Tuesday, September 19.2000
The University Daily Kansan
Section A • Page 5
Olympics
for comments, contact Lori O'Otoole at 864-4810 or e-mail editor@kansan.com
Five lifters reinstated
Olympic officials seek out drug-using competitors
The Associated Press
SYDNEY, Australia — A day after the entire team was banned for drug violations, five "clean" Romanian weightlifters were reinstated for the Sydney Games when their Olympic committee agreed to pay a $50,000 fine.
On Sunday, the International Weightlifting
The IOC and international and national federations all were in apparent conflict in the case of the Romanian weightlifting team.
Federation announced the entire seven-person Romanian team had been banned after two lifters tested positive for the banned steroid handrolone in out-of-competition controls prior to the games.
A third Romanian lifter had failed a test earlier this year and was left off the team.
The IWF said it was invoking its "three-strikes-and-out" policy under which a national federation is suspended for a year in the event of three positive cases in 12 months.
The money was put up by Ion Tiriac, the former fiery tennis star who now is president of Romania's national Olympic committee.
"I am not going to punish those who are not guilty for the ones that are guilty." Tiriaa said. "For the
athletes that worked for four years — I have no right to say, 'Because someone else did wrong, you are going to be punished.'
IOC Sports Director Gilbert Felli said he had received a satisfactory verbal explanation from IWF leaders.
"This thing is clear: The two athletes who are positive will be expelled," Felli said. "There's no doubt about that. It was only the sanction against the federation for the other athletes that was unclear."
IOC spokesman Franklin Servan-Schreiber dismissed suggestions that the reinstatements signaled a softening in the fight against doping.
"There is no message in punishing people who are innocent," he said. "Being tough doesn't mean being unfair. What's important is to catch the cheats and that that's done."
Tiricac said he would continue to pursue a zero-tolerance policy against drug users.
"The these people are not cheating us or this competition," he said. "These athletes are cheating the world. I prefer to have one clean medal than have five dirty medals."
In another high-profile doping case, former Olympic 5.000-meter champion Dieter Baumann of Germany was ruled out of the games after losing his appeal against a four-year suspension for steroid use. An arbitration panel of track and field's international governing body upheld Baumann's two-year doping suspension.
The International Amateur Athletic Federation panel rejected Baumann's defense that someone spiked his toothpaste with a precursor for nandrolone.
Baumann, 35, had hoped to be reinstated in time to compete in his fourth Olympics. In other developments:
— The World Anti-Doping Authority (WADA) said one more athlete who tested positive in out-of-competition controls could be identified and expelled today.
- Nine Olympians have been suspended for drug use found in pre-games tests, including six banned from the athletes' village. Schamasch said.
Kansas athletes win at Olympics
Two Kansas athletes were victorious in their events Sunday at the Olympics in Australia. One of them is bringing home a silver medal.
Tara Nott, of Stilwell, won a silver medal in women's weightlifting at 106 pounds in Sydney. Nott, 28, lifted a total of 407 pounds in the first women's weightlifting event at the Olympics. Her total was the same as Indonesia's Lisa Rumbewas, but Nott took the silver because of lower body weight.
Worms gobble up garbage
The Associated Press
■ Tara Nott: Silwell resident,
women's weightlifting
■ Christie Ambrosi: Overland
Park resident, U.S. softball
team
Nott, a former gymnast and soccer player, had never finished higher than ninth in the world championships. Her medal was the United States' first in weightlifting since 1984. The U.S. softball team defeat
Bulgaria's Izabela Dragneva captured the gold with a total lift of 419 pounds.
KANSAS PARTICIPANTS
Blacktown, Australia. Overland Park's Christie Ambrosi is a left fielder for the team.
comes out is better than what goes in. The byproduct, vermicast, is as rich as anything around the Olympic Village. It'll be used to fertilize soil on Australian farms.
The win comes one day after the Americans opened the Olympic softball tournament with the games' first solo nohitter — a 6-0 victory against Canada.
Ambrosi, 24, had 103 hits as a UCLA junior in 1999, which broke Olympic teammate Jennifer Brundage's four-year-old school record for hits in a season. In the 1999 NCAA Women's College World Series, Ambrosi played center field as top-ranked UCLA beat Washington and captured its eighth NCAA softball title.
The Associated Press
Olympics environmental officials said the worms were the best way to promote the Green Olympics that Sydney promised when it vied to become the city for the 2000 Summer Games.
Call 'em Ring Worms: the Olympic equivalent of hundreds of thousands of tiny vacuum cleaners, devouring anything organic in their path. They work all but silently, squishing a bit if you put 'em near your ear. Most people don't.
The SOCOG, the Olympic organizing committee, is putting its faith in the creatures. At its 2,000-person headquarters, they've chewed on shredded documents since 1998, worming more than 90 percent of the site's secure papers into oblivion.
"People don't realize it's there, but it's silently chewing away," is the ominous assessment from Peter Ottesen, the organizing committee's environment program manager.
Good advice for any restaurateur. But these particular diners, who cluster by the thousands behind eating areas at the Olympics, won't be leaving a tip — only a pile of dirt.
Garbage in, garbage out, it's said. But here, what
SYDNEY, Australia — Keep the temperature comfortable; if they start to sweat, they won't eat as much. Don't stress them out, either, or the chowing-down will ebb. And if they mingle and look lively, you'll know they're having a good time.
Other initiatives, while less attractive, are equally determined. Everything from solar-powered lodging to endangered-species protection to responsible irrigation is documented in a 60-page government guide.
These are, after all, worms — worms that are eating their way through Olympic garbage morsel by delicious, rotting morsel. And here's the kicker: They're supposed to be there.
In refrigerator-size units behind four key Olympic sites—the Sydney organizing committee headquarters, the Main Press Center, the International Broadcast Center and the Olympic Park Novotel three varieties of earthworms work around the clock, chewing through more than a ton of scraps to help realize Sydney's promise of an environmentally conscious games.
The U.S. softball team dete-
tated Cuba, 3-0, Sunday in
But they consume and process about 500 pounds of waste per week. So far, it's kept nearly three tons of waste out of landfills.
Organizers aim to recycle 80 percent of the expected 5,500 tons of Olympic-generated waste, according to SOCOG's Patrick Fletcher. Only a small amount will be devoured by the worms, which are a pilot project.
Scott sees this becoming the major alternative to traditional composting. Future sporting events, he envisions, would employ battalions of garbage-chewing worms. He can see it now: Turin, Athens, Salt Lake City, all replete with delicious garbage ready for the munching.
And he's not worried his boy will get full.
"So far," he said, "they're always hungry."
Competitor tells tale of friend's sacrifice
The Associated Press
SYDNEY, Australia — How many times have we heard athletes say it? Sure, we're friends, they explain. But out there in the ring, or pool or court or field, it's all business.
Not for Esther Kim.
The striking 20-year-old taekwondo athlete from Houston has become famous for a very different kind of sports story, one of sacrifice in the name of friendship. She told it to Oprah Winfrey, and now she's telling it at the Olympics, as an honored guest at the games.
Yesterday, facing a roomful of journalists, Kim and her best friend, Kay Poe, were all giggles and stolen glances. Long gone were the tears that engulfed them on May 20.
That was the day they were pitted against each other in the final match of the flyweight category at the U.S. Olympic trials. Only one would get to represent the United States in Sydney.
But this wasn't just a story of two pals having to compete for a prize. There was a twist. Poel, 18, had dislocated her kneecap in the previous match. As she sat with Kim in the holding area, the joint began to swell. She could barely walk, let alone
fight.
So Kim announced her plan. She would bow out so her friend could go to the Olympics.
"Kay has always pushed a little harder and wanted it a little more," she explained at the time.
It was especially heartbreaking for Kim's father, Jin Won Kim, who was coach to both women. But he supported his daughter's decision and told her he was proud.
"In taekwondo, winning isn't everything," he said of the martial art that is heavy on kicking.
Now, all three are in Sydney. It didn't take long for the story to travel to Winfrey, who played host to the young women on her television show, and then to Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the International Olympic Committee, who invited Kim to come to the games.
For now, Kim seems content telling her tale. She insists she has no regrets.
"For the first time in my life, I felt like a champion," she said of the moment she made her decision.
"She may have a gold medal around her neck," Kim added. "But I'll have one in my heart."
Kim plans to be there when her pal fights Wednesday, Sept. 27, and she said her dream was to see Poe bring home the gold.
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