phelps

The new country first appearance under the 5 rings was 1 year after its establishment. In Lillehammer 1994
 
We were represented by 42 athletes,
Although we Did not win any medal, we managed to earn 2 Olympic points for two 6th places, The first point ever was achieved by Biathlete Martina Jašicová in the W 15km Individual, the other one was grabbed by the Ice Hockey team...
 
which originally was not even supposed to be there, After the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, Some idiots in the international federation decided that the successor country will be ONLY the Czech Republic. Slovakia despite the popularity of the sport and well established great players was moved down to the world "C" Division, which was taken here as a huge insult and humiliation.... Slovakia was not even invited for the Olympics Qualifiers. Our NOC, Hockey Federation, Governement and some legends including Peter Štastný who returned from Canadian defection started an unprecedented "Lobby" war everywhere it was necessary, even at the UN and we succeeded, IOC and LIHG (IIHF predecessor) agreed to take us a chance at the Final Olympic qualifier in Sheffield.
 
History know, we won this tournament and won the only available ticket for Lillehammer. and there we won the preliminary group ahead of and , sadly lost the unforgettable Quarterfinal in the very last 10th minute of Overtime to . Ended 6th.
 
But despite not winning the medal, we succeeded to expose the whole LIHG in front of the whole world for the wrong they committed against us.
 
PS: Slovakia entered the world Top division in the shortest time possible,
2 years later after destroying the fields in the "C" Division after the Olympics 1994 and the next year also the "B" Division in 1995. And then...Since its first participation among the Elite in 1996 Slovakia was never relegated from the Top division
 
 
First ever Olympic Appearance (1994 Lillehammer) represented 42 athletes, Flag bearer the legendary Peter Šťastný, who represented 3 countries in his career, Czechoslovakia, after his defection in the 70s Canada where he became one of the best world players in history of this sport, and almost at his 40 after the fall of communism, he returned back to his homeland and led the new Slovakia in its first international hockey major campaign

 
 
25th July 1996, Independent Slovakia won its first Olympic Medal.
Shooter Jozef Gonci took Bronze in the Rifle Prone event

 
 
and after the first Winter came also the First Summer Olympics appearance of the country. In Atlanta 1996.
 
The games where Slovakia managed to win its first medals (Including the first ever independent Slovak Olympic Champion).
 
The 25th Jule 1996, in the Rifle Prone Shooting Jozef Gonci won Bronze medal and became the first Olympic medalist of the new nation.
 
2 days later the 16 years old rookie Michal Martikán won Gold in the Canoeing Slalom M C1 event at the Ocoee river, who would have guessed this kid will win 4 more medals at the next consevutive 4 Olympic Games.
 
The very last day of the Games, Slovakia won its last 3rd medal of Atlanta 96. Slavomír Kňazovický earned Silver in the Canoeing Sprint C1-500 meters.
 
First Olympic Champion
Michal Martikán at 16, won Gold in the Canoeing Slalom C1
and started his crazy Olympic journey which continued by Silver in 2000, Silver in 2004, Gold in 2008 and Bronze in 2012.
He is still active and dream about Paris 2024 btw

Minnesota Vikings came back from 33-0 down at half-time to beat Indianapolis Colts 39-36 in OT despite TWO fumble TD returns called back due to some horrendous referee calls. It's the largest comeback in NFL history (33 points)
 
QB Matt Ryan now has the largest Super Bowl blown lead AND the regular season blown lead. He might as well retire

Che settimana  E non è finita qui, piazzamenti sul podio a raffica anche nello snowboard 
 
Nel PSG Rollo Fishanller vince l'ennesima gara sulle nevi amiche, bronzo di Maarch. Peccato per la gara femminile, il podio per Dalmasso era alla portata. 
 
Ma ma sorpresa più grande viene dal Big Air dove l'Italia, con Ian Matteoli alla sua seconda gara in WC, riesce a piazzarsi sul podio con un fenomenale terzo posto. È il cinquantesimo podio invernale della stagione internazionale, senza considerare europei di curling e meeting privati. 
 
La settimana in corso ormai fa segnare un 6-3-5 abbastanza eloquente, e non è finita... Stasera ci saranno le sprint dello slittino e i 10.000m del pattinaggio... 

Nottata e giornata eccezionali finora per l'Italia.
 
Spendere parole su Sofia Goggia mi pare pleonastico. Al di là delle considerazioni tecniche, questa gara è tra quelle che più saranno ricordate quando tra 20 o 30 anni si parlerà di lei. Da sana avrebbe rifilato gli stessi distacchi ciclistici della seconda prova.
 
Per il resto si conferma la non eccezionale vena delle non-Curtoni nella squadra di velocità, in particolare la regressione di Nadia Delago nelle parti tecniche e la difficoltà della sorella nel tornare quella pre-infortunio. Brignone con la colla sotto gli sci e nemmeno così brillante sul difficile, anche se lei era a St. Moritz soprattutto per la gara di domani. Peccato per una Pirovano che fino a 100 metri dall'arrivo era da prime 10 (avrebbe fatto più o meno il tempo di Elena Curtoni, credo). Perlomeno ha portato a casa qualche punto per mantenere la posizione tra le prime 20 della start list.
 
Negli uomini, Casse ha colto il primo podio della carriera nella disciplina in cui meno lo si aspettava e sulla pista teoricamente meno adatta. Il risultato mi fa piacere, visto che ci era andato vicino più volte, ma non deve far trascurare che per il resto la discesa di oggi è stata l'ennesima Caporetto per lo sci alpino maschile.
 
Grande secondo posto di Lisa Vittozzi, che forse con un errore in meno nella seconda sessione avrebbe anche potuto provare a vincere. Bene Wierer che risale fino al quinto posto e altra bella prova di Giacomel, nono in rimonta malgrado 3 errori su altrettanti quinti bersagli. Difficilissimo però fare tante valutazioni su una gara in cui gli atleti con sci Fischer erano inchiodati al tracciato, preparato come sempre in modo imbarazzante dagli organizzatori di Le Grand-Bornand, e in cui gli equilibri visti fino a ieri nel fondo sono andati tutti a farsi friggere.
 
Una perla la vittoria di Pellegrino su Klaebo nella sprint dopo cinque anni. Il norvegese è reduce da un malanno, ma fino a ieri avrei giurato che nemmeno con un arto in meno avrebbe potuto perdere una sprint.
 
Nella notte le vittorie a Park City di Fischnaller e del doppio Voetter-Oberhofer (ora anche leader di Coppa del Mondo), di cui non ho visto alcunché perché i miei datori di lavoro avevano altri programmi.
 
In più Sieff seconda a Ramsau.
 

Chiccoooo!!!  
 
Finally,  Pellegrino beats  Klaebo in a direct match-up in a Sprint race.
 
Today it's really the Italian fest in the wonderful world of Winter sports (I'm not going to write anything more than this to avoid any spoiler...but I still can't believe what happened in the last few hours)...  

uff! once again!  
 
I always choose my picks and then I forget to click on the "Submit your Vote" button...
 
now I fixed it, by the way...

Pencak Silat XXX
 
in my world they don't even exist!  

we have a Finalist
 
Richard Nagy advanced to the 400 Medley final as last 8th. Also Andrea Podmaníková made it to the 50 Breast Semifinals as 14th
 

Athletics, women's 800m...difficult choice, plenty of doping cheaters and "real men" here...so, my pick is  Kelly Holmes, just to limit the damage.
 
Fencing, men's Team Foil...I was tempted to choose the 1976 German team  but then I stopped joking and I decided to pick the strongest team/school ever, even if they have always been terribly underachieving...so, my pick is  Italy.
 
Judo, women's Half-Heavyweights (currently at -78kg)...not a fan of the Chinese girls (even if they were really good), definitely not a fan of the Japanese girls in this class, not a fan of Harrison and her disrespect for the sport of Judo (let her enjoy UFC and WWE), therefore here my pick is the great  Ulla Werbrouck.
 
Taekwondo, men's Featherweight (-68kg), in absence of the great Kim Dae-Hoon in this list, my pick is the living legend  Steven Lopez (despite being a shameful human being, apparently).
 
Weightlifting, women's Super-Heavyweights...among all those Chinese champions, my pick is the great  Jang Mi-Ran, who beat them on their home soil and, considering their body weight, also has the best overall performance among them.

Stage #2 ( Pontedilegno)
 
Women's Sprint Race
 
Gold:  Celia Perillat-Pessey
Silver:  Mariana Jagercikova @hckošice
Bronze:  Lena Bonnel

French hockey team agree
 

better hire a beautician, then...

Btw, this was Femsteinevik in her mini Santa Claus cap today
 

Swimming (SC Worlds), Wintersports (especially Biathlon, Alpine Skiing and both versions of Speedskating), Hockey from all around the Globe and a lot of (American) Football (NFL, but also NCAA...the Bowl season has already started about 3 hours ago ).

Sinisa Mihajlovic lost his battle against Leukemia...
 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11546393/Sinisa-Mihajlovic-dies-aged-53-battle-leukaemia.html

Forever in Serie A Fans' Hearts 
 

Very sad news for Football Fans Sinisa Mihajlovic has passed away at age of 53 after a long struggle with Lukemia , he's been the main star of Yugoslav team in 90s and played for many teams Red Star Belgrade , Sampdoria , Lazio , Roma R.I.P 

So after so many years, and after the miracle of 2016 Euro Championship, our coach, Mr Engineer (or “the engineer of draws” as we call him) is leaving Portuguese national team.
 
Mourinho is now the one who’s the favorite to succeed him.
 
Meanwhile, as the info spread around the country, this is how Portuguese reached on Fernando Santos departure 
 

This guy honestly represents MacDonalds 

I neither can not believe that nobody picked Slovakia 2026 ! world of ungrateful people
 
but to be serious, sure, the red machine was simply impressive and some of their lines, especially Makarov-Larionov-Krutov, oh dear god, this was something so beautiful, an orgasm for hockey fans.
They are still called by many as the best what hockey ever produced and god know that it is completely legitimately deserved. but we still have to differentiate the different tournaments, I am really not the biggest fan of such comparison between different tournaments in different times, each tourney had its different and unique climate around, unique distribution of forces etc... Hard to say that the red machine of the 1970s was better than the red machine of the late 80s or better of any of the Canadian teams of the 20s-30s, You can also suggest the best tournaments are arguably the one with equally full NHLers involved from Torino or Vancouver, maybe even the Sochi one... Maybe Nagano (which I voted) because it was something unprecedented for the hockey world the first time with NHL, a tournament the whole hockey planet was looking forward years before...
 
For me there no one best team, many of them were great, some of them absolutely legendary but in the end all champions deserve their glory in this beautiful sport.
 
 
Was probably the most emotional comment I posted in a while, so cherish it !

Knockout Stage
 
Quarterfinals, 2nd Leg
Tuesday 13.12.2022 - Results
 
17:35 Tappara Tampere (FIN) - Rögle BK Ångelholm (SWE)  5-1 (0-0, 2-1, 3-0); 7-4 on Aggregate
18:05 Jukurit Mikkeli (FIN) - Luleå Hockey (SWE)  1-3 (0-2, 1-0, 0-1); 2-8 on Aggregate
19:05 Frölunda Indians (SWE) - Skellefteå AIK (SWE)  4-2 PSO (0-0, 2-1, 1-1, 0-0, 1-0); 4-3 on Aggregate
19:45 EV Zug (SUI) - Mountfield HK (CZE)  2-1 OT (0-0, 1-1, 0-0, 1-0); 4-3 on Aggregate

Gold for the 42 year old  Santos!

Alex Ovechkin scored his 800th goal last night. 3rd player in history to hit the milestone after Wayne Gretzky and Gordie Howe.
 
 

Simona Quadarella is out of the SCWC because of gastrointestinal virus (with high fever and dysentery).