Inspiring Athletes

Tobin Heath and Lauren Cheney were among the women’s soccer players from 2008 to capture Olympic gold once again. After narrowly defeating Canada in double overtime (4-3), the Americans shot out to a 2-0 lead and staved off a scurried comeback attempt by Japan. It was the third consecutive Olympic gold medal for the USA…

Wednesday was a watershed day for the U.S. Track and Field team. In four medal events, the Americans won seven of the possible 12 medals including three golds. Team USA was led by Allyson Felix who overpowered the competition in the 200-meter race with a time of 21.88. Her teammate Carmelita Jeter (who won silver…

Dawn Harper shocked the world with a gold medal in the 100-meter hurdles at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Still, she entered the 2012 Games with minimal hype for a defending champion. Much of the attention in the U.S., was still going to teammate Lolo Jones while the international press focused on Australia’s Sally Pearson. Add…

Missy Franklin closed out her stellar Olympic debut by swimming the backstroke leg for Team USA’s world-record gold-medal performance (3:52.05) in the 4×100-meter medley relay. Franklin was joined on the podium by teammates Allison Schmitt (freestyle), Rebecca Soni (breaststroke) and Dana Vollmer (butterfly) on this final day of swimming at the 2012 London Games. Franklin…

Kendrick Farris didn’t score quite high enough to earn a spot on the medal podium, but that didn’t stop the Shreveport, La., weightlifter from enjoying his second career top 10 finish at the Olympics. In Bejing, Farris placed seventh. In London, he took 10th and narrowly missed out on breaking his own American record. Read…

Competing in the second of her seven total events, 17-year old swimming phenom Missy Franklin lived up to the hype with a gold medal performance in the 100-meter backstroke (breaking her own American record). She had already collected a bronze medal for her part in the 400-meter freestyle relay team that set a new national…

In his first of two events, David Boudia joined teammate Nick McCrory for a late comeback to earn bronze in the 10 meter platform synchro event. It was Boudia’s first career Olympic medal after coming home from Beijing empty handed in 2008. Boudia and McCrory’s score of 463.47 edged out the hometown favorites from Great…

In one of the early surprises at the 2012 Summer Olympics, Brady Ellison and his USA Archery teammates to a silver medal performance in the Team event. The big shock came in the semifinals when the Americans knocked off gold medal favorites South Korea who just a day earlier had set two world records. Team…

If you’re an Olympics junkie like me, you’ll probably be spending the next 17 days (July 27 – August 12) watching wall-to-wall coverage from London on NBC and its various affiliate cable outlets. And while there’s plenty of opportunity to root for the athletes in the red, white and blue, there are also a number…

The Opening Ceremonies aren’t until Friday, but women’s soccer got started today at the Summer Olympics. In Glasgow, Scotland, the U.S. Women’s Team kicked off its defense of the 2008 gold medal with a 4-2 victory against France. The Americans got off to a poor start and were quickly down 2-0 in the first half…

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