Canada wins a gold, 2 sliver and a bronze on the track

Day 15


Medal Count
#---Country----------Gold---Silver---Bronze-----Total
1---Germany-----------11-----12---------6-------29
2---United States------9------9---------7-------25
3---Canada-------------7-----10---------7-------24
4---Austria------------9------7---------6-------22
5---Russia-------------8------5---------8-------21
6---Norway-------------2------8---------9-------19

Canadian Women Win Gold and Bronze in 5,000

Canada's Clara Hughes poured on the speed over the final lap to snatch the gold medal away from teammate Cindy Klassen in the women's 5,000 metres at the Torino Olympic Winter Games. With Klassen having set the time to beat, Hughes, 33, pulled away from three-time defending champion Claudia Pechstein to win Saturday's final pairing in six minutes, 59.07 seconds – and her first-ever gold medal.

"I just believed in myself until the last stride," a beaming Hughes told CBC Sports. "It almost killed me, but that's what it took to win the Olympics today."

It was a remarkably display of determination as Hughes trailed by nearly four seconds midway through the 12 1/2 lap marathon.

"The race started with five laps to go and that's when I knew it was going to hurt and that's when I knew I could fight," she said. "I just believed in myself and knew that my strength would be in the finish."

Hughes looked remarkably strong on the bell lap, powering her way around the Oval Lingotto to erase a 1.86-second deficit and win by 1.01 seconds.

"I just bided my time," she explained. "Every lap, I fought to keep my good technique and I knew the last lap I could outpace anyone."


Pechstein, from Germany, settled for the silver medal and bumped Klassen to bronze.

Interesting footnote: Hughes also nudged out Klassen to clinch the bronze in the 5,000 at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.

"It was the same as in Salt Lake City, where I just felt like my body and brain went to a whole other planetary system," said Hughes.

Klassen set Canadian records with five medals at Turin and six all told, but so did Hughes as the first multiple-medallist in both the Summer and Winter Olympics.


Hughes claimed silver in last week's team pursuit, to go with two bronze she won in cycling at the 1996 Atlanta Summer Games.

"My whole time here, I had to remind myself that I am a speed skater now," Hughes said. "And I should not be afraid to be the best in the world.

"If you dream and you allow yourself to dream, you truly can do anything. And that's what this gold medal represents."

Kristina Groves wound up sixth overall, but still leaves Turin with silvers medals in the 1,500 and team pursuit. Klassen, who clocked 7:00.57 was, unquestionably, the story of the Games, departing Turin as Canada's most prolific Olympian ever. She also won gold in the 1,500, silvers in the 1,000 and the inaugural team pursuit, and bronze in the 3,000. Klassen is the first Canadian athlete to win five medals in a single Olympics and the first with six overall. Her career total surpasses that of runner Phil Edwards and speed skater Marc Gagnon, who won five apiece over three Olympics. Klassen eclipsed the career mark over two Olympics and, only 27 years old, could add to her haul at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games.

Canadians have won silver medals in the men's 5,000-metre relay and the men's 500-metre sprint.
The relay team finished second with a time of six minutes, 43.707 seconds on Saturday.

The powerful South Korean squad (6:43.376) won the gold and the Americans (6:47.990) claimed the bronze. When the Koreans and Canadians crossed the line, the Americans and Italians were trailing by a half-lap.

The Canadians set a world record (6:39.990) en route to victory at the world championships last March. The team has some of the world's strongest skaters, including Eric Bedard, Charles Hamelin, Francois-Louis Tremblay and Mathieu Turcotte, who is ranked sixth overall in the world. Jonathan Guilmette is also on the team but didn't skate in the final.

"We are six days a week all together, 11 months," Bedard said. "We do everything together – the parties, the dinners, the training, the travel, the competitions. Everybody wanted to be proud of themselves."

The Canadian men set an Olympic record (6:45.455) at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games and came home with the gold medal. South Korean team member Ahn Hyun-Soo collected his third gold medal of the Torino Games. He also won the 1,000 and the 1,500.

Men's 500

Earlier, Tremblay won the silver medal in the men's 500. Tremblay finished in a time of 42.002 seconds, just back of gold-medal winner Apolo Anton Ohno (41.935) of the United States. South Korean Ahn (42.089) was third, narrowly edging Canadian Bedard (42.093), who finished fourth.

"This is my own medal and I'm really, really happy to have it," said Tremblay. "The other one feels just as great but it's different. It's a team medal. I'm happy with both, I guess."

"When I won the 1,000 and the 1,500, I was very happy," said Ahn. "I felt the expectations from people for me to aim to be a quadruple champion, but in the 500, it's my weakest race. To have won the bronze gives me very much joy."

The race was expected to be a showdown between Ahn and China's Li JiaJun. Ahn is now ranked first overall in this event, while Li is ranked second. But Li was disqualified in the semifinal. Tremblay is the reigning world champion and is ranked fourth in the world, one spot behind Bedard. Ohno is ranked fifth in this distance.

Canadian speedskaters spurred to victory by 'lucky leaf'

Canada's athletic superstitions have once again paid off, with the lucky loonie giving way to the lucky leaf at Oval Lingotto in Turin, site of several speed skating medals for the national team at the Winter Games.

Canadian icemaker Mark Messer buried the solid gold maple leaf near the finish line in the oval ice, borrowing on the tradition that came to prominence after it was revealed a dollar coin was buried beneath centre ice for Canada's hockey teams at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.

The maple leaf was dug up and presented to Clara Hughes after the Winnipeg skater raced to gold in Saturday's women's 5,000 metres. "I didn't know, but a couple of weeks ago my sports psychologist [Dr.] Kimberley Amirault and my coach Xiuli Wang had the ice technician, our master icemaker from Calgary, Mark Messer, put a little gold maple leaf in the ice for me," Hughes told CBC Sports after her victory.

"We knew about the loonie from the last time and what it brought for Canadian hockey, so we buried a solid gold maple leaf in the ice for the speed skaters here. . . hopefully it helped," Messer said.

Well it did, Canadians have raced to eight medals in long-track speedskating, with Winnipeg's Cindy Klassen in on five of them. The loonie has also made an appearance in Turin, a Canadian icemaker burying a pair of the coins in the championship ice sheet at curling, where Brad Gushue's rink won gold for Canada.

Later,
Kenaz

'Hortons looking to bring Tim Bits to Afghanistan

operation Timbit

Canadian soldiers serving in Afghanistan may soon be able to get their morning coffee and doughnut at a Tim Hortons coffee shop. The company, co-founded in Hamilton in 1964 by the famous NHL hockey player and local police officer Roy Joyce, is in talks with the military about setting up a store to serve soldiers on the front line of the war on terror in Kandahar.

General Rick Hillier, head of the Canadian Armed Forces, stepped up the negotiations yesterday by offering to personally take Tim Hortons president and CEO Paul House of Stoney Creek to visit soldiers in Afghanistan to help convince him the idea has merit. Hillier says soldiers pester him about when they might see one of the coffee shops open at the Kandahar base and he believes it would boost morale to have a Tim Hortons in the Afghan city that gave birth to the radically militant Taliban regime.

American troops serving in Kandahar have their own Subway, Pizza Hut and Burger King outlets.

Captain Tim Fletcher of the 31 Canadian Brigade Group in Hamilton, which oversees the operation of 14 army units in southwestern Ontario, said a Tim Hortons coffee shop in Kandahar would be well received by the troops. more from the Captain

"Ah, I love the smell of a 'fruit explosion' muffin in the Kandahar morning!"

If that story gave you the warm and fuzzies, than this cookie caper will make you sick. Not in the good way, like when as a kid you downed a dozen of moms home baked goodies and then layed on the couch groaning in a sugar induced happy coma. No, this story will leave you foaming at the mouth like the time your dog ate all your Christmas chocolates and pooped thunder for a week.

The defendant, Kathleen Rockingham, accused of illegal baking


The plantiff, the Hamilton cookie police









Exhibit A, the cookie










AND NOW THE CASE OF 'THE HALF BAKED COOKIE LAW' (cue 'The Peoples Court' music)

Mary Whitwell won't be baking for the Binbrook Fair this fall for the first time in nearly 60 years. The cookie police have already given her a warning. The city's public health inspectors cracked down on the 82-year-old's church table at last year's event. Her homemade cookies -- chocolate, spice and raisin -- aren't allowed at special events anymore. It's a matter of public safety.

City officials recently sent a notice to all church groups to clarify the rules around bake sales. It's fine for homemade goods to be sold at churches, service clubs or fraternal organizations because of an exemption in the health regulations. But if a group takes part in a special event away from their facility, like a festival, fair or carnival, the food must be made in an inspected kitchen -- and grandma's doesn't count.

"It's just to lower incidents of food poisoning," explained George Rice of the city's public health food safety program.

"We don't know what their kitchens are like because we haven't inspected them.

A public health official inspecting the event took exception to the homemade cookies being sold for a dollar with coffee at Knox Presbyterian Church booth. Local Councillor Dave Mitchell got a call and intervened, suggesting officials should educate first and enforce next year. He understands the rules, but wishes the city would use common sense to measure the risk to public health.

The Whitwell family has been part of the local church for six generations and every one of them has made sweets for the bake sales. Kathleen Rockingham, 85, has been making her famous shortbread -- 10 to 15 dozen a time -- for the sale in her own kitchen for years.

"I haven't had anyone die from one," she said chuckling. "This is absolutely ridiculous. Haven't they got anything else to do down at City Hall?"

Apparently not, I guess busting a cookie sale that brings in much needed revenue for this organization, so it can provide the services it does for the community is what the 'cookie monsters' at city hall concern themselves with today.

full story

Later,
Kenaz