Winter Games

Don't know your Lutz from you Salchow? Does explaining the Iron Cross make you Daffy or maybe just a little goofy? Not to worry. This year's Winter Games come with an online primer, courtesy of NBC. Through its Web site, www.nbcolympics.com and nbcsports.com, casual fans and rabid ring-heads can brush up on figure skating moves, take a video ride down the bobsled run or listen to Olympic legends tell of their glory days. Tom Feuer, coordinating producer of both sites, says that while the sites sizzle, the key to the Web operation is providing information in a format that's close to real time, from results to TV schedule changes.

Alpine skiing coach Diane Mikulis watched as the body language of her Special Olympic athletes - including Marylander Jake Reynolds - transformed one day last month from mildly interested to awe-struck. They had just entered Herb Brooks Arena in Lake Placid, N.Y., where international flags hung majestically from the rafters and where banners and murals honored historic athletic events. The skiers listened to a brief history of the venue and now were being told they were going to be allowed on the ice. They grinned widely, and a smile slowly crept onto Mikulis' face, too, as her skiers restlessly and excitedly waited to descend the stairs.

Bel Air's Kimmie Meissner takes to the ice in search of Olympics glory as the Ladies Figure Skating competition begins at the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. Our reporters, photographers and artists provide complete coverage of Meissner's training for tomorrow's short program, as well as spotlight friends, family and fans cheering for the 16-year-old. In addition, you can keep track of Meissner by logging on to The Sun's Web site at baltimoresun.com/olympics where you can find full coverage of the Winter Games, including stories, blogs, podcasts and photo galleries.

Facing a cupboard bare of medals and reeling from scandals, the once-proud U.S. bobsled and skeleton program was at rock bottom the year of the 2006 Winter Olympics. The helping hands that reached out to restore stability and glory came from an unusual place, one that knows heat and humidity better than snow and ice: Baltimore. Under Armour, the sports apparel company based in Baltimore, provided sponsorship dollars and put its logo on athletes' clothing and equipment in a deal that lasts through the 2014 Winter Games, part of the company's effort to expand beyond its base in traditional U.S. sports such as football and baseball and into overseas and niche markets.

EXPULSION of six International Olympic Committee members, joining four who quit, is one step out of the pit the IOC has dug for itself. But alone it does not end the scandal by proving the IOC is purging itself of corruption. Nor does it restore the credibility the Olympic movement requires.The Justice Department is investigating reported bribery in the selection of Salt Lake City for the 2002 Winter Games. Bills before the U.S. Senate would strip tax exemption from Olympic activities.In fairness, the IOC promises to do more, including cooperate with a U.S. Senate investigation and create an outside ethics commission and a commission to plan structural reform.

If baseball and women's softball are to be a part of the Summer Olympics in 2012, they'll have to rally at these Winter Games. Seven months after they were voted off the Olympic program, the sports could get a second chance from the International Olympic Committee when members consider possible reinstatement during their annual session next week on the eve of the Turin Olympics. "I'm optimistic," International Softball Federation president Don Porter told the Associated Press. "Everyone I've talked to is very supportive at least to come back and give us an opportunity for another shot at it. That's all we're asking for."

For Americans, the opportunity to combine European travel and the Olympics won't get any better than 1992, when the winter games will be held in the French Alps and the summer games in Barcelona, Spain.It will be the last year in which both the summer and winter games are staged the same year. The winter games then will move to the alternate biennials, starting in 1994 in Lillehammer, Norway. The next stop for the summer games will be in Atlanta in 1996.Both the French Alps and the Mediterranean seaport of Barcelona are tourist destinations of their own; the addition of the Olympic Games either adds to their lure or detracts from it, depending on your affinity for competition and congestion.

SALT LAKE CITY - As Mitt Romney drove from his mountain home to downtown yesterday morning, he saw the Olympic caldron ablaze for the last day. "I liken it to the feelings of taking my last son to college," said the president of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee. "It's easy to fall into a deep melancholy." Instead, he said, he'll concentrate on accomplishments and "the incredible experience." Last night, with fireworks lighting the sky from one end of town to the other and the air filled with music, the 19th Winter Games closed.

SALT LAKE CITY - The Olympics might be getting too big for their britches, but reining them in won't be easy. Jacques Rogge, the president of the International Olympic Committee, and other officials are concerned that the cost and size of the Summer and Winter Games are increasing to where only a handful of nations will be able to afford playing host to the world. Rogge has appointed IOC member and troubleshooter Richard Pound to investigate the problem and make recommendations. Pound was runner-up to Rogge in the election for president and handled the highly charged issue of athlete doping.

Got the barbecue fired up? Dogs and burgers at the ready? Cooler packed with ice and cold drinks?Sure, you're all set for Labor Day.So now is the perfect time to begin thinking about -- snow. And ice. Not the cube-kind that you put into your drinks, the flat-kind that people zip around on, wearing funny shoes with blades on the bottom.I'm talking Olympics. Winter Olympics.That's right, the games are only a few months off; six, to be exact.Funny -- seems like only last year . . .It was only last year that Albertville, France, was host to the Winter Olympic Games.

Nothing quite like the stunning vision of Vancouver from an airplane. The arriving U.S. Olympic snowboarders spotted the usual breathtaking vistas this week: picture-perfect mountains, pristine valleys and water everywhere. And golfers. In February. "We were joking about maybe getting a tee time," said Nick Baumgartner of Iron River, Mich., who will be competing in men's snowboard cross. This is, quite clearly, not your father's Winter Olympics. Already, there have been jokes about the Winter/Summer Olympics in temperate Vancouver, and the Lithuanian team was cracking jokes about the Spring Olympics.

No, you're not an Olympian. And you don't even play one on TV. Still, you can fake your way to respectability with just a few teaching aids. Here are the movies "Downhill Racer," starring Robert Redford and Gene Hackman, was one of the first movies to use a helmet-mounted camera to give viewers the sense of speed and thrills in the sport of skiing. Redford is the self-centered skier who derides the concept of team. Hackman is the coach who tries to make him conform.

Two years ago, Russian bobsled federation officials approached the designer of one of the world's fastest bobsleds and offered him "money, women, money and women" to transfer his loyalties - and secrets - from the U.S. team. "I told them, 'It's not going to happen. This stuff isn't for sale,' " says Bob Cuneo, retelling the story while leaning on a bar and laughing. Now 18 years after he partnered with former NASCAR driver Geoff Bodine to produce a world-class winter racing machine, Cuneo hopes the four-man competition will end with the perfect retirement present: the first U.S. gold medal since 1948.

The minute Gordy Sheer heard recently that celebrity gossip site TMZ was launching a spinoff dedicated to the dirty laundry of sports, he sent a warning e-mail to USA Luge athletes. "TMZ is a game changer," said Sheer, a 1998 Olympic silver medalist and marketing manager for the team. "In today's world, everyone has a video camera or a camera phone making them, in essence, a journalist. Even the most innocent thing - someone cuts in front of you at a bar and picks a fight - can end up for the world to see."

Yesterday, a reader of my blog, reacting to an item I wrote about the pea-and-shell game that San Francisco city officials played with the Olympic torch Wednesday, posed this question: With all the problems that are popping up with the Olympics - illegal drugs, new Speedo swimsuit illegal or legal, then all the energy to guard the flame - at some point, it is time to get rid of the Olympic Games altogether? Look at the staggering financial cost to host them. He gave me something to ponder.

SOCHI, Russia -- The two-lane road from the old Soviet-style airport to the center of town has become an avenue of billboards showing men, women and children on skis and snowboards, riding chairlifts and chasing hockey pucks. On their faces is the promise of what might come to be in this city in southern Russia, and something Russians have historically had little experience with: hope. Dubbed the "Russian Riviera" - which, granted, is a bit of an embellishment - Sochi has palm trees and parasailing and a shoreline stretching dozens of miles along the temperate Black Sea coast.

NAGANO, Japan -- Well, it's not every Winter Olympics that includes sumo wrestlers and snowboarders.But then, the organizers of the last Winter Olympics of the 20th century are out to prove that just about anything is possible on ice and snow.The Nagano Games, which begin with opening ceremonies televised Friday night to the United States, could be subtitled the Transition Games.There will be new stars and new sports in a 17-day, multibillion-dollar spectacular centered in this city of 360,000 tucked in rugged mountains 125 miles west of Tokyo.

SALT LAKE CITY - On your mark. Get set. Click. That's how millions of people worldwide are reaching out to the 2002 Winter Olympics. For tickets. For jobs. For lodging. For souvenirs. Armchair athletes have never had it so good. The Web site for the Games is getting 400,000 unique visitors each month, and they in turn generate several million page views. With just three months remaining before the Olympic caldron is ignited, that level of interest is only expected to increase. In fact, the Salt Lake Organizing Committee expects its Web site (www.

George Farber spent several minutes wading through a cluster of happy parents and spectators at Soccerdome II in Harmans Friday night. The coach of the Fort Meade indoor soccer team in the under-11 girls second division league received a number of compliments, shook hands and talked for several minutes, laughing and joking along the way. Fort Meade had suffered a tough 3-2 loss to the first-place Lady Red Devils, but not many parents or fans of the...