American Women Duplicate Men's Success in the Halfpipe

One day after the US Men won the gold and silver medals in the halfpipe, the US Women did the same as Hannah Teter won the gold medal while Gretchen Bleiler netted the silver medal. The women fell one frontside 900 short of a sweep of the medals like the men had in the 2002 Games. Kelly Clark, the 2002 gold medalist fell on her final trick despite getting huge air in her run, ruining a possible medal worthy run. Kjersti Buaas of Norway won the bronze medal.

In the 500m speed skating event, the United States won another gold medal as Joey Cheek blew away the rest of the field. Cheek had times of under 35 seconds for each of his two races and was the only skater to break the 35 second mark on the track, viewed as slow by some. The margin of victory for Cheek was .65 seconds, a virtual lifetime in speed skating. After winning the gold, Cheek announced that he would donate the bonus of $25,000 that the USOC gives to gold medal winners to Right to Play, an organization formed by Johann Olav Koss (Koss is The Boss!)

In the pair's figure skating competition, there was no sign of the controversy that marred the 2002 competition. Russia's Tatiana Totmianina and Maxim Marinin, the two-time world champions, blew away their competitors, winning the event by 14.75 points. Two Chinese pairs finished won the silver and bronze medals. The Chinese pair, Zhang Dan and Zhang Hao, put on a gutsy performance after a horrendous looking fall to win the silver medal. American champions Rena Inoue and John Baldwin, who landed the Olympics' first throw triple axel in the short competition, did not come close to winning a medal.

As if being shut out of the medals in Sunday's men's downhill wasn't bad enough for the US Ski Team, Lindsey Kildow, who is considered a medal contender for three alpine skiing events, went down in a training run for the women's downhill. She had potentially serious fall while racing down the mountain at about 50 mph when it seemed like Kidlow caught an edge and then hit a rise in the course and went airborne. Kidlow, who was airlifted from the ski venue, had a severe hip injury and a pelvic contusion, according to the ski team's medical director. Kidlow has yet to rule out competing in Wednesday's race, the Super G or the combined events.

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