25 April 2007 – The Executive Board (EB) of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) today unanimously decided to declare permanently ineligible six athletes from the Austrian biathlon and cross-country skiing teams who competed at the Torino 2006 Olympic Winter Games (see full details below). This decision excludes them from taking part in any future Olympic Games in any accredited capacity – be that as an athlete, coach, official, etc.
The EB approved the recommendations of the Disciplinary Commission (DC) set up by the IOC in February 2006 and composed of Dr Thomas Bach (chairman), Denis Oswald and Sergey Bubka.
IOC sets up …read more

The Torino Olympics was the third Winter Games for Italian cross-country skier Girogio di Centa. (Photo: Clive Mason/Getty Images)
Here are the Final Results of the only other event today, besides the Men’s Ice Hockey Final …
1 – ITA – Giorgio di Centa (2:06:11.8)
2 – RUS – Eugeni Dementiev (2:06:12.6 / +0.8)
3 – AUT – Mikhail Botwinov (2:06:12.7 / +0.9)
44 – CAN – George Grey (2:09:38.4 / +3:26.6)
Well .. must have been exciting when the top 28 skiiers all ended with 1 minute behind the leader … And especially exciting to all the Italian fans for Giorgio’s win .. …read more

According to the news …
Italian law enforcement authorities raided the residences of some staff members of the Austrian biathlon and cross-country teams early Sunday morning, apparently searching for banned substances, said two separate news reports.
The International Olympic Committee also confirmed it has conducted out-of-competition doping tests on “a number of Austrian cross-country and biathlon athletes,” according to Reuters and Associated Press.
[..more..]

A day after Estonia’s Kristina Smigun won her second Gold in the Women’s 10km Classical event (her first was in the 15km Pursuit), compatriot Andrus Veerpalu took the Gold today in the Men’s 15km Classical.
Weather conditions was poor as overnight snow carried on into the competition. Despite that, Veerpalu posted a time of 38 minutes 1.3 seconds. He was 14.5 and 19.2 seconds ahead of the Silver and Bronze Medalists (Lukas Bauer of the Czech Republic and Tobias Angerer of Germany).

Veerpalu triumphant (Source: NBC)
Veerpalu was the Gold Medalist in the same event at the 2002 Salt Lake City …read more

Canadian Ladies Beckie Scott and Sara Renner won a silver medal in the women’s team sprint cross-country skiing event today bringing the total of medals for Canada to 3, 1 for each flavour. And each won by a woman (come on guys, don’t you have any pride?) ;-).
Remarkably, Renner was able to recover from a broken a pole on the third lap of the six-lap race on the Pragelato course. In only a few strides, she found a coach to replace the snapped ski pole.
In the final half-kilometre, Scott kicked up a hill to take the lead over Finland …read more

brem writes / asks Is 25 Medals Goal For Canada Realistic? and has a dPoll going. Well, at first I immediately went there and clicked YES (naturally – Go Canada Go!) .. but then I got to thinking ..
25 Medals for Canada? Where are we going to get 25 medals?
I should say that in my general community of friends and online contacts, sure – we are proud of ALL our Canadian Athletes (maybe a little more with the 5 Winnipeggers in Torino) and we are quite happy if they just perform to the best of their abilities to …read more

Could a doping scandal be brewing or is this just a case of cross country skiers keeping up with the Jones’?  Hey, he/she is doing it, so I have to do it to compete with them.  Whatever the case, why if this practice is illegal is the suspension only for five days?
Eight Olympic cross-country skiers, including two Americans and one former gold medalist, were suspended for five days after they were found to have excessive hemoglobin levels — the first hint of scandal at the Turin Games.
The suspensions, announced Thursday by the International Ski Federation, last five days from the …read more