Olympic Trials

Tens of thousands dream of competing next summer in Athens, Greece. Chris Ciamarra just wants to race in Alabama next February. Ciamarra, 32, accepts that he'll never compete in the Olympics, but he hasn't discarded his goal of being in Birmingham in four months when the United States determines its three entrants in the men's marathon. Ciamarra has to shave nearly six minutes off his personal best to reach the qualifying standard of 2 hours, 22 minutes, but it's not for a lack of trying.

Saturday's UnderArmour Baltimore Marathon added talent over the weekend. Christopher Kipkosgei, a member of Fila's Discovery Kenya program who recently secured his visa to travel here, has a personal best of 2 hours, 15 minutes, 52 seconds. Alexsander Kapitonov, a 35-year-old Russian, has similar credentials. Michael Wardian of Arlington, Va., ran 2:21:48 in Detroit last week, to qualify for next February's U.S. Olympic trials. Kapitonov runs for the Gaithersburg-based RedSquare Sports team, which will supply two-time women's champion Elvira Kolpakova.

Excerpted from "A letter to Olympic Winter Games Credentialed Media from Bob Condron," director of media services, U.S. Olympic Committee: ... Some last minute thoughts, notes, survival techniques and tips as you continue your Olympic journey to the Great Salt Lake. Remember the three C's of the Olympics: * Credential * Cell Phone * Clothes Be sure and have them with you at all times. Security Please check your frustration and impatience at the door. ... Access to any secured area will not remind anyone of the Oklahoma Land Rush.

While most students are sitting in class and studying for exams this week, two Key School students will be taking a step toward competing in the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. Jimmy Praley and Jimmy Attridge, both juniors for the Obezags' sailing team, will pilot a boat in the Olympic Class Regatta race tomorrow in Miami. Praley and Attridge, who will be the youngest sailors in the international 470 class, will compete against a couple of dozen boats for the right to participate in the U.S. Olympic trials next year.

Apollo was the Greek god of music and poetry. Apolo Anton Ohno brings those same elements to the sport of short-track speed skating. The 19-year-old sensation from Seattle dominated the Olympic trials at the Utah Olympic Oval in Kearns. Ohno was almost perfect, even in the qualifying heats, to win a spot skating at the Olympics in the 500-, 1,000- and 1,500-meter events and the 5,000 relay. The only blemish came in the 1,000 final, when Ohno said he briefly lost his footing, which allowed his close friend, Shani Davis, to win the final spot on the team.

How close is one-hundredth of a second? "It's so close it's not even funny," said speed skater J.P. Shilling, who can laugh about it now. That blink of an eye, that whisker, that almost-photo-finish measurement of time is what put Shilling on the U.S. Olympic team Wednesday night. The Baltimore native edged K.C. Boutiette in the 1,500-meter event during the U.S. Long Track Olympic Trials in Kearns, Utah. "In speed skating, I don't know how you would measure that amount of time with your hands, the difference between K.C. and me. Is it even a centimeter?"

Chris Chattin is going on a sentimental journey Saturday. Chattin last ran a marathon in 1996, but this year he picked up his weekly mileage and planned his training to peak his fitness on Oct. 20, the date of the inaugural Baltimore Marathon Festival. He was bitten by the long-distance running bug in 1983, when he finished third in the Maryland Marathon as a teen-ager, and the 37-year-old is eager to revisit some of the locales that started him on a career that included two appearances in the U.S. Olympic trials.

SYDNEY, Australia - Women will fly in the pole vault, take kicks and punches in taekwondo. Those are some of the additions to an Olympic program that has bloated to 29 sports, and none of the newcomers will make as big a splash, literally and figuratively, as triathlon. A sport that didn't exist a generation ago will take center stage tomorrow, the first full day of competition at the Games. As many as 100,000 spectators could rant and rave over a field of 48 women who will start and finish in the shadow of the Sydney Opera House.

The sports world is full of stories about teen athletes deprived of their youth by overzealous coaches and overbearing parents ... of the joy of sport being replaced by the intense pressure to succeed. Maybe that's why U.S. gymnastics champion Elise Ray is such an appealing Olympic story. It takes tremendous commitment to become one of the best athletes in the world, but Ray - the 18-year-old Columbia resident who swept through the nationals and the Olympic trials to establish herself as the nation's top women's gymnast - has proved that you don't have to sacrifice your life to pursue your dream.

Elliott Denman 66, an Olympian and retired sports writer for the Asbury Park, N.J. Press, recalled the other day a restless night he spent in a Baltimore hotel room in 1956. He had interrupted a vacation with his parents and brother to compete in the National Amateur Athletic Union 50-kilometer race-walking championship in Baltimore that also doubled that year as the U.S. Olympic Trials. The championship, held Sept. 16, 1956, was also the only Olympic tryout held in the city for the Games to be played in Melbourne.