Kostner will carry torch before baby bag
ROME – She won’t compete, but the recently retired Isolde Kostner will still have a small role in the upcoming Winter Olympic in Turin.
A day after she announced her sudden retirement, organizers Wednesday asked the top women’s downhill skier in Italian history to carry the Olympic torch through her hometown of Ortisei on Jan. 25.
The 30-year-old Kostner, known as “Isi,” is retiring because she is pregnant.
Ortisei is located in Val Gardena in the heart of the Dolomite mountain range. A day after passing through Ortisei, the torch will be brought over a couple of mountain passes to Cortina d’Ampezzo to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Winter Games held there.
Cortina native Kristian Ghedina will carry the torch in his hometown.
The 36-year-old Ghedina, still Italy’s top male downhiller, was planning to retire at the end of this season. But after three straight top-10 World Cup finishes, he is rethinking his plans.
“I continue to be among the best and my confidence is building as a consequence,” he said.
Paralympics expand
Bode Miller put on a one-ski show at last season’s world championships. But single-ski racers are the norm at the Paralympics.
The IX Winter Paralympics are scheduled for March 10-19 in Turin, with 534 athletes lined up from a record 41 countries.
“Watching these athletes really moves me. The desire they show in their effort to make it to the finish line and for victory is extraordinary,” Fabio Capello, coach of Italy’s top soccer club, Juventus, said Monday at the Paralympics presentation.
“These champions really embody the spirit of the pure athlete.”
The games will be held in the same city and Alpine facilities used for the Olympics. Besides Alpine skiing, the other sports are ice sledge hockey, Nordic skiing (which includes biathlon) and wheelchair curling for the first time.
There will be two Paralympic villages, one in Turin and another in Sestriere, 58 medals up for grabs and 3,000 volunteers.
Capello brought his entire Juventus team with him to the presentation. Also attending were Italian Winter Olympics gold medalists Alberto Tomba, Stefania Belmondo, Manuela Di Centa and Piero Gros.
Alvise De Vidi, who has won nine athletics medals over five Paralympics since an errant dive made her a quadriplegic, also was in the crowd. So was Orazio Fagone, who grew up in Turin and won a gold medal as part of Italy’s four-man team in the 5,000-meter short track speedskating relay at the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics.
In 1997, Fagone’s hopes for the Nagano Games ended when his right leg was amputated after a motorcycle accident. Now he’s a member of Italy’s sledge hockey team.
Bombs away
This had nothing to do with Alberto “la Bomba” Tomba.
Turin’s Olympic zone nearly was shut down last Sunday for the removal of an undetonated bomb left over from World War II.
Six thousand residents were evacuated from their houses while the bomb was removed from a road construction site. Auto, rail and air traffic over the Lingotto zone was closed for several hours.
The nearby Palavela skating arena was opened as a shelter, with residents able to watch Italy’s short-track speedskating team train.
Four other bombs were discovered during construction for the Olympics. Three of them were located near the Olympic stadium that will host the opening and closing ceremonies.
Relay this rumor
How about a real relay team to handle the final leg of the torch relay?
The talk around Turin lately has Italy’s 1994 cross country relay team listed as a possibility to light the torch at the Feb. 10 opening ceremony.
Maurilio “Grandpa” De Zolt – he was 43 years old at the time – Marco Albarello, Giorgio Vanzetta and Silvio Fauner won the 40-kilometer relay by beating mighty Norway on its home turf in Lillehammer.
It was Italy’s first relay gold in cross country and it came before 105,000 fans – nearly all of them Norwegian.
After briefly turning silent when faced with a loss in the signature event of their national sport, the fans – including Norwegian King Harald – applauded the Italians’ feat.
France sets modest goal
Turin is just across the border from France, but French Sports Minister Jean-Francois Lamour is not increasing his goals for these Olympics.
Lamour said last week that French athletes would have a good showing in Turin if they win 11 medals, the same number as in 2002.
“I think that if we repeat our performance in Salt Lake City in 2002, meaning 11 medals, it will be a good result for the French team,” Lamour told France-Info radio.
Lamour said that forecasts were more favorable for cross country than downhill skiing, where French athletes have yet to shine this season.