• Britain’s Sarah Price saw her Olympic swimming medal hopes evaporate when a clash with an underwater camera shortly before the 100m backstroke semifinals Sunday left her with a three-inch gash on her lower left leg. Price, who suffered the injury in her pre-race warm-up in the competition pool, finished last in the semifinals. “It’s the inside of my left leg, and it really hurts,” she said. “I didn’t train for four years for something like that to happen. I wouldn’t mind if I swam like that because of my own mistakes.” Price is also qualified to swim the 4x100m medley relay. British team manager Craig Hunter said the team had already raised the matter with Athens organizers swimming world governing body FINA and planned to discuss the matter with the International Olympic Committee.
World Vault Champion’s Comeback Cut Short
• World vaulting champion Oxsana Chusovitina, a 29-year-old Uzbekistan mother who returned to gymnastics to raise money for her leukemia-stricken son Alisher, had an all-too brief Olympic appearance. Chusovitina, the eldest gymnast here in her fourth Olympic appearance, hit the ground on her rear while landing her first qualifying vault and failed to reach Sunday’s apparatus final. The wife of 2000 Olympic fifth-place wrestler Bakhodir Kurbanov began gymnastics in 1981, before many of her rivals were even born, and won Olympic team gold in 1992. Chusovitina lives in Germany where her son is being treated and received permission from Uzbek officials to represent Germany. But she was unable to establish residency before the Games so she represented her homeland instead.
Sprint Suits Ryk Neethling
• Ryk Neethling, a perennial international medal contender in freestyle distance events in the 1990s, saw his switch to sprint swimming pay off with Olympic gold in South Africa’s stunning 4x100m record-breaking relay in Athens. Not only has the 100m free given the 26-year-old Neethling a longed-for Olympic title, it’s not as much of a grind as the 1,500m. “I wish I had gone down to the 100m a lot sooner,” Neethling said. “Two laps is a lot easier than thirty.”
Phelps Has Spitz Seal of Approval
• Mark Spitz, whose seven swimming victories at the 1972 Munich Olympic remains the Olympic gold standard, was in the stands at the Olympic Aquatic Center to see Michael Phelps try to take another step toward matching that feat. Phelps has won one gold already but having only taken bronze in the 4x100m medley, he must win six events in a row to achieve his aim of matching Spitz’s record of seven golds at the 1977 Olympics. “I hope he does it,” Spitz said. “He’s entitled to it. He’s got a lot of courage. I like that.”
Japanese PM Toasts Judo Winners
• Japan’s Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi telephoned Olympic judo champions Ryoko Tani and Tadahiro Nomura to congratulate them on their gold medals. Koizumi said he was so excited he could not sleep on Saturday night.
Rules Foul-Up Costs Udomporn an Olympic Record
• A refereeing blunder robbed Thailand gold medalist Udomporn Polsak of what she thought was an Olympic record, red-faced weightlifting officials admitted yesterday. Udomporn lifted 125.5kg in her final effort in the clean and jerk on Sunday to top the record of 125kg China’s Yang Xia set at the 2000 Sydney Games and add further joy to becoming Thailand’s first female Olympic winner. News of the record was broadcast on television, radio and the semi-official Olympic News Service but the official result later showed the lift as 125kg. “It won’t have been allowed to lift that weight.” He explained that Olympic records must be beaten by a margin of at least 2.5kgs to be recorded. So to have set a valid record Udomporn would have had to have lifted 127.5kg in her final hoist. The confusing rule caught out the officials after the Thai coaches called on Udomporn to go for the record after she had already secured victory in the 53kg division with an earlier lift.
Last Action Hero Tony
• United States water polo star Tony Azevedo scored on the buzzer to give his team a 7-6 win over Croatia and paid back his coach’s faith. Ratko Rudic had cleared Azevedo to take the shot during the last timeout. “We knew that Tony would take the last shot, we just didn’t know if he could make it. You can plan for it, but you can’t always expect a goal in that situation.”
Where Are the Celebs?
• Athens is growing increasingly impatient at the failure of the anticipated celebrities to show up at the Games. “Half of Hollywood” had been expected to add glamour to the occasion, but the city’s tabloid press was yesterday bemoaning the absence of film stars like Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson and Sly Stallone. Footballer David Beckham and Microsoft’s Bill Gates were also among the no-shows, while Madonna was too busy kicking off her new European tour with a gig in Manchester. But the tone of the reports suggested they had not yet given up hope.
Blast From a Yugoslav Past
• Athletes from the federation of Serbia and Montenegro will be treated to a blast from the past should they find themselves on the winners’ podium. Parliament in Belgrade has been unable to agree on a new national anthem, so the old one used by Yugoslavia is to be pressed into service. Objections from the Orthodox Church are to blame.
Olympian Garbage
• The games will leave behind them a garbage pile to match Mount Olympus itself. The Olympic Village alone produces around 50 tons a day, while officials and visitors weigh in with 1.5 kilograms a day each. Athens is ill-equipped when it comes to recycling, and the bulk of the rubbish will find its way to dumps outside the city.
Opening Ceremony Hangover
• A firework display in front of the mansion belonging to controversial Olympics organizer Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki set more than the sky alight. The ensuing forest fire has brought public prosecutors and the mayor of the Athens suburb Filothi into the act with an inquiry into whether the party organizers had bothered to obtain permission. The fire needed 25 fire engines to put out.
Danish Kangaroos
• Denmark’s Crown Prince Frederik had an answer ready for journalists tracking the link between his married life and successive Olympics. Frederik met his wife, Australian Mary Donaldson, at the Sydney Olympics and visited the Athens Olympic Village just three months after they tied the knot. Asked whether he would be bringing an heir to the 2008 Beijing Games, Frederik responded: “In four years’ time, there should be a couple of little kangaroos in the pouch.”
Lost in Translation
• Zelmir Obdradovic, Serb basketball team coach, walked out of a post-match press conference in protest at the quality of the translation. “The translation was a joke. It’s my right to speak in my mother tongue during the Games. I can speak English, but the point is that I prefer not to and don’t have to,” he said. The angry gesture came after his team went down 82-83 to Argentina.
