia bared their teeth ahead of next month’s Winter Olympics by sweeping all titles on offer for the second consecutive year at the European figure skating championships which ended here on Saturday.
Full Story (Source: Pakistan Daily Times)

Heil could be first medallist
Canada will play an ace to open the 2006 Winter Olympics - freestyle ski moguls champion Jennifer Heil.
Full Story (Source: Slam! Sports)

Italy to Spend $110 Million for Security at Winter Olympics
Italy will spend at least 89.6 million euros ($110 million) and will deploy 9,200 police to ensure security and prevent a terrorist attack at the Winter Olympic Games in Turin next month.
Full Story (Source: Bloomberg)

No firm threat to Winter Olympics
Italy sees no firm evidence of a security threat to the Winter Olympics in Turin, but is alert to possible attacks by local and foreign militant groups.
Full Story (Source: Adelaide Advertiser)

U.S. Biathlon Athletes Increasingly Tech-Savvy to Gain a Competitive Edge
In a sport that demands precise weather calculations for optimal performance, the 2006 U.S. Biathlon Team has turned to sponsor Kestrel Pocket Weather Meters to help gain a competitive advantage in this year’s Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo! Finance)

Turin security bill hits $126 million
TURIN, Italy — Italy has spent more than 89 million euros ($126 million) on security for the Turin Winter Olympics, a figure that will increase over coming weeks, the interior minister said Monday.
Full Story (Source: Toronto Star)

Turin Trendy yet traditional, and oh, so tasty!
There is no availability at these hotels during the Olympics, but they are good choices for people visiting Turin at another time.
Full Story (Source: Charlotte Observer)

2006 Torino Winter Olympics Information
The 2006 Winter Olympics start February 10 in Turin, Italy. There will be 17 days of winter sports in the city of Turin…
Full Story (Source: About.com)

Italy isn’t buzzing about Turin Games
SESTRIERE, Italy — Using that most ancient of means for expressing private thoughts publicly — graffiti — someone scrawled OLIMPIADI INFERNALI in black spray paint on a stone wall along a road snaking through the Alps near Turin Games venues.
Full Story (Source: Northwest Herald)

Great timing
With Turin approaching, American Joey Cheek wins the world sprint speed skating title in Heerenveen, Netherlands, the most important victory of his career. Cheek says it’s bigger than his bronze in Salt Lake City.
Full Story (Source: CBS Sportsline)

Olympic Fight in Skeleton World Costly
Zach Lund needs a better car, and has enough money to upgrade his ride. Yet for now, the rickety 1995 Audi with 140,000 miles rolls along — because Lund doesn’t know how long the cash he’s saved will last.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

Lueders captures bobsleigh silver
Edmonton’s Pierre Lueders is definitely peaking at the right time as the Winter Olympics draw closer.
Full Story (Source: CBC)

Hey, NBC: You say Torino, I say Turin
A memo to: Brian Williams, NBC News; Katie Couric, NBC “Today;” Jay Leno, NBC “Tonight;” Bob Costas, NBC Sports, and all other network employees
Full Story (Source: Chicago Tribune)

Vidal shows Olympic form with slalom win
KITZBUEHEL, Austria — Frenchman Jean-Pierre Vidal won only his second World Cup slalom on Sunday, just a month before he defends his Olympic gold medal at the Turin Games.
Full Story (Source: Yahoo!)

US Olympic uniforms honor Italian fashion, 1970s skier style
NEW YORK — Italy and fashion go together. So do athletes and high-performance gear. What does that mean for team uniforms at the upcoming Winter Olympics in Turin?
Full Story (Source: North County Times)

Sides meet for 22 hours in two days, but no ruling until Monday
ALBANY, N.Y. — An arbitrator was expected to rule Monday on whether the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation was justified in suspending coach Tim Nardiello, who was accused of sexually harassing two members of his team.
Full Story (Source: CBS Sportsline)