Young Speedskater Finds Her Place With U.S. Team

Hyo-Jung Kim may never find good kimchee near her residence at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo.

But the 16-year-old speedskater has succeeded in her quest for a spot on the U.S. short track team at the Turin Olympics with a dominant performance at last week’s U.S. championships at Marquette, Mich.

Kim, who was born in South Korea but has U.S. citizenship because her father became a citizen while working in Southern California, was the overall winner and earned berths in the 500-meter, 1,000-meter and 1,500-meter races at Turin. She came to the U.S. to train when she was 14, after deciding she didn’t like the Korean federation’s training regimen.

“I like the American style and freedom,” she said at the recent Olympic summit. “In Korea, they can’t go to school because they have too many practices.... I want to practice and study.”

She studies math, English and the Bible and has rapidly improved her conversational skills. She adopted an American first name, Halie, but maintains close ties to her parents through frequent phone calls to Korea. She also longs for good kimchee, a spicy cabbage dish that’s popular in her homeland.

Allison Baver of Sinking Springs, Pa., who finished second to Kim, will skate the 500 and 1,500 at Turin. Kimberly Derrick of Caledonia, Mich., won a spot in the 1,000. Also nominated to the team were Maria Garcia of Carson and Caroline Hallisey of Natick, Mass.

Apolo Ohno of Seattle, the Salt Lake City gold medalist in the 1,500 and silver medalist in the 1,000, won all three distances to become the men’s overall winner, with 225 points. Rusty Smith of Long Beach was second, earning a chance to add to the bronze medal he won in the 500 in 2002. Alex Izykowski of Bay City, Mich., J.P. Kepka of St. Louis and Anthony Lobello of Tallahassee, Fla., also won nominations, but Shani Davis of Chicago finished sixth, one place too low to realize his dream of competing on the short track and long track teams.

“I want to grab some medals,” Ohno said. “You can say you want to get on the podium, but anything can happen. There are no guarantees.”

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Born to Luge

Mark Grimmette can remember when no one took U.S. luge athletes seriously.

“When I started sliding, Europeans ran to the side of the track to watch us and get some entertainment,” he said. “Over the years we’ve worked hard to get ourselves up in the standings and get some victories.”

Grimmette, of Muskegon, Mich., and doubles partner Brian Martin of Palo Alto will get a third try at an Olympic victory. They were among seven athletes nominated on Saturday to the U.S. team for the Turin Games, with race-offs to be held at Lake Placid, N.Y., on Wednesday for the second doubles berth and third men’s spot.

Grimmette and Martin won a bronze medal at the 1998 Nagano Games and silver at Salt Lake City. “I’d love to have three gold medals, but we’re still missing that first one,” Martin said.

The second doubles spot will go to the winner of a best-of-three race-off between the team of Christian Niccum of Woodinville, Wash., and Patrick Quinn of Lombard, Ill., and the duo of Preston Griffall of Salt Lake City and Dan Joye of Carmel, N.Y. Quinn is a former speedskater who runs a sports marketing company and is the agent for speedskater Derek Parra. Niccum has won a singles spot, overcoming a concussion.

“It’s pretty exciting,” he said, “but I have work to do, to bring my partner onto the team.”

The other men’s spot went to Tony Benshoof of White Bear Lake, Minn., who earlier finished second to Olympic champion Armin Zoeggler of Italy in a race at Lake Placid. Benshoof moved up to third in the World Cup standings, behind Russia’s Albert Demtschenko and Zoeggler. Jonathan Myles of Rumney, N.H., and Chris Mazdzer of Saranac Lake, N.Y., will vie for the final men’s spot.

The women’s team will be Courtney Zablocki of Highlands Ranch, Colo., who finished 13th at the 2002 Games, and first-time Olympians Samantha Retrosi of Saranac Lake and Erin Hamlin of Remsen, N.Y.

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Here and There

The International Ice Hockey Federation will allow teams in Turin to designate a three-man taxi squad they can tap if an injury occurs during the Games. The reserves can be named up until 24 hours before the Turin opener.

Each team must name its 23-man roster by Thursday but substitutions can be made until the night before the Games. The U.S. will announce its roster on Monday and Canada will follow on Wednesday.

The U.S. women’s hockey team had to rally to defeat Finland, 5-3, on Saturday at Hartford, Conn. The U.S. trailed, 3-1, until Sarah Parsons scored the first of four consecutive goals in the second period.

A change in U.S. Figure Skating’s Olympic selection procedures has given ice dancer Tanith Belbin more time to gain U.S. citizenship. All nominated athletes now must have a valid U.S. passport no later than Jan. 28 to allow the U.S. Olympic Committee to submit paperwork to the Turin Organizing Committee by Jan. 30. Belbin, a native of Canada, teamed with Ben Agosto to finish second at the 2005 world championships.

The winner in each discipline at the U.S. championships, Jan. 10-15 in St. Louis, will get an Olympic nomination. U.S. Figure Skating’s International Committee will select the remaining athletes based on performances at the U.S. championships and other competitions. Injured skaters can petition to be nominated to the team.

Todd Hays of Del Rio, Texas, and Steve Mesler of Buffalo, N.Y., won the silver medal at a World Cup bobsled competition at Cortina, Italy, extending their lead atop the World Cup two-man standings.