Russian pair crush rivals, take gold

Tot and Max’s Russian rout made the judges’ jobs easy.

Tatiana Totmianina and Maxim Marinin eliminated any chance for controversy and kept their nation’s domination of Olympic pairs going with a balletic free skate reminiscent of the greatest Russian couples.

A Russian or Soviet pair has won the gold medal every Olympics since 1964, and this one was as good as any.

The huge margin – 14.75 points over China’s Zhang Dan and Zhang Hao – also erased thoughts of any judging improprieties in the first Olympic pairs event since the 2002 Salt Lake City scandal that led to the new code of points system.

Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo of China earned their second straight bronze medal.

Snowboarding Not to be outdone by the boys, Hannah Teter won gold and Gretchen Bleiler won silver – another set of Olympic medals for the United States on the halfpipe.

Teter and Bleiler, the top two women in a distinctly American sport, dominated every part of the snowboarding event – from qualifying through finals – and gave the United States four of the possible six medals over two days of snowboarding in sunny Bardonecchia.

A day earlier, it was Shaun White and Danny Kass finishing 1-2, with Mason Aguirre in fourth.

And just like the men, the women came painfully close to a sweep. Kelly Clark got bumped out of the bronze- medal spot by Norway’s Kjersti Buaas.

Cross-country skiing Four suspended cross-country skiers will get their chance at an Olympic medal, passing new tests administered after serving five-day suspensions for elevated levels of hemoglobin.

Two of the athletes cleared were Americans, another a German gold medalist. Now, eight more have to hope they get the same results.

German cross-country skier Evi Sachenbacher and the two Americans – Kikkan Randall and Leif Zimmerman – were among the four retested. The identity of the fourth skier was not immediately released.

Curling The American men routed defending Olympic champion Norway 11-5 in the opening game of the men’s curling tournament, but then fell to Finland 4-3 later, leaving both the U.S. and the Fins 1-1 in the opening round.

Britain and Sweden each started 2-0, and Italy and New Zealand lost their first two games.

“The U.S. women squandered a 4-1 lead in their opener against Norway.

The Americans conceded the match when they needed four points with three rocks left.

Hockey Finland and Sweden’s women won their second straight games to finalize the semifinal field for the Olympic women’s hockey tournament.

Sweden and Finland will join Canada and the United States – all four teams have 2-0 records – in the semifinals Friday.