Olympics Page 12 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

SafeSport Says It Found Culture Of "Grooming And Abuse" In Figure Skating
The U.S. Center for SafeSport declared on Monday to USA Today that it had uncovered “a culture in figure skating that allowed grooming and abuse to go unchecked for too long” while it was investigating sexual misconduct allegations against national pairs champion John Coughlin, among other cases....

Olympic Skier Caught With A Needle In His Arm During Blood Doping Raid<em></em>
Boy, it’d suck to be this guy. German and Austrian officials conducted a doping raid at the Nordic skiing world championships last week in Seefeld, Austria. Five skiers and four other people were arrested at the championships, while German authorities claim they also arrested the alleged ringleader ...

Olympic Skier Caught With A Needle In His Arm During Blood Doping Raid<em></em>
Boy, it’d suck to be this guy. German and Austrian officials conducted a doping raid at the Nordic skiing world championships last week in Seefeld, Austria. Five skiers and four other people were arrested at the championships, while German authorities claim they also arrested the alleged ringleader ...

The Obsession With Caster Semenya's Body Was Racist From The Very Beginning
A week before the 2012 Olympics, a group of researchers and academics gathered for the International Convention on Science, Education, and Medicine in Sport in Glasgow, just over 400 miles north of London, where the Games were being held. One of those athletes was South African runner Caster Semenya...

The Obsession With Caster Semenya's Body Was Racist From The Very Beginning
A week before the 2012 Olympics, a group of researchers and academics gathered for the International Convention on Science, Education, and Medicine in Sport in Glasgow, just over 400 miles north of London, where the Games were being held. One of those athletes was South African runner Caster Semenya...

President Of Gymnastics' Athletes' Commission Says Abuse Survivors Are In It For The Money
Liubou Charkashyna, the president of the International Gymnastics Federation’s athletes’ commission—which was created to represent gymnasts’ interests—used a recent interview with Belarussian media to express skepticism about the frequency of abuse in sports and victims’ motives....

President Of Gymnastics' Athletes' Commission Says Abuse Survivors Are In It For The Money
Liubou Charkashyna, the president of the International Gymnastics Federation’s athletes’ commission—which was created to represent gymnasts’ interests—used a recent interview with Belarussian media to express skepticism about the frequency of abuse in sports and victims’ motives....

Harvard Runner Turns His Foot Into Ground Beef After Winning 3,000-Meter Race With One Shoe
In the first lap of the Ivy League Heptagonal Championships’ 3,000-meter race, Harvard distance runner Kieran Tuntivate abandoned his left shoe when it came loose around 300 meters into his run. Electing to go without the shoe meant that Tuntivate had to complete the rest of that competition while e...

Harvard Runner Turns His Foot Into Ground Beef After Winning 3,000-Meter Race With One Shoe
In the first lap of the Ivy League Heptagonal Championships’ 3,000-meter race, Harvard distance runner Kieran Tuntivate abandoned his left shoe when it came loose around 300 meters into his run. Electing to go without the shoe meant that Tuntivate had to complete the rest of that competition while e...

Olympic Athletes Are Trying To Get A Seat At The Bargaining Table
Athlete representatives in the U.S. Olympic movement recently met in the basement of an airport hotel in Chicago to discuss the next step in mobilizing against their respective chartered national governing bodies and the USOC—creating a union....

Michigan Attorney General Takes Over Investigation Of Former Olympic Gymnastics Coach John Geddert
The Michigan attorney general’s office, which oversaw the criminal case of disgraced gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar, has taken over the investigation of gymnastics coach John Geddert. Geddert owned Twistars USA Gymnastics Club in Lansing, Mich., and coached the U.S. women’s team in the 2012 Olympics...

SafeSport: Why Would Anyone Expect Our Paid Employees To Investigate Abuse?
Four women are suing USA Taekwondo, the U.S. Olympic Committee, and the U.S. Center for SafeSport for their roles in ignoring repeated reports of sexual abuse by Taekwondo star coach Jean Lopez and his brother, Olympic medalist Steven Lopez, going back to 1996. SafeSport has asked to be dismissed f...

Despite Claims To The Contrary, The IAAF Is Still Persecuting Caster Semenya
The Times reported yesterday that the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) will argue in front of the Court for Arbitration for Sport (CAS) that Caster Semenya, the 2016 Olympic champion in the 800 meters, is “biologically male.” The IAAF quickly issued a statement denying this c...

Japanese Sports Official Worries That Olympic Excitement Will Decrease Because Star Swimmer Was Diagnosed With Leukemia
This week Japanese swimming star Rikako Ikee announced that she has been diagnosed with leukemia and is starting treatment for the cancer. Ikee, 18, won six gold medals at the 2018 Asians and was expected to contend for several medals at the 2020 Olympics, which are being hosted in Tokyo....

SafeSport Has Closed Its Investigation Of Pairs Skater John Coughlin Due To His Death
The U.S. Center for SafeSport announced today that it was ending its investigation into multiple reports of sexual misconduct involving former pairs skater John Coughlin. SafeSport had placed Coughlin on an interim suspension in January after three people reported his possible sexual misconduct to t...

More Than Two Years After The Games, Rio's Olympic Debt Keeps Rising
Just because the Olympics are long over doesn’t mean that we’re done with the fallout from the Rio de Janeiro Games. According to a report from Brazil, the debt incurred by the local organizing committee has dramatically increased to more than three times the original estimate. In December 2016, the...

Jamaican Distance Runner Kemoy Campbell Collapses While Pacing Men's 3000m At Millrose Games
Saturday afternoon’s Millrose Games had to be temporarily put on hold when Jamaican distance runner Kemoy Campbell collapsed while performing his rabbiting, or pacing, duties during the men’s 3000-meter race. ...

Senator Boasts About How Happy He Is That SafeSport's Conflict Of Interest Is Getting Worse
When Congress authorized the U.S. Center for SafeSport, it decided to not directly fund the organization that was supposed to independently investigate sexual abuse across all Olympic sports. Instead, it set up a grant—which, it turns out, couldn’t be used to pay for the investigators that SafeSport...

Head Of International Ski Federation Denies Climate Change, Says It's Easier To Work With Dictators<em></em>
In an interview with Tages Anzeiger ahead of the alpine world championships, Gian-Franco Kasper, the president of the International Ski Federation, forwarded some opinions about climate change, immigrants, and working with dictators. The interview amounts to an all-you-can-eat buffet of batshit thin...

Gymnastics Doesn't Need A Safety Valve
This weekend, UCLA women’s gymnastics defeated their Pac-12 rival Oregon State in Corvallis, which was hardly an unexpected result given that the Bruins were ranked third heading into the competition and the Beavers were 20th. En route to this victory, the Bruins scored 197.9, a season high for them...