Lindsey Jacobellis' Wipeout

Lindsey Jacobellis' Wipeout

Lindsey Jacobellis' Wipeout

Chills and Spills
The perception is that these Olympics have been a disappointment for the U.S., but the reality is that the team is still on pace for the nation's second-best Winter Games
By David Wharton
Times Staff Writer

February 20, 2006

TURIN, Italy — In that gasp of a moment, Lindsey Jacobellis went from golden to ruins, flying through the air with a snowboarder's twist, then suddenly tumbling to the ground.

The image of Jacobellis letting certain victory slip away in an Olympic snowboard race last week might seem a metaphor for the U.S. team.

The American squad has suffered from one high-profile gaffe after another at the 2006 Turin Games.

Bode Miller has skittered to defeat in his first three ski races. An injured Michelle Kwan had to withdraw before the start of figure skating. Even the U.S. women's hockey team, historically a lock to make the gold-medal game, fell short.

Yet, with many of its stars floundering through the first week of competition, the U.S. team remains on pace to have its second-best Winter Olympics and reach what experts consider to be an impressive medal count.

"We feel good about where we are," said Darryl Seibel, a U.S. Olympic Committee spokesman. "We're up there with perennial Winter Olympic powers."

Through Sunday, the Americans ranked behind only Norway and Germany with 13 medals. They are tied with Germany for most golds with seven.

If their performance has seemed disappointing, it might be because they arrived in Turin under the weight of heightened expectations, thanks to an unprecedented haul at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games.

The team came away from those Olympics with 34 medals, a quantum leap from its previous high of 13 in 1994 and 1998.

A large part of the 2002 success could be attributed to the idiosyncrasies of winter sport, in which the home team benefits not only from crowd support, but also from familiarity with conditions.

All regulation indoor basketball courts have wooden floors with 10-foot hoops at each end. But each mountain is different, with different slopes and types of snow, and each outdoor sliding course has unique characteristics.

So the USOC, despite hiking its budget 10% to about $36.5 million for Turin, declined to make any predictions before these Olympics. It was left to sports experts to declare that the team needed to win 25 or more medals to show continued improvement.

That message got through to the athletes.

"As much as we tried to downplay it, there was no denying the pressure," said Bud Keene, a U.S. snowboard coach. "We talked about it."

Things got off to a bad start with Kwan's withdrawal from women's figure skating. Shortly thereafter, Johnny Weir put himself in position to finish among the top three in the men's competition only to botch his long program. He blamed a lack of inner peace and a malfunctioning aura.

The U.S. wasn't doing any better in another top winter sport — Alpine skiing.

On the second day of competition, Miller finished fifth in the downhill. Though his time was only 0.11 of a second short of the podium, it was a failure in a marquee event.

Perhaps the most scrutinized athlete of these Games, Miller subsequently missed a slalom gate while leading in the combined and, on Saturday, veered out of control after hitting another gate in the super-giant slalom.

Daron Rahlves, a fellow star on a ski team that bills itself as "Best in the World," also had problems.

"It's pretty poor right now," Rahlves said. "I think [the men] should have been able to medal in every event."

But, even as top female skier Lindsey Kildow suffered an injury during a practice run, the team got an unexpected lift when Ted Ligety came from behind to win the combined. He is the only U.S. Alpine skier — male or female — to reach the podium so far.

Snowboarding has fared much better.

Keene, the coach, admits to being worried when he saw Shaun White, a favorite in the men's halfpipe, grow nervously quiet before the event. And when he noticed anxious body language from Hannah Teter, his top women's halfpipe rider.

Both came through with gold-medal performances.

"They rode like champs," he said. "They were poised and killing it."

In the men's moguls, Toby Dawson nailed two 720 aerials to win bronze. American speedskaters Chad Hedrick, Joey Cheek and Shani Davis won gold in rapid succession.

"You've got to be tough," Davis said after his victory in the 1,000 meters Saturday night. "People are skating really well, and you've got to go out there and know you're a tough dude."

Part of the challenge facing the Americans is a greater depth of international talent. Consider the women's hockey team, which lost to Sweden in a semifinal. Turin will mark the first time the U.S. players will miss a gold-medal game since their sport joined the Olympic program in 1998.

"I look at our record against Sweden and Finland and they were close hockey games," defenseman Angela Ruggiero said. "Unfortunately, we ended up on the wrong end of the stick."

That was what Seibel, the USOC official, meant when he said: "We knew this was going to be the most competitive Winter Olympics ever. We knew that nothing was going to be handed to us."

Through the first week, 23 nations won medals, including nontraditional winter competitors such as Australia and China. Estonia had three golds.

Such is the predicament facing American athletes with a week of competition remaining in their big test, trying to prove that they can be a consistent force in the snow and on ice. Their task has been filled with ups and downs.

For Hannah Kearney, a favorite in the women's moguls, that meant wobbling down the hill and failing to qualify for the final. She insisted it was "not the end of the world," then melted into tears.

But more than a third of the medals are yet to be presented — many for events in which the U.S. is expected to contend for a place on the podium. The Americans are within reach of 25 medals.

Miller still has two more races, ski team officials say. Sasha Cohen is still a favorite in women's figure skating.

Even Jacobellis recovered from her internationally televised embarrassment.

After falling to the snow, she hurriedly pushed herself up and glided across the finish line in her snowboard cross final.

"The good news out of that was everyone didn't pass me," she said. "Only one person passed me, so I got the silver."

Snowboardcross gaffe costs U.S. gold medal

BARDONECCIA, Italy – The specter of Leon Lett touched down on the icy women's snowboardcross course Friday.

Lindsey Jacobellis of Stratton, Vt., was swooshing all alone toward an apparent Olympic gold medal in the exhilarating – if not downright crazy – sport when the unthinkable happened.

The 20-year American star went flying off the second-to-last jump on the final straightaway and caught some big air (which is not necessarily good in SBX). She reached down in mid-flight to grab her board, twisting her body a bit as well. To the crowd, it looked like a style move in an American-born sport that thrives on it.

But unlike the halfpipe, snowboardcross isn't at all about style. It's about survival.

After her backside method grab, Jacobellis didn't stick the landing. She caught the backside edge of her board and fell on her back, sliding beyond the blue line marking the course. By the time she scrambled back up, Switzerland's Tanja Frieden was speeding past her to claim the sport's first women's Olympic gold medal.

Jacobellis had to settle for the silver, which nonetheless gave American snowboarders six medals in the Turin Games.

She could have been the fourth U.S. snowboarder to win gold in the Alps, and the second in snowboardcross. Seth Wescott won the men's gold medal on Thursday in the Olympic debut of the thrill-a-minute sport that features four racers going side-by-side down the mountain on a 1,000-yard course with tight, high-banked turns and various jumps.

Jacobellis initially denied she was showboating. She said she was simply trying to stabilize her board against the Alpine wind.

U.S. coach Peter Foley said the same thing.

Two hours after his rider tumbled, Foley changed his story after viewing a sequence of photos shot by The Associated Press.

"She definitely styled that a little too hard," Foley said. "That's probably a little riskier than what you want to do. That was a good, stable grab, but she pulled across too far for it to be safe."

Thus the Lett comparison.

The former Dallas Cowboys defensive lineman will forever be remembered for his hot-dogging gaffe in the 1993 Super Bowl. He picked up a fumble and rumbled toward what should have been a glorious moment in the Cowboys' rout over the Buffalo Bills.

Approaching the end zone, though, he began to strut and raised the ball. Bills receiver Don Beebe swooped in from behind and swatted it out of Lett's hand at the 1-yard line.

Hours after taking the tumble, Jacobellis finally 'fessed up.

"I was caught up in the moment," she said. "I think every now and then you might see something like that. I didn't even think twice.

"I was having fun," she added. "Snowboarding is fun. I was ahead. I wanted to share with the crowd my enthusiasm. I messed up. Oh well, it happens."

Jacobellis' family, which had been cheering in the front row of the bleachers while waving American flags and wearing red, white and blue stovepipe hats, was stunned when she fell.

At the time of her wipeout, Jacobellis had a huge lead over Frieden. Plus, the other two riders in the final had fallen. One, Canadian Maelle Ricker, was injured in a fall early in the run and was taken off the course on a stretcher. She was taken to a hospital in Turin for observation, and released.

Jacobellis' trick was unfortunate because she had survived some scrapes during earlier heats, including one in a curve when her board made contact with that of France's Karine Ruby.

In this sport, one wipeout and it's over.

"When she tangled it up with Karine, I was like, 'Oh, how's she going to stand up?' " Foley said. "And this one, it was like a gift all of a sudden, she was so far in front."

Regardless of the outcome, the last two days were a scintillating debut for snowboardcross.

It's been compared to NASCAR on ice. But this was better than NASCAR, because these riders have pigtails.

The crowd loved every wipeout, and there were plenty.

It's also a sport Yogi Berra would love.

"I was already stoked for silver but I knew I had to concentrate because it's never finished until we're done," Frieden said. "I saw her crash there, and it was like, 'Whoa!' I knew, 'Hey, keep it together, you're not done.' "

Foley agreed.

"I don't think anybody has it until they cross the line. I know better. The whole time I was yelling at the screen, 'Keep racing.' You see it all the time."

The best thing for Jacobellis, of course, would be to come back in 2010 and win the gold medal at Vancouver. She's already achieved fame, having appeared in a credit card commercial that aired plenty before the Turin Games and posing for Seventeen Magazine.

"It's got to be really hard," Foley said. "But I'm proud of her. She rode great all day, and it's not easy. You can see right from the start it's not easy. It's tough the whole way."

Jacobellis was relieved that she at least had a podium finish.

"It was so frustrating because I didn't know how close everyone was. I thought, 'Everyone's going to pass me and I was going to miss any medal. I'm so glad I got a medal."

Minus that pesky backside method grab, it would have been gold.

Roundup: Hot-dogging costs Lindsey Jacobellis gold medal

BY KEVIN FEE

Knight Ridder Newspapers

TURIN, Italy - Lindsey Jacobellis went from gold to silver in one moment she won't want bronzed.

The star of the Visa check-card commercial made a costly mistake near the end of the snowboard cross final, doing a showy toe-grab, and wiped out. She got up and finished in time to cross in second place, but she was left to wonder what might have been.

Tanja Frieden of Switzerland was the beneficiary of Jacobellis' late mishap, moving past her to finish with the gold. Canadian Dominique Maltais recovered from a crash to win the bronze medal.

In figure skating, Emily Hughes feels she has gained inside information while watching from the outside regarding the hype and competition in the Olympic Games.

Hughes was there, high in the stands in Salt Lake City in 2002, when her sister, Sarah, won a gold medal.

Now, after a whirlwind week in which Michelle Kwan pulled out of the Games because of a groin injury, Emily Hughes is preparing for her own Olympic skate. She is here after being elevated from alternate to the U.S. competitive team after Kwan's departure.

The 17-year-old Hughes, who's from Green Neck, N.Y., arrived Thursday afternoon. She spent time later in the day receiving her credentials and Olympic team apparel. At noon Friday in Turin, she met with the media.

"In Salt Lake, my whole family was there to cheer for Sarah," Hughes said. "We were really high in the third tier. ... I think that experience on the outside helped me coming to this Olympics."

She is pleased to get the late call after placing third in the U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

"The Olympics are such an unexpected competition," Hughes said. "You never know what can happen."

Her sister is a good example of that. She surprised everybody by winning the gold medal in Salt Lake City.

"My whole family is so supportive, including Sarah," Hughes said. "They're all going to be here watching. ... Sarah said to have fun and just enjoy. That's what I've been doing since I got here."

Also Friday, one skier made it down a shortened downhill course in the first leg of the Olympic women's Alpine combined event before officials postponed the race due to high winds.

Croatia's Nika Fleiss crashed on the course's first jump. Though Fleiss was able to ski down, race officials huddled and decided to postpone the downhill.

The second part of the race, two slalom legs in the evening, was scheduled to go off as planned.

The combined race features one downhill run and two slalom legs.

World Cup overall leader Janica Kostelic and top U.S. Alpine skier Lindsey Kildow have said they will race in the combined.

Kostelic, who pulled out of the downhill race because she wasn't feeling well, has won the last six combined races she's entered, including gold at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics and the past two world championships.

The Prodigy: Lindsey Jacobellis

Lindsey Jacobellis is the nearly unchallenged champion of snowboard cross, in which four or five competitors race downhill through banked turns and over jumps.

And she can thank her brother for making her so good.

Ben Jacobellis, at 12, was the family's snowboarding pioneer. While on a ski trip near the family's Roxbury, Conn., home, he declared he wanted to ditch two boards for one.

Before long, Lindsey, five years younger than Ben, was itching to try snowboarding, too.

"I didn't pick it up as easily as he did and, quite frankly, that made me very upset," she said.

But by the time she turned 10, she was ready for Friday night "boardercross" competitions at Stratton Mountain in Vermont. The only girl racing in the 12-and-under category, she often finished in the top three. The next season, she often won.

"Lucky Lindsey" went on to become a three-time world champion (2003-2005) and is a medal favorite heading into the Winter Games.

A technically sound stylist, Jacobellis has a high profile heading into Turin, thanks to her role in a Visa commercial that has been on TV the past few weeks.

The 20-year-old had won three straight titles at the Winter X Games, but she strained her knee last month during practice for this year's competition. Instead of risking further injury with the Olympics less than two weeks away, she decided to pull out of the X Games.

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TV Starts to Look Like Internet Protocol TV
February 10, 2006
By Chris Marlowe

Many telecom operators are turning to Internet Protocol Television to salvage a bottom line ravaged by mobile phones and even Voice-over Internet Protocol, but they might be missing the potential gold mine of the platform's advanced home entertainment services.

That was one key conclusion of a report from market research and consulting firm Parks Associates. "Making TV Meaningful: Consumers and IPTV Applications" also forecasts that by year's end, nearly 13 million households will subscribe to multichannel IP video offerings, a market that will grow to about 70 million households by the end of 2010.

Much of this will be driven by video-on-demand, gaming, interactive responses and other entertainment-related features, resulting in a competitive edge for IPTV over satellite or cable. "Operators have found success from their 'one bill' approach for triple-play service (which includes voice, data and wireless)," the report said. "But ... consumers attach more value when it comes to video."

Telcos already have slashed the pricing on triple-play packages as far as they can, the report authors Deepa Iyer and Kurt Scherf said. To remain profitable in the long run, however, they must provide a more compelling product.

Cable operators have a head start in this direction. In addition to popular and current programming, the report points to such VOD offerings as children's, instructional and educational programming as ideal content for this, because they do not depend on being fresh and they serve to further differentiate cable from its satellite competition.

It seems to be working. Parks Associates found 41% of digital cable subscribers used VOD at least once a month during second-quarter 2005, up from 28% a year ago.

Satellite providers are pulling ahead, using exclusive and strategic content offerings as its most significant differentiator, the report said. This is especially true of Sunday Ticket, the optional NFL programming available in the U.S. from DirecTV.

"Parks Associates research has shown that current satellite TV subscribers are more likely to rate their satisfaction with the level of programming choices at or above a level provided by current digital cable subscribers, despite the wide variety of on-demand offerings from their cable competitors," the report said.

IPTV lets providers offer unlimited amounts of highly targeted content, but it's difficult to measure how avidly viewers want these options because the concept is poorly understood. Iyer and Scherf said most consumers assume video delivered over the Internet must be watched on a computer and are therefore unfavorably disposed to the idea. Once they understand IPTV better, the authors expect the numbers to grow.

Even with that caveat, 23% of respondents in Parks Associates' "Digital Entertainment: Changing Consumer Habits" study said they were very or extremely interested in the ability to obtain comedy programs from an IPTV service. Educational programs got a thumbs up from 18%, with a tie at 16% for family entertainment programs and music and plays. Interestingly, just 13% would like U.S.-based sporting events.

Coming Thursday: Pandemonium on a board

By THOM GABRUKIEWICZ
Scripps Howard News Service
14-FEB-06

BARDONECCHIA, Italy -- The Winter Olympics first went X Games in Nagano, Japan in 1998, when snowboard halfpipe was introduced.

But you ain't seen nothing yet.

Snowboard cross, or SBX, makes its Olympic debut here Thursday with the men's SBX (the ladies _ with U.S. darling Lindsey Jacobellis of Stratton Mountain, Vt., leading the way _ race on Friday).

What is this wild new sport? Pandemonium on a board, where four snowboarders fight their way down a motocross-style course for all the glory. The event is held tournament-style, meaning that the last four riders to survive fight for medals _ and one rider goes home empty-handed.

Almost anything goes, as the contestants vie for the perfect line down a course filled with jumps, tabletops and banked curves.

"It's a four-man race and the top two guys advance and the bottom two go home," said Nate Holland of Squaw Valley, Calif. "It's a cutthroat world out there. The courses are difficult enough to ride by yourself, but add the factor of three racers riding right along next to you.

"It makes for a great spectator sport."

Like the halfpipe, this is one sport where U.S. riders are expected to medal.

"I have my own high expectations," said Jacobellis, maybe the most recognizable SBX rider, what with her Visa commercial.

On the men's side, the man to beat is Seth Wescott of Carrabassett Valley, Maine.

"Coming in as the reigning world champion, I have high goals set," Wescott said. "It's a great opportunity. The bigger the event, I tend to have better results."

Rounding out the men's squad are Jayson Hale of Sugarbowl, Calif., Jason Smith of Basalt, Colo., and Graham Watanabe of Sun Valley, Idaho. Joining Jacobellis on course will be Leslee Olson of Bend, Ore.

How brash are the extreme-team U.S. SBX racers? Plenty.

"We're just the best SBX team," Hale said. "And there's Lindsey, who will get a medal, too.

_Contact Thom Gabrukiewicz at tgabrukiewicz(at)redding.com.

"I'm nervous, but I never show it like in the Visa commercial," Jacobellis said Thursday. "That's pretty exaggerated.

"I really get a horrible feeling at the start. I feel the nerves, the anxiety, the adrenaline. That works for me, fires me up and makes me even more aggressive. And snowboardcross is an aggressive sport."

Gutsy Olympian's quest for gold spells marketing dream

By Pete Thomas
Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times
Published February 12, 2006

Lindsey Jacobellis vs. the world.

That's what it has come down to for the fearless 20-year-old from Stratton, Vt., the term in this case describing her win-at-all-costs style in a snowboard slalom during which riders careen shoulder to shoulder in a jump-filled dash to the finish.

Jacobellis, 20, is the lone entry on the U.S. women's team, so the nation's hopes for a gold medal in this new Olympic event rest solely on her shoulders.

Her success has been such--she's the reigning world champion, the 2005 overall Grand Prix champion and three-time X Games champion--that anything but gold will be a disappointment.

If that's not enough pressure, corporate sponsors have taken a liking to this appealing athlete. Jacobellis, in fact, has already signed endorsement deals with Visa, the primary sponsor of the Turin Games; Dunkin' Donuts, Kellogg's Frosted Flakes and Paul Mitchell hair products.

"I think, because the way the sport is going, if she doesn't do as well as we think she will, the opportunities will still be out there because snowboarding as a sport is growing and growing," says Jacobellis' agent, Josh Schwartz.

"But on the flip side, if she wins a gold medal in the new event and she's America's darling, then the upside is tremendous."

Translation: If things go well, she could soon be pulling in a high six-figure salary.

Jacobellis spent her early childhood as a skier and had only dabbled in snowboarding until the family vacation home burned in 1998, destroying the skis. Older brother Ben, who had taken up snowboarding, persuaded the parents to replace the skis with snowboards and Lindsey had to comply.

"I think that things happen for a reason," she says. "I may have taken up snowboarding anyway, but it might have taken a lot longer. Or it might not have happened at all."

"Benny" Jacobellis was also at least partially responsible for igniting the competitive fire in his sister's 5-foot-5 frame.

They were raised in the farming community of Roxbury, Conn. Houses were far apart, so after school they had only each other to play with. Ben, being a boy and five years older, played hard. Lindsey soon found herself playing just as hard.

This spiritedness spilled onto the slopes andsoon the Jacobellis siblings entered the Friday night boardercross series at Stratton Mountain.

Lindsey had to compete against boys because there was no bracket for young girls. It was scary at first, she says, because no boy wanted to lose to a girl. But eventually she was beating the boys.

She enrolled at Stratton Mountain School, a college prep facility and skiing and snowboarding academy, and although she couldn't have known it then, that put her on course for the Turin Games.

At 15, she won the boardercross competition--boardercross is the same as snowboard cross--at the U.S. Open in Stratton, on a steep and icy course so potentially dangerous that nearly half of her rivals chose not to race.

At 16, she claimed the overall title in the Junior World Championships in New Zealand. At 17 she won her first Winter X Games gold and graduated from Stratton Mountain School, receiving the Founder's Award for academic and athletic excellence. She was also accepted at the University of Vermont.

At 18, she competed in her first World Cup event, taking second in the halfpipe competition in Chile. At her second X Games, she became the first athlete to compete in three snowboarding disciplines, taking first in boardercross, fourth in halfpipe and 13th in slopestyle.

During another World Cup competition in Japan she won both boardercross events and the halfpipe competition to become the first snowboarder from any country to sweep an event in two disciplines.

Last year she won the snowboard cross World Championships at Whistler, Canada, and was also the U.S. Snowboard Grand Prix overall champion.

Also last year, she won her third consecutive X Games gold medal, which was testament to her inner strength. Ben's board was swept out by a competitor in a sharp turn. His head slammed onto the ice and he lay motionless for more than a minute.

Lindsey was in the gate, awaiting the start of the women's race, and she assumed the delay had been caused by injury to her brother because she had heard the other racers' names called as they crossed the finish.

Ben would later be found to have suffered a moderate concussion. Lindsey went on to win her race and afterward told reporters, "I knew Benny wouldn't want me to back down or be worried at all because he gets mad at me even if I just ask him if he's OK."

Since then, her focus has been on qualifying for the U.S. team in halfpipe and snowboard cross. She fell just short of that goal but qualified for the snowboard cross team in September.

Says Seth Wescott, the reigning men's world champion, "Lindsey has just been pushed ... to a level beyond where any of the other women of the world are right now."

Thus the biggest question remaining:Can she push herself to the levelof Olympic champion?

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-0602120277feb12,1,5446054.story?coll=chi-business-hed

Lindsey Jacobellis To Achieve BigTime Status!!!

The beautiful and talented Lindsey Jacobellis is set to achieve BigTime Status as she goes for the Gold at the 2006 Winter Olympics!