Word: medal
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...with something like 14 million skiers in the U.S., Americans have won just 13 medals, four of them golds, out of a possible 135 in the Olympic downhill, slalom and giant slalom and just one of 168 in cross-country events. No American man has ever won a gold medal in skiing. In the downhill and giant slalom, no American man has ever won a medal of any kind...
BILL KOCH. Americans do not win crosscountry ski races. So when Bill Koch, a reclusive Vermonter from Putney (pop. 1,789), won the silver medal in the 30-km race at Innsbruck in 1976, the first U.S. medal ever in Nordic siding, nobody was there to notice. In fact, after the race was over, Koch had to go out again in his uniform and skis so that photographers could take his picture for the papers back home...
...remaining events, the U.S., as usual, has only the faintest shot at any kind of medal. The 70-and 90-meter ski jumps often produce surprises, but the Soviets and Finns should go into both events as favorites. The same is true of the three biathlon events, which combine cross-country ski races and marksmanship contests. The luge (pronounced loozh), a kind of toboggan that careens down an ice track with one-or two-man teams, should be dominated by the East Germans...
...over Canada, and was equally brilliant in a 3-2 victory over the Soviets. The U.S. players needed a victory in their final game against Czechoslovakia to win their first hockey gold medal. Behind 4-3 after two frustrating periods, they were visited in their dressing room by the Soviet team captain, who urged them to take oxygen. With Roger Christian of Minnesota firing in three goals (he scored four on the day), the Americans roared back in the final period to win, 9-4. "The big joke," McCartan recalls, "was that the guys who didn't take...
...them flying just as they reached a 90° bend, appropriately dubbed "the airplane corner." The high hopes of the American women crashed at that turn: Betsy Snite and two teammates spilled. Pitou did not fall, but she tottered, squandering precious ticks of the clock and losing the gold medal by 1 sec. to Germany's Heidi Biebl...