Olympic Notes: USATF's Web Site Providing Valuable Updates
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Writer Lauds USA Track & Field's Web
Site For Its Coverage Of Olympic Trials |
In San Antonio, David King writes USA Track & Field, through its Web site, USATF.org, is “doing a fine job online with its reporting on the U.S. Olympic trials” in Eugene, Oregon. The reports “have been handy, to say the least, from breaking news reports to updates on record performances to daily roundups” (SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS, 7/1).
TRACKING CHANGES: In L.A., Helene Elliott wrote of the U.S. Track & Field Trials, “For the sake of the team the U.S. will send to the Beijing Games, please let this event turn out to have been honest and fair and accomplished without having anyone having resorted to chemical enhancement. If it wasn’t, track and field is dead. If it was, it could signal the beginning of a wonderful new era for a sport that has never quite known how to promote itself.” Elliott wrote track and field currently “has been blessed with a legion of skillful and appealing athletes who can sell the sport with their vitality and vigor” (L.A. TIMES, 6/30).
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China Mint Offering 22-Pound
Beijing Olympic Gold Coin |
WORTH ITS WEIGHT IN GOLD: In St. Paul, Nicole Garrison-Sprenger writes a 22-pound gold coin commemorating the Beijing Games is available at GovMint.com at a cost of $1M. The coin -- with the Beijing 2008 Games logo on one side and an image of a "Chinese temple towering above Olympic athletes" on the other -- is one of only 29 issued, and the only one released for sale in the U.S. (ST. PAUL PIONEER PRESS, 7/1).
OLYMPIC LOCKDOWN? In L.A., Barbara Demick writes as the Beijing Olympics near, “foreigners are discovering that the welcome mat they had expected is being abruptly rolled up.” More difficult visa renewal processes have meant “thousands of foreigners have been kicked out” of China. An exact figure on “how many foreigners must leave China remains unclear.” Also, “most Chinese embassies and consulates are no longer issuing visas with more than 30-day validity and prospective tourists now have to show hotel reservations, plane tickets and other documentation.” China-based Danwei.org Founder & Editor and media analyst Jeremy Goldkorn: “You have sort of an Olympic lockdown. The Chinese have decided they can’t leave anything to chance so they’ve shut down a lot of Beijing” (L.A. TIMES, 7/1).
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