Olympics: Performances overtake scandals on day nine

SALT LAKE CITY - New Zealand's two-man bobsleigh team is lying in 20th place in a field of 38 after day one of their two-day competition.

Alan Henderson and Mark Edmond are under two seconds in arrears of the leading Swiss pair of Christian Reich and Steve Anderhub.

Meanwhile, Gold medal records by Kjetil Andre Aamodt and Ole Einer Bjoerndalen and a speedskating world mark put the Olympians back in the frame today at a scandal-tainted Salt Lake Olympics.

Bjoerndalen became the Games' first triple gold medallist and the greatest Olympic men's biathlete of all time and his Norwegian compatriot Aamodt won his second gold in four days to take his Olympics record to seven.

Dutch speedskater Gerard van Velde won in the 1000m in a world-record time of 1 minute 7.18 seconds. His teammate Jan Bos took the silver with bronze for American Joey Cheek.

Aamodt's split-second win over Stephan Eberharter in the Super G gave him seven career Olympic medals. With five gold medals between them here, Aamodt and Bjoerndalen, they boosted Norway's medal total to seven gold and 12 overall.

After a figure skating judging controversy that overshadowed the first week of the Winter Games, the gold rush was timed to perfection.

Aamodt edged three Austrians at Snowbasin's steep Grizzly course.

He finished the icy run in 1 minute, 21.58 seconds, 0.10 seconds ahead of Eberharter with Andreas Schifferer's taking bronze. Downhill champion Fritz Strobl was fourth.

Aamodt now has three Olympic gold medals. His win in the men's Alpine combined here on Wednesday was his first Olympic gold since his win in the super-G at Albertville in 1992.

"The combination gold was the important one for me, I was the favourite. When I managed to win that, it gave me a lot of confidence," Aamodt said.

"Today was just a bonus."

Bjoerndalen had an all-the-way win in the men's 12.5km biathlon at Soldier Hollow.

The 28-year-old Norwegian is the first biathlete to win three gold medals at a single Winter Olympics. He won the 20km individual and 10km sprint earlier in the week.

"I never thought that I would get three gold medals before I came here and, for me, this is really amazing," Bjoerndalen said.

"Today I had a lot of fun."

He missed two targets as he covered the course in 32 minutes, 34.6 seconds and finished 43 seconds clear of second place Raphael Poiree of France. After two fourth-place finishes here, Ricco Gross of Germany got a bronze.

Poiree's podium finish makes him part of the first married couple to win medals at a Winter Olympics while competing for different countries.

His wife, Liv Grete Poiree of Norway, won the silver in the 15km individual race Monday.

"The medal is great for me and my wife because we have put so much into our sport," he said.

In the women's 10km biathlon pursuit, Olga Pyleva of Russia took gold with a 5-second lead over Germany's Kati Wilhelm, who won the sprint gold earlier in the week. Irina Nikoultchina was third and got Bulgaria's second bronze of the games.

Five-time world champion Magdalena Forsberg of Sweden led until she had two misses at the final shooting station, pushing her back to sixth.

Swiss freestyle skier Evelyne Leu set the world record in qualifying for the aerials finals with a two-jump score of 203.16.

Leu nailed a triple flip with three full twists on her second run that earned a score of 99.42, and combined with her first-jump score of 103.74, she had the new record.

The old record of 200.21 was set by Ji Xiaoou of China in 1998.

The unexpected happened twice for Canada Friday. First the IOC moved with unusual swiftness to grant figure skaters Jamie Sale and David Pelletier a share of the Olympic title after the skating federation suspended a French judge for misconduct during Monday's pairs.

Then Canada's All-Star hockey team, assembled by Wayne Gretzky and led by Mario Lemieux, got a rude awakening against Sweden, playing slow and sluggish in a 5-2 defeat.

"It was embarrassing," Canada forward Paul Kariya said.

Also Friday, the United States added three medals in luge and snowboarding to climb further up the medal table with 14 overall, already breaking its all-time record at a Winter Games.

Germany got gold from Olympic rookies Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch in the double luge.

Russia, in the women's 5km combined pursuit, and France, in the women's snowboard parallel slalom, both earned gold-silver doubles to boost their medal counts.

But by far the most stunning gold was earned without a drop of sweat when IOC President Jacques Rogge ended four days of furious speculation by announcing the belated figure skating solution, hoping his first games as Olympic chief will not be dragged further into scandal.

"We took a position that is one of justice and fairness for the athletes," Rogge said.

"Justice was done," Pelletier said, stressing it took nothing away from joint gold medallists Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze.

"This was not something against them. It was something against the system."

But the figure skating system is still mired in controversy.

Ottavio Cinquanta, head of the International Skating Union, said judge Marie-Reine Le Gougne of France told the ISU she was under "a certain pressure" from her own federation to vote for the Russians, initially leaving the Canadians with silver.

"This is the allegation," he said.

The French federation was outraged. The ISU suspended Le Gougne indefinitely.

While France continued to be at the centre of the figure skating furor, a French couple, Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat, took an expected lead in ice dancing after the compulsories.

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Medals table

The table at the end of the ninth day of competition at the Winter Olympics:

(Gold - Silver - Bronze - Total)

1. Norway 7 5 0 12

2. Germany 5 8 5 18

3. Russia 4 4 2 10

4. US 3 6 6 15

5. Switzerland 3 0 1 4

6. France 2 3 1 6

7. Netherlands 2 2 0 4

8 Finland 2 1 1 4

8 Italy 2 1 1 4

10. Canada 2 0 2 4

11. Spain 2 0 0 2

12. Austria 1 3 8 12

13. South Korea 1 1 0 2

14. Estonia 1 0 1 2

15. Croatia 1 0 0 1

16. Sweden 0 1 2 3

17 Japan 0 1 1 2

17 Poland 0 1 1 2

19. Bulgaria 0 0 2 2

20 China 0 0 1 1

20 Czech Republic 0 0 1 1

Note: Two golds, no silver awarded in the figure skating
pairs programme.

Two silvers, no bronze awarded in men's cross-country combined pursuit.