The Sochi Olympics opened with a celebration of Russia’s past greatness and hopes for future glory, especially for a group of athletes who marched into a rollicking seaside stadium during the opening ceremony with no shortage of pride.
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Gold-medal hockey goalie great Vladislav Tretiak and three-time figure skating gold medalist Irina Rodnina ran out of the stadium and joined hands to light the towering Olympic cauldron.
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In a new type of culture war, about 5,000 cups of Greek yogurt from Team USA sponsor Chobani isn’t getting to Sochi because of a customs dispute. U.S. halfpipe skier Aaron Blunck said that for traveling athletes, getting food from home is part of feeling fit and healthy. Russian authorities said the U.S. Department of Agriculture has refused to provide a certificate that is required for dairy products.
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Norwegian skiers thought the biathlon track was too short, and they were right. The loop at the Laura Cross-Country Ski and Biathlon Center should measure 1.6 miles, but they had to add 130 feet. The venue hosted a World Cup biathlon event last year, but the shape of the course has been modified since.
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The first five medals at Sochi will be awarded Saturday: the men’s 5,000-meter speedskating, where Sven Kramer of the Netherlands opens defense of his lone Olympic title; the men’s 10-kilometer sprint in biathlon; the women’s moguls, the men’s slopestyle final; and the women’s 15-kilometer skiathlon, where Marit Bjorgen of Norway, the most successful athlete of the Vancouver Games with three golds, a silver and a bronze, leads a strong Norwegian team.
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Austria and the United States completed their squads for the Olympic men’s downhill.
Steven Nyman earned the fourth and final U.S. spot, edging out Erik Fisher and Jared Goldberg with a solid training run Friday. He joins Travis Ganong, Bode Miller and Marco Sullivan.
The Austrians will go with Max Franz, Klaus Kroell, Matthias Mayer and Georg Streitberger for Sunday’s race. Mayer was the fastest through the tricky course during Friday’s training.
U.S. coach Sasha Rearick said he used the second training session as a “one-run shootout,” with Nyman tied for 18th. Fisher and Goldberg wound up several spots behind.
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Fabienne Suter of Switzerland led the second women’s downhill training session Friday at the Olympics, which went off without problem after a key jump was shaved down.
Suter clocked 1 minute, 42.70 seconds. Tina Weirather of Liechtenstein was second, 0.11 behind, and Anna Fenninger of Austria was third, 0.23 behind, although she missed some gates.
Suter has won four World Cup races but only one of those was in downhill, in Bansko, Bulgaria, five years ago.
After Thursday’s opening session was delayed and then re-run because of the height of the final jump, organizers cut it down to a minor bump.
Defending overall World Cup champion Tina Maze was fifth, and American teammates Stacey Cook and Julia Mancuso placed sixth and 10th, respectively.
Current overall leader Maria Hoefl-Riesch was 11th.
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Heidi Kloser of Vail had to pull out of the Olympics after injuring her right leg during a training run before moguls qualifying.
Kloser tore knee ligaments and broke her femur after a crash Thursday night, only moments before she was supposed to head to the starting gate.
Kloser’s father, Mike, posting on his Facebook page, said Heidi asked him if he still considered her an Olympian even though she didn’t make it to the starting line in her first games.
“We said, of course she is,” Mike Kloser said.
The 21-year-old Kloser was fourth in the World Cup standings coming into the Olympics.
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Jesse Vetter is back in goal for the U.S. women’s hockey team.
The No. 1 goaltender when the Americans played Canada in the gold-medal game in Vancouver four years ago will get the start when USA will open the Sochi Olympics against Finland on Saturday.
“She’s just playing great,” U.S. coach Katey Stone said Friday after the team’s final full practice before the opener. “She’s doing her job, and we just decided to go with Jesse.”
Vetter was a three-time NCAA champion at Wisconsin and the winner of the 2009 Patty Kazmaier Award given to the top player in women’s college hockey. She went 3-1 with the U.S. Olympic team that won a silver medal in Vancouver in 2010.
Backups Brianne McLaughlin and Molly Schaus also were on the U.S. team four years ago.
Vetter allowed one goal on 42 shots in three games before a 2-0 loss to Canada in the gold-medal game.
This year, the Americans will open with Finland, which is a favorite to reach the medal round in Sochi.
Associated Press
