Yankee’s pitcher Chan Ho Park had a rough first outing with his new team.  The New York media is notorious for pressing and getting their answer but Chan Ho Park made it easy by being honest.  Maybe it’s better to make up something because Korean honesty just doesn’t translate well.

There was one Korean-American on the U.S. olympic team and he medaled in the 5,000 meter relay for the short track speed skating team.  Simon Cho, an 18 year old speed skater, won the bronze medal with fellow relay members Apolo Ohno, J.R. Celski, and Jordan Malone.

Cho was born in Seoul, South Korea, and began speedskating at age 3 – thanks to a father who saw a son with energy that needed to be channeled.

The family moved to Chicago before settling in Maryland in 2000. Eventually, he hooked up with the current national team coach, Jimmy Jang. Cho moved to Salt Lake City in 2007 – by himself.

“When I first moved to Salt Lake, I was excited,” Cho said. “I was young, I was 15 years old, and I enjoyed being away from home. It was definitely a new realm for me, and I felt like I’d grown up, living on my own. Which wasn’t the case. I thought I’d grown up, but I still had a lot of growing up to do.”

Eventually, Cho’s intense, win-oriented over-training caught up with him. His love for skating was exhausted. But discussions with prominent national team members Shani Davis and Ohno early in 2009 encouraged him to relieve the pressure and free himself to chart a new course.

“Once I was able to regain my passion and love for the sport, skating became really simple,” Cho said. “When I went out there, it was just the simplicity of me loving what I love to do. I lost sight of that in the past.”

His Bio from the NBCOlympics.com
Simon Cho is making his Olympic debut in Vancouver, skating in the 500m. The youngest member of the U.S. team at age 18, Cho earned his spot by winning a 500m race at U.S. Olympic trials. The win came when a fortuitous collision between leaders Apolo Ohno and J.R. Celski allowed Cho to cross the line first. Cho had not expected to make the team heading into trials and was planning to quit the sport after the meet. “It was such a huge surprise,” he said. “My mind wouldn’t wrap around it.”

Sticking with it
Cho wanted to quit skating in January 2009, unhappy with his results from that season, calling it “a complete failure.” Cho said he was overtrained, and exhausted mentally and physically. But after talking to friends and family, he decided to continue training through Olympic trials, but with the knowledge that he had to tone down his training. “I’ve learned to take steps to prevent doing that again,” he said. “Just listening to my body more and not ignoring the signs that it’s giving me.” He now plans to continue skating even after Vancouver.

Keeping pace
Just two seasons ago, Cho was serving as the “training rabbit” for the women’s team. His job was to pace the girls, going faster than they could but just enough so they could stay near him. “When I lead I don’t go 100 percent,” he said. “I kind of have to gauge myself so that I would go fast enough so that the girls could barely keep up but not slow enough that they weren’t working hard.” Though not a glamorous job, it was Cho’s way of getting to train with the national team. After one season of that, Cho qualified for his first World Cup team in 2006-07, and no longer had to be the rabbit. “Occasionally I still lead for the girls,” he said. “I think it’s good for me and the girls.”

On the move
Cho was born in Seoul, South Korea, where he first started skating at age 3. His father, Jay, noticed that his son had a lot of energy and thought skating would be a good way to release it. The family moved to Chicago when Cho was 5, and he stuck with the sport, skating at several local clubs before moving to Maryland in 2000. National team coach Jimmy Jang joined Cho’s Maryland club as a coach in 2001, and Jang still coaches Cho, now in Salt Lake City. Cho moved to Salt Lake in 2007, and after a few years on his own, Cho’s family recently moved there as well. Now in his junior year of high school, he is taking time off to train and compete in Vancouver, with plans to continue next year.

Family ties
Most of Cho’s family still lives in Korea, where he travels frequently for competitions and training but has never returend with his family for vacation. Every year there is a World Cup stop in South Korea, and he has spent summers there training as well. Cho speaks Korean at home, though he says he’s more comfortable with English.

Kim Yu Na kicked ass during the first night of ladies’ figure skating competition at the Winter Olympics.  She skated a near perfect performance and outdazzled her competition by setting the all time record for short program scores with a 78.50.  This bested her closest competitor and biggest rival, Mao Asado, by nearly 5 points.  She came prepared and was a competitor because she had to perform right after a magnificent performance by Mao Asado.  It was appropriate that she came out swinging with a performance to the James Bond theme song.  She skated with grace, power and beauty.  Kim Yu Na is skating her heart out and competing with the grit of Michael Jordan.  She has the weight of South Korea on her shoulders and also the knowledge that the previous 3 favorites entering the Winter Olympics failed to win the gold medal in ladies’ figure skating.  A lot of guys could learn from her competitiveness and focus.  She simply kicked major ice skating ass!

So it has finally come.  South Korea’s Kim Yu Na will finally hit the ice in competition for the crown jewel event of the Winter Olympics: woman’s figure skating.  There’s a reason why it’s the last of the figure skating events because it carries the beauty and pageantry of the Winter games and Kim Yu Na possesses all of that in her skating.  She enters the games ranked #1 in the world and having won many events.  However, she carries the weight of the world on her shoulders because South Korea has put their hopes into this teenager to become South Korea’s first gold medalist in figure skating at the Winter Olympics.

Sport Illustrated’s E.M. Swift says Kim Yu Na is the best female skater he’s ever seen when she is at her best. ” I don’t say that lightly, but Kim is the complete package: elegant, athletic, fast, beautiful, charismatic,” says Swift. “Her programs are wonderfully choreographed. She has all the jumps, except the rare (for women) triple axel. Her spins are weightless. But the 2009 World Champion will have to win here before I put her above the likes of past Olympic champions Kristi Yamaguchi and Katarina Witt. She’ll have to prove she can withstand the suffocating Olympic pressure.”

So here’s a quick breakdown between Kim Yu Na and her biggest rival from Japan – which adds to the tension – Mao Asada.

Yu-Na Kim versus Mao Asada

There are several Annie Oakleys in this shooting match, but the gold medal could come down to the same two skaters who have been dueling for supremacy ever since the last Olympics: South Korea’s Yu-Na Kim and Japan’s Mao Asada, who were born 20 days apart in September 1990. Reigning world and Grand Prix series champion Kim seldom stumbles and is peerless from an artistic standpoint. But former world and Grand Prix titlist Asada, who lives and dies by her spectacular jumps, could rack up huge point totals if she lands two triple Axels in her long program as she did recently at the Four Continents event. Their contrasting talents could put the much-maligned revamped scoring system to the test.

Read more at New York Times about how South Korea weighs heavily on Kim Yu Na’s shoulders.

Source: ESPN.com

South Korea is on the medal board early because of a surprise performance by Lee Seung-Hoon in the 5,000-meter men’s speedskating.  He won the silver medal which caught everyone in the arena by surprise.  Lee, a former short-track speedskater who switched last year to long track, won the next heat in 6:17.00 to take a stunning silver.

“This is a dream, big surprise,” Lee said. “I’m very happy.”

Source: NBC Olympics

Not sure if this is a bummer because people have very mixed feelings about the Korea’s marching together at the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympic Games.  On one hand, it’s very symbolic and hopeful that the Korea’s could someday be united.  However, do you want to deal with one of the worst dictators in the world and play nice?  Quite the dilemma.

Previous to this year, Korean athletes had marched together at the 2006 Winter Games in Turin, extending a tradition that started at the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney and continued at the 2004 Athens Olympics.  However, the two teams did not march together in Beijing in 2008.

South Korea has 46 athletes entered for the Vancouver Games.  North Korea has two: one each in figure skating and speed skating.

Source: NBC Olympics

Everywhere I look, there’s a lot of articles about woman’s figure skating champion Kim Yu Na from her chances to winning the gold medal to being the top-earning athlete entering Vancouver.  With the Winter Olympics about to start this week, she’s headlining so many articles because she’s intriguing on many fronts. Woman’s ice skating is traditionally the crown event at the winter Olympics and also because she comes into this event with so much pressure.   She enters the Olympics with the weight of South Korea on her shoulders to win the country’s first ever gold medal in Olympic figure skating.  Further heightening the pressure from South Korea is the fact that her #1 competitor is from Japan, Mao Asada, and we know about the very heated rivalry between these two countries.  Unfortunately, Olympic figure skating has not been to kind to reigning world champions who enter the Olympic games.  Brian Orser and Michelle Kwan are the faces of failed Olympic bids for the gold medal as both were very heralded reigning world champs.  Coincidentally, Brian Orser is the coach for Kim Yu Na and it’s his first time coaching anybody.  The New York Times released their second video about Kim Yu Na this week and it describes her relationship with Brian Orser and how she’s been transformed by him from a tactician to an elegant skating beauty.   Kim Yu Na was this very raw talent when Brian Orser decided to coach her 4 years ago.  She was typical of Korean athletes back then: win by practice and repetition.  However, Brian released her creative side and let her express herself.  What Brian wants is the judges and the crowds to cry for Kim Yu Na’s performance.  So it begs the question, will we cry because she fails to win the gold medal or cry because her performance was so breathtaking?

For the full video on Kim Yu Na and her coach Brian Orser, go to the New York Times.

Hold the presses but the New York Times did a feature on Kim Yu Na, the top ranked women’s figure skater entering the Winter Olympics, and they didn’t write anything dumb like how Koreans like tall people with eyelid surgery and thin calves.  Nice!  With the Winter Olympics fast approaching, the New York Times is doing short video pieces on  athletes and they’re trying to understand the nuances of their respective sport.  Kim Yu Na and her coach Brian Orser are featured in the “Inside the Action” video this week as they discuss the execution of the very difficult triple lutz-triple toe loop.  The New York Times doesn’t allow embeds so you’ll have to go to their website to check out the 2 minute video.

The Winter Olympics starts up this weekend and you know you’ll be glued to your television for the next couple of weeks. Time Magazine came out with it’s top athletes to watch out for during the Winter Olympics and Kim Yu Na is one of the featured athletes. She is South Korea’s biggest hope in winning a gold medal figure skating because she enters the games as the current world champion and therefore the unofficial favorite to win a gold medal. However, we all know about past Olympics and the disheartening falls of figure skating favorites. Will Kim Yu Na be able to handle the weight of South Korea on her shoulders or will she succumb to the pressures of living up to massive expectations?

Taekwondo, archery, short track — these are the niche sports in which South Korea tends to dominate. But a bright-light event such as figure skating? You bet, ever since Kim, 19, began racking up championships and setting records with the highest-scoring performances, quietly making her case to be the Olympic gold-medal favorite. Steady and consistent almost to the point of appearing robotic, Kim rarely slips on the ice — a skill that has served her well in the points-based judging system. She’s the current world champion and trains in Toronto but is hard to miss in Seoul — her image adorns buses, stores and cosmetics counters. When it comes to performing, the unflappable teen always delivers; Kim stood at the top of the podium in every competition she entered this season.

Read more at Time Magazine

Anthony Kim made a guest appearance on The Jay Leno show on Monday night to teach Jessica Alba how to putt.  First it’s pretty cool that Jay Leno referred to AK as his friend and he was on national television, and secondly, it was really cool that AK got to cozy on up to Jessica Alba and teach her how to putt.  She almost made the first putt after Anthony’s instruction but she left it a little short though it was on line to go in.  It was then AK’s turn and he quickly set up and stroked a power putt up the ramp into the buddha statue for a hole in one.  Sure he’s a professional, but there had to be some nerves putting in front of a national television audience on a contrived hole. Check it out below!