■SNOWBOARDING
Lago blames woman
American halfpipe bronze medalist Scotty Lago says risque photos of him that showed up on the Internet weren’t his idea. Lago was photographed last week at a party wearing a Team USA T-shirt when somebody snapped a photo of a woman kneeling below Lago’s waist to kiss his medal. Appearing on Friday night on Jimmy Kimmel Live, Lago says the woman wanted to take the photo so that “it looked as it does.” After the photos surfaced, Lago left the Vancouver Olympics. Now he’s saying he didn’t leave voluntarily, but rather that the US Olympic Committee and the US Ski and Snowboard Association asked him to leave the Games.
■NORDIC SKIING
Bjoergen cheated: rival
A rival athlete has accused Norway’s triple cross-country gold medalist Marit Bjoergen of using asthma medication to help her win at the Vancouver Olympics. “Without the medication she would not have won,” her Polish rival Justyna Kowalczyk said on a Polish Web site. “Marit knows very well that without this ‘aid’ she would not have much to show.” Bjoergen’s coach Aage Skinstad said the medication used by his athlete was legal. “This is the most idiotic thing I have heard since the start of the Olympics,” he said.
■SKATING
Zhou gets new apartment
Chinese teenager Zhou Yang will be able to display her two Olympic short track speed skating gold medals in a new apartment when she returns from Vancouver. The parents of the 18-year-old 1,500m and 3,000m relay champion were awarded a new home by the local government in their home city of Changchun on Friday, Xinhua news agency reported. “It is a surprise to get the flat that solves our housing problem. Zhou Yang can live with us when she comes home,” said Wang Shuying, Zhou’s mother. The 94m² apartment, with two bedrooms and two living rooms, was valued at 300,000 yuan (US$43,960), Xinhua reported.
■ALPINE SKIING
Iranian shows pride
For Marjan Kalhor, the most important thing about competing at the Winter Olympics was that she started, not where she finished. Kalhor, wearing a pink Islamic headscarf beneath her safety helmet, finished last among the 55 skiers who completed the women’s slalom on Friday — a full 35.71 seconds behind winner Maria Riesch of Germany. She was the first Iranian to compete at the Winter Games. “I’m proud,” the 21-year-old Kalhor said through a translator. “I’m the first one and we’ll practice and practice, and we’ll be better in the next Olympics.” Kalhor said the headscarf she wears to comply with Islamic dress code was no big deal: “We’re used to it, we wear it at every event in Iran and everywhere we go ... Women in Iran are free, and accept that the Islamic revolution rules ... President [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad wants women to be more active, to be free,” she said.
■RUSSIA
Putin disappointed at team
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has expressed disappointment with the performance of Russian athletes at the Vancouver Olympics and suggested officials “analyze” their mistakes and shortcomings. Putin said in televised remarks on Friday that he “expected more” in Vancouver from the Russian team, which has so far collected three gold medals and 13 overall, the nation’s poorest result at the Winter Games. He said, however, that the haul was “no reason to throw in a towel.”
■BASKETBALL
Robertson facing charges
Former star Alvin Robertson faces sexual assault of a child and sex trafficking charges alleging he was among seven people who kidnapped a 14-year-old girl who was forced into prostitution and made to dance at a strip club, authorities said on Friday. Robertson, who was an All-Star player for the San Antonio Spurs, was taken into custody on Friday in Arkansas, Bexar County Sheriff’s Deputy Ino Badillo said. The arrest comes as part of an investigation that began last April when a 14-year-old girl waved down a police cruiser in Corpus Christi and told authorities she had been abducted from San Antonio, Badillo said. She told police she was driven around the city and forced to have sex with various men, before being driven to Corpus Christi and forced to dance at a strip club. The girl escaped her alleged captor, Leslie Campbell, while he was showering, Badillo said. The 49-year-old Corpus Christi man pleaded guilty last month to sexual assault of a child. Badillo said the girl was able to identify several of her assailants and the locations she was taken in great detail. Robertson’s girlfriend, Raquel McIntosh, 41, was arrested early on Friday on charges of sex trafficking of a minor and forcing a sexual performance by a child, Badillo said.
■BASEBALL
Former Yankee arrested
Dominican pitcher Maximo Nelson, once on the books of the New York Yankees, has been arrested by Japanese police after a live bullet was found in his bag at an airport in Okinawa. Nelson, who had been in the southern prefecture for spring training with the Chunichi Dragons, was taken into custody on Friday on suspicion of breaching Japan’s laws on gun and sword control, Kyodo news agency reported. The 27-year-old was signed by the Yankees in 2000 and was a highly-rated prospect before being named by the New York Times as one of dozens of Dominican Republic natives caught up in a marriage scheme to fraudulently win US visas for women. All of the minor league players involved were banned from getting visas for the US and Nelson subsequently played in the Israeli league, before moving to Japan in 2008.
■GYMNASTICS
Chinese set to lose medals
The six Chinese women gymnasts who won a team bronze at the 2000 Sydney Olympics are likely to be forced to return their medals after one of them was found to have falsified her age. An International Gymastics Federation probe has found Dong Fangxiao was younger than the minimum age requirement of 16 during the 2000 Games after she registered different ages at Sydney and the Beijing Games eight years later. “Consequently, the results obtained by Dong Fangxiao at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games have been canceled,” the federation said in a statement yesterday. The statement said Dong had registered a Jan. 20, 1983, birth date at Sydney, but when accredited to act as “secretary” at the vault in Beijing, she had declared her birth date as Jan. 23, 1986.
■GOLF
Gatorade drops Tiger Woods
Gatorade has ended its marketing deals with Tiger Woods, joining the list of sponsors to drop the superstar golfer in the wake of a sex scandal. “We no longer see a role for Tiger in our marketing efforts and have ended our relationship,” Gatorade spokeswoman Jennifer Schmit said. “We wish him all the best.” Gatorade discontinued its Tiger Woods-brand drinks in November. His image went into free-fall as 14 women claimed to have had an affair with the married father of two.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB