Lindsey Vonn's risk-it-all strategy: overall, rewarding

Last season, after making an incredible late charge, Lindsey Vonn lost out at a chance at her fourth straight overall World Cup title by a measly three points, in part because of bad weather on the very last day. She said at the time she was "devastated." This season, Lindsey has skied with unmistakable passion, and that emotion has been further channeled by everything going on behind the scenes in her personal life, including the split early in the season from her husband, Thomas, and a reconciliation with her father, Alan Kildow.

When she skis, Lindsey has said, she is "very clear-minded," on her game like never before -- bluntly, like very few athletes, American or otherwise, in any sport, have been in any season.

Racing Friday in Are, Sweden, Lindsey won a World Cup giant slalom.

It was her 11th victory of the season, and 52nd of her career. It locked up the 2012 overall World Cup title -- obviously, her fourth in five years.

"I don't know what to say. I just wanted to have two really aggressive runs today," Lindsey said at the bottom of the hill, her U.S. teammates cheering.

"I have nothing to lose. I'm just having fun. My sister is here," younger sister Laura. "My teammates are so cool, cheering me on in the finish."

She added, "I am just really excited."

Some facts and figures, and keep in mind two things. These numbers and statistics can only suggest how dominant Lindsey has been. And the season is not yet over:

Lindsey's four World Cup overall titles are the most by an American skier. Phil Mahre had three.

The most-ever? Austria's Annemarie Moser-Pröll, with six, won in the 1970s. Lindsey, with those four, is now alone in second place. Croatia's Janica Kostelic, Switzerland's Vreni Schneider and Austria's Petra Kronberger had three apiece.

The 52 career victories leave her only 10 behind Moser-Pröll. Lindsey got to 50, in early February, faster than any female racer in history. Lindsey's first win came on Dec. 3, 2004, a downhill in Lake Louise, Canada.

The 11 victories this season match the U.S. record Lindsey set two seasons ago.

For the season, Lindsey now has 1,808 World Cup points. That's an American record.

Lindsey had 1,788 points when she won the 2009 overall.

In second place in the 2012 overall standings: Tina Maze of Slovenia, with 1,254 points. That's a 554-point lead. Again, and for emphasis: Lindsey lost last year, to her friend Maria Riesch of Germany, by three.

There are five races left on the World Cup calendar.

No female racer has reached 2,000. In 2006, Kostelic reached 1,970 points. In 1997, Sweden's Pernilla Wiberg got to 1,960.

On the men's side, Austria's Hermann Maier reached exactly 2,000 points in -- there was a nice symmetry here -- in 2000.

You bet Lindsey has noticed she is within striking distance of 2,000.

In prior seasons, she said in a conference call later Friday with American reporters, 2k had never seemed possible. "Trying to beat the 2,000-point barrier is something extremely significant. This opportunity may never happen in my career again," she said, adding a moment later, "I'm going to fight in every race until the end."

Indeed, she said, that's what this entire season has been about -- seizing focus, opportunity and momentum and not letting go.

She said she was "disappointed" to have lost last year by three, wanted "to come out this season starting strong and keep the momentum going," and "then the problems in my personal life … have made me a little more focused."

Last year, she said, taught her "to seize every opportunity, to put everything on the line," in every race.

Moreover, skiing has been a source of stability and solace. Racing, and in particular this season, has been a complete release from everything else.

She said, "I mean, I have had a lot of difficult times in my life, just with injuries and family issues," a reference to the arc of her entire career. "But, you know, skiing is always the constant in my life and I can always rely on it."

The 2012 overall title is the 15th of Lindsey's career and the third of this season; she had previously clinched the downhill and super-combined.

The giant slalom that Lindsey won Friday? That was the second giant slalom victory of her career, both this season, testament to the men's skis she switched to this year and the ferocious workouts she did last summer after coming up those three points shy last March.

Men's skis are longer and more rigid. To control them, Lindsey had to be in distinctly better shape. The advantage of using those longer, stiffer skis is that they enable Lindsey to ski a straighter line. A straighter line means she can, in essence, go faster. Thus: new success this season in the giant slalom.

The first giant slalom victory kick-started the season -- in the very first race, last October, in Soelden, Austria.

On Friday, in flat light and in bumpy, slushy conditions, Lindsey held a lead of seven-hundredths of a second after the first run. That marked the first time in her career Lindsey had ever held a first-run lead in giant slalom.

"I didn't want to let this opportunity pass me by," she said later. "I knew I could win but I still wanted to risk everything. I knew I had to risk everything."

So she really turned it on, leading at every interval to extend her winning margin to 48-hundredths of a second.

Federica Brignone of Italy, the giant slalom world championships silver medalist, came in second; Viktoria Rebensburg of Germany, who won both GS races last weekend in Ofterschwang, finished third, 1.05 seconds back.

Two other Americans finished in the top-15: 28th birthday girl Julia Mancuso, eighth, Resi Stiegler, continuing her late-season surge, 13th.

"I am thrilled," Lindsey said, excited and breathing hard, in the finish area.

Asked if she was going to be taking time off to celebrate, she said, jokingly, "I wish."

No one wishes. Of course the calendar will turn soon enough to spring. And even all great things have to come to an end.

But there are still five races to go.

Like mother, like son, like cousins, like ...

Forty years after his mom won Olympic gold in the slalom in Japan, Ryan Cochran-Siegle won the alpine Junior World downhill championship in Italy. And Barbara Ann Cochran was there to see it.

Pretty neat stuff for the Cochrans, widely regarded as the first family of American alpine racing.

But there's a twist.

Barbara Ann didn't get filthy rich off that Olympic medal. Hardly.

This wasn't cause for celebrating with magnums of Champagne. Or, it being Italy, Asti.

More like buckets of Vermont maple syrup.

A little background:

Ryan's grandfather, Mickey, was once the U.S. alpine coach. "There's a piece of Ryan that reminds me of my dad," who was not just not just a multi-sport athlete and pretty darned good at a lot of them, Barbara Ann said. "I just feel like [Ryan] has a pretty good head on his shoulders."

Over the years, the skiing Cochrans' contributions to the U.S. Olympic Team have been formidable indeed.

Three women: Marilyn (1972 Sapporo), Barbara (1972 Sapporo), Lindy (1976 Innsbruck).

Two men: Bob (1972 Sapporo) and son Jimmy (2006 Torino, 2010 Vancouver).

Cousins Jessica (a former Junior Worlds medalist) and Tim Kelley have been on the U.S. Ski Team, and Robby Kelley is currently on the Team.

And now Ryan is the Junior Worlds downhill champion.

He won, racing in Roccaraso, Italy, a few days ago, wearing a sticker on his helmet that proclaims, "Slopeside Syup" -- a family business started by four of his cousins. Kind of a sponsor, he said.

Ryan had, arguably, the day's worst start position: No. 1.

Usually, that's when the snow and the conditions can be the worst.

Except on this day -- it was the best, because the course was hard and cold.

And as the day warmed up, the others had to race on snow that increasingly turned slushy.

Ryan, who is 19 years old, finished in 1:11.99. "When I got to the finish, I knew I definitely had a good run and I was hoping I could stay on top," he said later.

Ralph Weber of Switzerland, bib No. 6, managed to get within nine-hundredths of a second.

Nils Mani, also Swiss, running third, was 49-hundredths back.

No one else was within half a second.

It's not as if this win came out of the blue. Ryan scored some World Cup points a couple weeks back, in super-G.

The amazing thing, to be blunt, is what his upside could be.

Skiing, as is obvious, can be a very expensive proposition.

Ryan has an older sister, Caitlin. Barbara Ann has been single-parenting for most of their lives. She has, she said, been a part-time teacher. She has worked at the family ski area in Richmond, Vt. She has done this and done that.

"It was a struggle," she said, "for me to pay my bills and come up with enough money to pay for entry fees and licenses and season passes at other areas. It really -- it was a struggle for me," she said. "I got so much help from so many other people."

She laughed when it was pointed out that some believe that an Olympic gold medal is  the ticket to the high life.

"You have no idea," she said. "It has been so difficult. That whole saying -- that it takes a village to raise a child -- has been so true for our kids. I have gotten so much help from so many people. People I don't know."

And people she does.

The trip to get her to Italy to see Ryan ski -- her brother, Bob, and brother-in-law, Steve Kelley, paid for that. "I can't tell you how much that means to me that they gave this trip and also the trip to World Juniors last year," she said.

Last season, someone else stepped forward to help underwrite Ryan's skiing.

 All of this has been impressed on her son. He has been on skis since he was 2.

"I think ski racing is -- it takes a lot of preparation, for sure," he said. "A lot of people -- if they don't reach a certain level, they fade away. If you prepare and you're willing to try to go for it all, it's possible. You should go for it.

"I'm trying."

Resi Stiegler's "dream come true" breakthrough

In 2006, Resi Stiegler, born and raised in Jackson Hole, Wyo., raced at the Torino Winter Olympics. She was just a couple months past her 20th birthday. She took 11th in the combined, 12th in the slalom. The future seemed so bright. In October, 2007, she took fourth in the slalom at the World Cup stop in Reiteralm, Austria, just off the podium. Then came two more top-10 World Cup slalom finishes that December, one in Canada, the other in Aspen. Her breakthrough seemed -- right there.

It had to wait until Sunday.

In the interim, she has known pain and seen hospitals and rehab centers. Repeatedly.

Resi Stiegler is tough.

At the World Cup stop in Ofterschwang, Germany, skiing from bib 35, an almost-impossible position, and in slushy, warm snow, Stiegler raced Sunday to second-place, beaten only by five-hundredths of a second, by Canada's Erin Mielzynsky.

It was Mielzynsky's first World Cup podium finish, too. Her winning combined time over the two runs: 1:53.59. She became the first Canadian to win a World Cup slalom since 1971, according to the authoritative Hank McKee at SkiRacing.com.

Austria's Marlies Schild, who has won all but one of the season's slalom races, finished third, two-hundredths of a second behind Stiegler.

Lindsey Vonn crashed in the first run. Vonn still holds a commanding lead in the overall standings; the tour now moves to Are, Sweden, for the final giant slalom and slalom races of the season. After that comes the World Cup finals in Schladming, Austria.

No one has ever doubted that Resi Stiegler had talent.

Or fantastic bloodlines. Her dad, Pepi, racing for Austria, is a three-time Olympic medalist. He won gold in the slalom in Innsbruck in 1964; in the giant slalom, he won silver in 1960 in Squaw Valley and bronze in 1964.

Beginning in December, 2007, Resi Stiegler has endured a string of injuries that are so freakishly bad, almost weird, it almost makes you wince just thinking about it.

That December, a crash in Lienz, Austria, sent her sliding under the fence and into the trees. She broke her left forearm and right shinbone and tore ligaments in her right knee. Here is video of the crash.

She returned in time for the 2009 world championships in Val d'Isere, France; there, French President Nikolas Sarkozy signed her racing bib.  A week later, she broke her foot and was out for the rest of the season.

In November, 2009, after competing in the early-season races in Soelden, Austria, and Levi, Finland, Stiegler, preparing for the U.S. World Cup stop in Aspen, fell while training in Colorado. She broke her left leg. That kept her out of the 2010 Olympics.

In a conference call Sunday, Stiegler talked at length about "growing up and having different thoughts than I had when I was 20."

She said, "This year was kind of that for me. I knew I had been skiing really fast. I didn't want to get just top-20, top-25. I wanted to be in the top-5. And I knew I was skiing well enough to do that.

"But to put it down on that day is a whole another mental game. For me, I had to learn how to focus in on -- what negative thoughts I didn't need, to think about something that was positive, just get the job done.  For me, that was the easiest way to overcome a lot of the negative mental activity I had, focusing on what I wanted to do, that I just wanted to have, an amazing run."

Stiegler's first run Sunday catapulted her from the 35th start slot into ninth, 82-hundredths back. Her second run shot her into the lead; only Mielzynsky would go faster.

Alex Hoedlmoser, the U.S. women's team's head coach, said in a statement that he was "super-, super-psyched for Resi," adding, "This is so amazing for her and it's hard to put it into words, actually."

Asked on that conference call if finishing in second place felt like first, Stiegler laughed.

"Yes, it did," she said. "I have visualized this since I was a child. I feel like I won. To me I don't feel like I -- you know, whether I got first or second or third today, the podium was a huge accomplishment.

"… I never in my wildest dreams thought it was going to happen this year. It's just a dream come true for me. Because the feeling is amazing."

Calm, strong, happy: Jessica Hardy

Some winter mornings in Los Angeles break warm and soft. This was not one of them. It had rained overnight, and there were fast clouds scudding overhead, and the thermometer said it was 49 degrees at 7:30 Thursday morning. The water in the USC pool was warm, as always, 80 degrees. But on the deck it was chilly and it was way early and now there were two solid hours of swimming to be done.

No one wants to know how hard you work in March. They just want to see the results come July, when the Olympic Games get underway in London. But this is when what happens this summer gets determined.

And perhaps no one is more determined than Jessica Hardy.

Four years ago, after the U.S. Trials, Jessica Hardy seemed on top of the swim world. She had qualified for the 2008 Beijing Games in four events: the 100-meter breaststroke, the 50 freestyle and two relays.

Then, though, she found out that she had tested positive for the banned substance clenbuterol.

Jessica and Dominik Meichtry, who went to grammar school in Manhattan Beach, Calif., and college at Berkeley and swims at the Olympics for the Swiss team -- his dad works in the airline business -- have been dating for six years now. She turns 25 this month; he is 27.

The day she found out, she called him; she was in Palo Alto, he in Berkeley; he borrowed a car from Dana Vollmer, another top-flight U.S. swimmer, and drove down to see Jessica; he was so distracted he got in a fender-bender. "It was just bad," he said.

They went to a hamburger place. They ordered. The food just sat there and got cold. He had to leave the next day, to go to a pre-Games training camp. He didn't know whether to go. Go, she said. He was so addled that he thought his flight leaving at 1 meant 1 in the afternoon; it had left 1 in the morning.

He explained the situation to the airport staff. They got him on another flight. He got to Singapore at 3 in the morning. Doping control officers, apparently suspicious, knowing his connection with Hardy, were there to meet him. "I was freaking out," he said.

Their phone bill that month, he said, was "skyrocketing." He said, "I remember one conversation between us was that I should swim," meaning at the Games. "She said I deserved to be there and I should swim for her, too, and be selfish about it.

"… She wanted me to do well and wanted something for the both of us."

He made the Olympic final in the 200 meters, finishing sixth.

Back home, meanwhile, Hardy was trying to sort out exactly what had happened. She and her team, including the immensely capable California-based lawyer Howard Jacobs, figured out that the clenbuterol had gotten into a dietary supplement she had been taking.

To make a long story short, the two-year suspension typical in even a first doping case was cut in half.

And then last year the International Olympic Committee announced that Hardy would be cleared to compete in London, assuming she qualifies at the U.S. Trials, which get underway in late June in Omaha.

The takeaway from all this: For sure Jessica Hardy tested positive. But she did not deliberately do anything wrong.

She is no cheater.

And in a weird way, getting suspended might have been the best thing to have ever happened to her.

"If you had asked me that in 2009," she said, "I would have punched you. I was so angry. But it has turned into that."

Because while she missed the 2008 Games -- perhaps 2012 is her time.

In her return to competition in 2009, she set three world records, two in the same race. That's angry.

"I started off being furious in my training because I was suspended. It was just -- train as hard as you can. I was doing too much too fast. It was just too much emotion. I felt like a bird in a cage when I should have been out soaring. It was almost reckless.

"Dave," meaning Dave Salo, at USC, the coach who has worked with Hardy for years now, "knew that was going to happen. So he only let me train two or three times in the water."

Over the years since, the trick has been to, as she put it, "find happiness."

She said, "I am doing well in both strokes in practice. I am extremely motivated. But not reckless. It's a calm motivation. When I am too motivated I spin out of control. I have too much explosiveness to hold the water. When I want things too much, it doesn't work. I have to be calm, strong and happy."

She added a moment later, "It's a mental thing. I am just really mentally strong. I want it. It has made me focus on the bigger picture than just now. Do I really want it and what does it mean to me?"

In the group she trains with at USC are, among others, Rebecca Soni and Yuliya Yefimova of Russia. At the 2011 swim world championships in Shanghai, they went 1-2-3 in the 50 breast: Hardy, Yefimova, Soni.

Of course the 50 is not an Olympic event. Soni is the Beijing 200 breast gold medalist and 100 silver medalist. Yefimona was just 16 in Beijing; she finished fourth there in the 100 and fifth in the 200.

Hardy is the world-record holder in the 100 breast. But she did not swim the event in Shanghai, taking as she put it, a "mental vacation" from it last year, part of the big-picture plan.

Which includes training at USC with a bunch of world-class men. Among them: Ricky Berens, who raced on the 800-meter free relay with Michael Phelps that won gold in Beijing and is, moreover, Soni's boyfriend; Dave Walters, who swam in the prelims in Beijing in that same relay and thus earned gold himself; and Ous Mellouli, the 1500 gold medalist in Beijing.

And, of course, Meichtry.

"What's really special about Jess," he said, while she listened, "is that any other person would have this anger inside them …

"It's a little scary for her competitors how calm she is. We obviously talk about London. Quite often. There are 140-something days left. But she really just takes one step at a time. She's not putting all this pressure on herself, saying, 'Oh, at the Trials everything has to go right.' That's what has changed. She has become a lot more calm person, a lot more grateful person over everything that has happened to her."

They looked at each other with obvious affection, a couple that had been through an enormous test of what each means to each other. She smiled at him. And he at her.

He said, "We make a great team."

Best in the world -- believe it

Three weeks ago, in Sochi, Russia, Bode Miller, America's best male Alpine skier, smashed his left knee coming off one of the jumps on what will be the Olympic course at the 2014 Winter Games. He tried to ski through the pain the next weekend at the World Cup stop in Bansko, Bulgaria. But it wasn't good. So Miller flew back to the United States, to have the knee scoped at a clinic in Vail, Colo.

If you know Miller and his ways, you know he could well have called off his season right then and there.

But no.

From the get-go, Miller had purchased a round-trip ticket. He was always intending to go back to Europe, back to the next stop, in Crans Montana, Switzerland -- underscoring the incredible culture that is at the core of everything the U.S. Ski Team does, manifested in its motto, "best in the world."

That slogan was so easy to make fun of when the Americans were anything but. But look now, and understand the success that is across the board, from alpine to cross-country to snowboard to freestyle to ski jumping and Nordic combined, and these are just a few of the many examples:

Lindsey Vonn on Sunday won a super-G at Bansko, her 10th World Cup victory this season, 51st lifetime. The 18th super-G win of her career, she is now the World Cup leader in the discipline. Vonn is way ahead in the World Cup overall points race for the 2012 season.

Cross-country skier Kikkan Randall leads the World Cup sprint standings.

The incomparable Shaun White is, plainly put, the best snowboarder on Planet Earth. Kelly Clark has 15 straight halfpipe wins.

Moguls artist Hannah Kearney won 16 straight World Cup races.

Sarah Hendrickson has six World Cup ski jumping victories.

Tom Wallisch has won every slopestyle contest this season but one.

For every Vonn, by the way, there are many, many others. The Americans have depth.

The U.S. women's alpine team, for instance, currently leads every other country in the world in the downhill standings, including the vaunted Austrians and Swiss. Racing in Sochi earlier this month, for instance, four of six American starters made the top-10: Vonn, Julia Mancuso, Stacey Cook and Alice McKennis. And Laurenne Ross was 18th, Leanne Smith 26th.

Someone ought to do a Harvard Business School case study about the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Assn.

For real.

There are huge corporations that could learn a lot from the U.S. Ski Team. Business-wise. Culture-wise. Success-wise.

All those things are intertwined.

When Bill Marolt took over, USSA had revenues of $8.14 million. That was for the fiscal year ending April 1996.

The fiscal year ending April 2012? Revenues will total $24.75 million.

At the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, the U.S. team won 37 medals, best in the world. The U.S. Ski Team accounted for 21 of those 37 medals.

Miller won three in Vancouver, including gold in the super-combined; Vonn won two, including downhill gold. The breakout story of the 2010 Games: the four medals won by the American Nordic combined team, testament to 14 years of consistent funding, improved coaching and training.

Marolt, USSA's president and chief executive officer, stayed the course with the Nordic combined program.

He also, over his tenure, has directed initiatives that produced the Center of Excellence, the Park City, Utah, facility that opened in May, 2009, that serves as USSA's all-in-one training center and headquarters; the Speed Center at Copper Mountain, Colo., which gives alpine racers early-season training; an ongoing partnership with 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic venues that includes, among other things, roller ski train development at Soldier Hollow; and an overall organizational focus on what's called "sport science," everything from cutting-edge advances to simple stuff like making sure American athletes drink enough water on airplane trips.

Staying hydrated on those long-haul flights, U.S. sport scientists have found, makes a huge difference in keeping the athletes healthy so they can actually make use of those training days when it's winter Down Under but summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

A new initiative: combining sports and school in an academy. If you are, for instance, Mikaela Shiffrin, and you are turning 17 in two weeks, and you have already made a World Cup podium (Dec. 29, bronze, Lienz, Austria, slalom) but you might have designs on college and beyond -- why should you or your parents be put to that either-or?

"We want to send that message to parents," Marolt said. "This is a big commitment, a big family commitment of time and resources. They're thinking, 'If my child gets to the point where they could be an Olympic great, I'm going to have to make a choice: academics or athletics.' We don't want them to have to make that choice. They can be both."

Marolt, along with Luke Bodensteiner, USSA's executive vice president for athletics, are big believers in the vision thing and in the concept of culture driving the mission. Both, it should be noted, are former Olympic athletes -- Marolt in alpine skiing in 1964, Bodensteiner in cross-country in 1992 and 1994.

"We started with the idea of 'best in the world,' and … they thought I was nuts," Marolt said. "But you can't change it unless you put it out there. And we have done that."

Bodensteiner said the brilliance of "best in the world" is that it is one, "super-aspirational," and, two, easy to understand and translate.

He explained: "When Bill came on and said, 'We are the best in the world, or aspiring to be the best in the world,' he has never wavered from that. That is a very visible pronunciation. That goes all the way down to the deepest levels possible, down to a race in a tiny mountain somewhere. It's a simple concept but also so powerful and people feel good about being brought in.

"Part of the evolution of that statement -- and it has been interpreted so many different ways, us saying we are the best when we were not but it is something that a lot of people have aspired to -- is that it has been a filter for every decision we have made for the last 16 years: Is this going to make us better or not?"

Bode Miller, as things turned out, ultimately did have to call off the rest of his season. He got to Crans Montana and the knee just didn't hold up. But it wasn't for lack of trying. Or buy-in.

"I'm still having fun and as long as skiing is enjoyable, I'm going to continue to do it," Miller said in a statement issued by the U.S. Ski Team.

Marolt, in an interview before Miller's season would come to a close, said, "One of our strengths is the idea that we tried to create a team. Not just an athletic team but an entire organizational team where everybody buys in, everybody understands what it is you try to do. Everybody multitasks and does more than is required.

"That is what makes us so good, everybody pulling on the rope at the same time and in the same direction. That is a hard one. It is difficult to achieve, because of the personalities and the profiles of every individual, from the chairman of the board to the person answering the phone in the lobby. But it's a good team, and the team is our strength."

Maggie Steffens: time to shine

Under the lights last week in Irvine, Calif., in the second period of a FINA World League Prelims game against Canada, the score tied at 3, the Americans on offense, Team USA attacker Maggie Steffens was lurking about seven meters from the goal. In basketball terms, she was on the left side, at the top of the key. The ball swung her way. Again, think basketball. When Kobe Bryant gets the ball like that, what happens? It's catch-and-shoot.

It's a no-fear, no-mercy style of play that's rooted in confidence and mental toughness. It's what special players do because -- they can.

Maggie Steffens caught the ball and did not hesitate. She swung and fired and, that quick, just like Kobe would, she scored, putting the United States up, 4-3, en route to an eventual 11-7 victory.

Maggie Steffens is 18 years old.

Water polo can be a capricious game. But Maggie Steffens is fast earning a reputation for reliability under the most extreme pressure. Last summer, at the Pan American Games, the Americans and Canadians staged an epic contest that went through two standard overtimes and then to 20 penalty shots before, finally, there was resolution. On the line: not only the gold medal but an Olympic qualifying spot.

The Americans prevailed, 27-26. Who nailed the winning shot? Maggie Steffens.

Assuming she makes the U.S. team that goes to the Olympics, and all signs are she will, Maggie could well be a star in the making for a team and a sport that has everything going for it to be a potential hit.

Expect the U.S. women's water polo team to be featured prominently in NBC's coverage of the London Games.

Why?

Over the past several Olympics, the U.S. women's team has done everything but win gold -- silver in Sydney in 2000, bronze in Athens in 2004, silver again in Beijing in 2008.

The U.S. women's team is made up of a collection of personalities that is fit, tan, well-educated, well-spoken and not averse to publicity -- in October, 2010, for instance, most of this bunch posed in the all-together for ESPN The Magazine.

And while Maggie Steffens may herself be on the verge of breaking out, she also figures to be part of one of the great personal stories of the Games -- layered with family, with Olympic history and with powerful notes of redemption.

Maggie's oldest sister, Jessica, 24, a standout on the 2008 U.S. team, apparently recovered from a 2010 shoulder injury, is in strong contention to make the 2012 U.S. team, too.

The Steffens house has roots in water polo that run deep and strong.

The girls' father, Carlos, played for the Puerto Rican and U.S. teams in the early 1980s.

Their mom, Peggy, comes from a family of 13; she is the 11th. The family name is Schnugg. Peter Schnugg is a member of the 1980 U.S. Olympic team that would have gone to Moscow.

Carlos and Peggy met in college at Berkeley. They have four children: Jessica, Charlie, Teresa and Maggie.

Growing up in the Steffens house, sports was an essential part of the rhythm of life. As was school. As was family -- their own home and their extended family. There are something like 45 cousins.

For Carlos, sports was the way up and out of a house in Puerto Rico where he had almost nothing.

Peggy said, recalling her own childhood, "My mom out of sheer duress would drop us off at the pool and we would stay there all day long." And, in a family of 13, "There was always competition. It was great."

Even so, Peggy said, referring to their four children, "Most of their mental toughness comes from him," meaning Carlos, adding, "Every day he has a story or an analogy. It has been ingrained in them since they were little."

In turn, Carlos was quick to praise Peggy, saying she's the one who did the carpooling, the sandwich-making, all of that, when he was traveling on business. "I spent quality time with them," he said, "teaching the passion and the love for the sport."

Both Jessica and Maggie said their parents emphasized not only sports but school and doing the best you could at each. Charlie played water polo at Cal and graduated last December; Teresa went there to play but then opted to focus on school and is now a junior majoring in media studies; Jessica is a 2009 Stanford grad; Maggie is headed to Stanford this fall.

"If any of us were feeling sorry for ourselves, our parents were quick to nip it in the bud," Jessica said, adding a moment later, "It's like putting change in your pocket -- that's what we grew up valuing. That has continued through with us.

"At this level you need that mentality. We put in so much work, so much time, so much effort just to survive in the game. It's a tough sport but at the end of the day I think we love the grind, we love the competition, we love the toughness of it all."

Jessica, as a player, is indeed more of a grinder. Maggie, by contrast, is more of a, hey, everybody, look-at-me -- the sort of natural talent people have been noticing since she was kicking soccer balls as a 5-year-old.

Her father said of his youngest daughter, referring now to water polo, "She has feeling for the game. She understands the game. And she loves it. When you see her play, she anticipates. That is the key to everything -- in life, right?"

"I have seen Maggie play since she was 12," said Adam Krikorian, the U.S. women's head coach, who used to be the coach at UCLA. "I knew she was special at 12. It was no surprise.

"… I knew from before, from watching her, before ever coaching her, that she was incredibly talented, she was coachable and she was tough as nails. That was why I wanted her from the get-go."

"Maggie is good," Carlos said, and always has been, dominating 13-year-olds in the pool when she was 8.

"But," he said, "she has yet to do what Jessica did at the 2008 Olympics. I don't know if you noticed but they made an all-world team," the Olympic media all-star team, "and the only one that made that team from the U.S. is Jessica. This is a girl who [barely] made the [U.S.] team. Maggie still needs to show that."

He also said Jessica has been a "great sister," adding, "She has really helped Maggie a ton going through the journey. Maggie has always looked up to Jessica."

Jessica said, "I'm trying to take it day by day. Ultimately, it's one thing playing with your teammates who become your sisters. It's another to have your sister be your teammate. I know she and I can go through hell together and we'll come out okay.

"I feel that way with the other girls but it's completely natural with us. There are things we see and do in the pool together that are so cool. It's a really fun thing to be a part of."

For her part, Maggie said, "It's a very surreal thought, to be able to not only have one person but two people on one team sharing that same experience. It's pretty amazing -- a crazy experience."

"We are working so hard," Jessica said. "We are taking it step by step."

As is Carlos. And here is a little secret.

Carlos was good enough, probably, to have made the 1984 U.S. team. But, with his degree from Berkeley in hand, he had to make a living. He had to support his mother back in Puerto Rico and then his wife and then a growing family.

When the Olympic Games would come on television, it hurt to watch. For a long time it hurt.

"In water polo, there's nothing bigger than becoming an Olympian," he said. "I made sure, and I still do, that I offer my kids the best possible opportunity that what happened to me will not happen to them. I will support them as much as they can to make sure they don't have that empty feeling."

That feeling lasted until 2008, when Jessica played in Beijing. The whole family went to watch. "Man," Carlos Steffens said he remember thinking in the stands, "how lucky I am to live this through my kids."

Something else happened in those stands. After the U.S. team lost in the gold-medal game, defeated 9-8 by the Netherlands, Carlos gave his attention to Maggie, who was sitting next to him. She had just turned 15.

"I looked at her and she at me and I said, 'Now it's your turn to get the gold.' She was all business. She nodded her head.

"And now here we are, four years later."

Mario Pescante and the matter of dignity

According to the earliest records, the first Olympic Games were held in 776 BC in what we now call ancient Olympia, in Greece. Tradition holds that the city of Rome was founded 23 years later, in 753 BC.

In the abstract, it was quite okay for Rome to drop out of the race for the 2020 Summer Games, Mario Pescante was explaining Wednesday on the phone from Italy. But it was not okay to do so on such short notice, with just hours to go before the deadline for the applicant cities to tell the International Olympic Committee whether they were in -- or not.

This, he said, is why he had no choice but to resign as vice president of the IOC.

This is also why Mario Pescante should be applauded.

His resignation was an act of honor -- the work of a man of principled action who would not be persuaded to reconsider.

It's a significant loss for the IOC's policy-making executive board. Pescante has a law degree. He is a professor, a parliamentarian and something of a philosopher.

At the same time, it also may prove a key stroke in restoring the dignity of Italian sport.

How many senior officials would similarly have the fortitude to do what Pescante did?

It's a big deal to be an IOC vice president. Who gives that up, and why?

Who measures both the political and economic circumstances of the times in which we live now and the pull of the traditions, cultural and social, of a movement that reaches to ancient times?

"This movement," Pescante said, "has 2,700 years of antiquity."

He added a moment later, "It's not particular to decide 12 hours before the deadline. It's not correct."

Once more, for emphasis, "It has nothing to [do] with the negative decision. Just the timing."

Last Tuesday, the day before the IOC deadline, Monti scrapped Rome's 2020 bid, saying the Italian government could not provide the required financial backing the campaign required at a time of economic crisis. Projections for playing host to the 2020 Games in Rome: $12.5 billion.

Rome's withdrawal leaves five cities in the 2020 mix. In no particular order: Tokyo; Istanbul; Madrid; Baku, Azerbaijan; and Doha, Qatar. The IOC will pick the 2020 city in September, 2013.

Reflecting on the debt crisis in Europe and its intersection with Rome's 2020 bid, Pescante said, "Personally, I thought the moment to change the policy and to start with the investment was right. But the prime minster, at this moment, I think, with the situation in Greece, in Spain, where everybody -- they were sacrificing, the discipline is extraordinary, this was the time to think of the future. I respect this decision.

"My trouble is this decision could be taken two months ago, not 12 hours before the deadline. This is not correct for the Italian sports movement."

For emphasis, Pescante said, Monti is "doing a fantastic job." But in this case, "There was a lack of style," and for the sake of the Italian sports movement it was important that he -- Pescante -- resign his IOC vice presidency.

"Frankly," Pescante said, summing up, "sport is a very important social expression. But it's not decisive in this moment to solve the problem of Europe, or the crisis."

He also said, "I repeat -- 2,700 years of history. This is another aspect of life in the world. No other religion or philosophy has this. Frankly, if I can show my prime minister, and also the Italian public -- this must be respected. I am happy to finish my career at the top of the Olympic movement."

To be clear: Pescante, now 73, is not resigning his IOC membership. He is still a member; at the conclusion of the London Games, he will no longer be a vice president.

It is no easy thing to become an IOC vice president. There are only four. All four are elected by their IOC peers.

"I know well," Pescante elected as a regular IOC member in 1994, said. "I was elected vice president after 15 years of activity in the world of sport."

Once elected, you are the fourth vp for roughly a year, then the third for another year, and so on.

The way it would have worked, Pescante would have been in the enviable position of being the first vice president from the closing ceremony at the London Games until the session in Buenos Aires in September, 2013 -- roughly 13 months.

At that session in Buenos Aires, the IOC will elect a new president -- Jacques Rogge's 12 years in office come to a mandatory end -- and the 2020 Summer Games site.

Talk about influential.

This is what Pescante is giving up, willingly and knowingly.

Pescante said he spoke twice Tuesday to Rogge about the matter.

"Jacques said, 'Mario, will you change?'

" 'I said, 'No, thank you.'

"This is theater. Theater was also born in Italy. I don't want to be an actor in the theater."

It was not immediately clear how the IOC would address the matter of Pescante's position for those 13 months. Zaiqing Yu of China is due to rotate off the board after London; Ser Miang Ng of Singapore and Thomas Bach of Germany hold the other two vice presidencies. The early indication was that Ng would slide up to the first vice presidential slot and Bach to the second. Bach is widely believed within IOC circles to be interested in the presidency; Ng is similarly discussed as a contender.

Pescante said, "I would like to say -- how do you say it in English? -- that my decision is irrevocable."

Steve Holcomb: driving to history

Three years ago, Steve Holcomb won gold at the bobsled world championships, driving a four-man sled. Two years ago, he won four-man gold at the Olympic Games in Vancouver.

On Sunday, pushed by Steve Langton, Holcomb won gold in the two-man at the world championships in Lake Placid, N.Y.

It's the first American gold in the two-man in the 80-year history of bobsled world championships.

That four-man worlds gold had been the first in 50 years; the Olympic four-man gold the first since 1948.

"I don't know -- I'm kind of running out of records to break," Holcomb said late Sunday, laughing in disbelief.

"We had an unbelievable drive by Steve," Langton said. "He is an unbelievable pilot. He can drive anything down the hill."

Name another American in his sport who has achieved as much.

Michael Phelps has of course won more world championship and Olympic medals.

Shaun White has perhaps pushed more boundaries.

But in his sport, Steve Holcomb has lifted the United States team back to heights the Americans haven't known since John Glenn was orbiting the earth all of three times. And before, way before -- since the Great Depression.

In Olympic terms -- before the first Los Angeles Summer Games in 1932.

Top that.

Later Sunday, Holcomb switched sleds and his brakeman, Justin Olsen, and anchored the U.S. to its first-ever worlds team gold by a margin of 56.20 seconds, the fastest of the eight teams competing -- the times a combination of men's and women's skeleton, women's bobsled and men's two-man bobsled.

Germany had won all four prior team golds, in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2011; the U.S. had taken silver in 2007, bronze in 2008 and 2009. Germany took second Sunday, 73-hundredths of a second back; Canada, third, 1.30 second behind.

Holcomb, in a telephone interview, repeatedly gave credit Sunday to his teammates, coaches and the U.S. support staff. He also said, "If you put a sled in front of me, I'm going to do my best to drive it."

Holcomb turned not only his career but everything around in March, 2008, with the help of an eye doctor in Beverly Hills, Calif., Dr. Brian Boxer Wachler.

Holcomb was suffering from a condition called keratoconus, which causes the eye's cornea to bulge outward. Glasses and contact lenses weren't working. Lasik hadn't worked, either. Holcomb was so nearsighted -- and so frustrated -- he was ready to quit bobsled.

How nearsighted? He couldn't read the big E at the top of the charts. Not even close.

"It was kind of a standing joke," Holcomb said Sunday, recalling what it had been like then. "I had to stand eight inches from the big E to see it."

In 2003, it turned out, Boxer Wacher had developed a procedure to restore Holcomb's vision. He called it C3-R; it involves administering drops to strengthen the cornea and then embedding a lens behind the iris of each eye. The procedure took remarkably little time.

Bingo.

The results on the track since speak for themselves. Simply put, when you have Holcomb's innate talent, it makes an enormous difference to be able to see, actually see, where you're going.

Boxer Wachler has since renamed the procedure the Holcomb C3-R.

Last September, at the U.S. Olympic Committee's annual assembly in Colorado Springs, Colo., Holcomb -- on stage to receive the 2010 team of the year award -- became emotional when discussing the difference Boxer Wachler had made. He didn't just save my career, Holcomb said. He saved my life.

Before Sunday, the best the United States had done in the two-man at the worlds was four silvers; the most recent had been in 1961. The Americans had won but six bronze medals; four had come between 1949 and 1967 and then Brian Shimer, now the U.S. men's coach, had won one in 1997.

The way a competition like the two-man works at the worlds is, in all, four runs -- the first two Saturday, the final two on Sunday.

Holcomb's first run was off. He knew it. He posted to his Twitter feed, "Huge mistake in the first run. Sitting in 4th. Got it figured out. Time to make my move."

In the second run, Langton powered to a 5.02-second start and Holcomb got them to the finish line fastest of the 27 sleds that finished the run -- ending the day just 12-hundredths of a second behind Canada's Lyndon Rush and Jesse Lumsden.

In Sunday's first run -- that is, the third overall --  Langton again came out hot, at 5.07 and Holcomb got them down in 55.54 seconds, the fastest of any team in all four heats. That put the U.S. team up top by 20-hundredths of a second over the Canadians, 26-hundredths ahead of Germany's Maximilian Arndt and Kevin Kuske.

"Very happy with my 1st run, but the race isn't over," Holcomb posted to Twitter. "Need to stay focused & relaxed, then do it again."

Which is what he did, finishing the day with a final run of 55.63.

The U.S. team's winning time over four runs: 3.42.88.

The Canadians finished 46-hundredths back, the Germans 55-hundredths.

All three U.S. sleds finished in the top 10:  John Napier and Christopher Fogt took sixth, Nick Cunningham and Dallas Robinson ninth. Both Napier and Fogt are in the military and served overseas after the Vancouver Olympics, Napier six months in Afghanistan, Fogt a year in Iraq.

"Everything is clicking," Holcomb said. "Everything is going well … Right now we are on top of the world. Everything is fantastic. I am living life. When you get a second chance at being able to see, it gives you a new perspective on life -- it really does."

Women and sport conference: impatient optimists

Women have come a long way in the struggle for gender equity on the field of play at the Olympic Games. But more, much more, needs to be done to achieve equity in Olympic sport's management and executive positions, it was made clear at the International Olympic Committee's fifth "Women and Sport" conference.

The session, which wrapped up a three-day run Saturday at the JW Marriott hotel in downtown Los Angeles, attracted 855 delegates from 135 nations as well as IOC president Jacques Rogge and a number of senior IOC members -- a significant outreach for the U.S. Olympic Committee and for Los Angeles Olympic backers.

"I am an impatient optimist," Academy Award-winning actress Geena Davis, who has gone on to become a noted archery competitor and leading advocate for women's equity in sport, told the conference Saturday morning.

She added, "The time for change is now."

The two LA Summer Games provide an easy benchmark to show how far things have come.

In 1932, only 9 percent of the competitors were women. In 1984, 24 percent. In 2008 in Beijing, more than 42 percent, and in London this summer, Rogge said, "We expect to improve on that."

Moreover, with the addition of women's boxing, women will compete in every one of the 26 sports on the Olympic program at the 2012 Games.

C.K. Wu, the president of the international boxing federation, which goes by the acronym AIBA, said at a session Saturday that female boxers will most likely be given the option of wearing either shorts or skirts, resolving a long-running controversy.

The addition of female boxers means there are only these two entries that are not gender-neutral on the Olympic program, Summer (synchronized swimming) and Winter (Nordic combined).

Rogge, asked about that, said that men could do synchro and women Nordic combined if there was more "worldwide activity."

Only three nations, meanwhile, have yet to send a woman to the Games -- Saudi Arabia, Brunei and Qatar. In an interview before the conference with a group of journalism students from the University of Southern California's Annenberg School of Communication & Journalism, Rogge said he was "optimistic" the number would be down to zero by the London Games.

The next frontier, he and a number of other speakers over the conference underscored, is two-fold:

One is getting women involved at the highest levels of leadership across the movement -- in national governing bodies, national Olympic committees, international federations and, of course, the IOC itself.

"In the Olympic movement," Anita DeFrantz of Los Angeles, the senior IOC delegate to the United States said at the closing ceremony, "we desperately need more women to take their role at the decision-making tables."

The long-established target for women in senior positions in the movement is 20 percent.

There are currently 19 current active female IOC members, Rogge said. "Without jumping the gun" and mentioning no names, he said he expected the ratification of two more female members at the IOC's forthcoming annual meeting this summer in London, bringing the number to 21, and the percentage to 19.5 percent.

He said, "Is that enough? No. It's not the end of the story. But it's an important milestone."

In the international federations, the proportion of women on executive boards or commissions is still well below that 20 percent figure -- 16.6 percent for Summer Games sports, 12.4 percent for Winter Games sports, Wu said in a report to the conference.

The percentage of female national Olympic committee presidents: 4 percent.

Wu, the father of two daughters, said, "Everything in this world is more exciting, interesting and inspiring when women participate," adding a moment later, "We need to work harder on making progress."

The second "long battle for us," as Rogge phased it, is "to have better access [around the world] for women to sport."

He added, "It's not going to be easy."

In many countries in the world, Rogge said, the idea of sport for women may not necessarily be met with resistance. In most countries, sport is a government enterprise. But many governments are dealing with -- you name it -- armed conflict, economic woes, disease and other profound challenges.

In such circumstance, "They tell us frankly sport is not our No. 1 priority and you have to understand that."

It's why, when asked what sort of outcome he hoped to see from this conference, he responded, he said, "A strong message that resonates outside of this conference."

Here, he said, this conference had "what you would call a captive public," what in idiomatic American English we might call preaching to the choir.

"… Everyone is saying this is a sacred noble goal," promoting women's equity in sport.

Now, though, the conference is over and everyone is headed home from Los Angeles. The sixth "Women and Sport" conference won't be for another four years. What will the numbers say then?

Salt Lake 2022: not a chance

As Salt Lake City celebrates the tenth anniversary of the 2002 Winter Olympics, local authorities have announced they intend to explore the idea of bidding again for the 2022 or 2026 Winter Games. Addressing supporters at the Olympic cauldron at Rice-Eccles Stadium was re-lit last week for a few minutes, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert said, according to a report in the Salt Lake Tribune, "We need to pursue this [exploration] to see if there is real opportunity there."

I can help, Mr. Governor.

There is no chance Salt Lake City can win. Zero. Zip. Nada. You can stop right now.

Save everyone the money, the time and the worry.

This is not -- repeat, not -- a slam on Salt Lake, or Utah. Salt Lake is cool. Park City and Deer Valley are beautiful. So is Soldier Hollow.

This is, instead, a blunt assessment of the reality of the International Olympic Committee bid game. I have covered every IOC bid contest since 1999. I spent a great deal of 2011 reporting on the 2018 Winter Games contest, won by Pyeongchang, South Korea, going to each of the three stops on the Evaluation Commission tour and then the vote itself last July in Durban, South Africa.

Mr. Governor, not once since the 2002 Games closed has even one IOC member said to me -- you know what, I really want to go back to Salt Lake City.

That is why you have no chance.

Do you know where the members of the IOC consistently say they would want to go?

San Francisco. And Los Angeles. For the Summer Games.

In polling done for the 2012 New York and 2016 Chicago bids, IOC members consistently told their American friends that where they really wanted to go was California. The IOC is Eurocentric; San Francisco is a magic name in Europe and yet it has never staged the Games. LA has played host twice, in 1932 and 1984, but Southern California, with Hollywood, Disneyland and the surf and volleyball culture of the beach, nonetheless remains a potent draw.

Mr. Governor, another point to consider:

Salt Lake was an Olympic city in 2002 but since then, what? The IOC is back in the United States this week for a conference it stages every four years called "Women and Sport." President Jacques Rogge is in attendance. Some 800 people are with him. Where's this conference? Los Angeles.

Is anyone from Utah in attendance here in Los Angeles? Um, still looking.

Three years ago, an Olympic-related conference, SportAccord, was held amid the IOC's policy-making executive board meeting. Where? Denver.

What has Salt Lake done for the IOC since 2002?

This, again, Mr. Governor, is why Salt Lake has no chance.

Though you undoubtedly have been briefed, Mr. Governor, that Denver and Reno-Tahoe are your domestic competitors for 2022, and that Bozeman, Mont., may be interested as well, the real play for the United States may well be California in 2024.

Obviously, a 2024 candidacy would likely take 2026 out of the mix.

If, that is, there's any bid in play at all in the next few years.

There's just no urgency to bid, and here's hoping someone on your exploratory committee by now has told you this.

For starters, it's not at all critical for the Games to be back in the United States. Sure, it would be nice if the Games were back. But it's not an imperative -- not politically, economically or culturally. NBC just agreed to pay $4.38 billion for the rights to televise the Games through 2020; none of those Games is in the United States yet the sales price was hardly depressed.

Moreover, the U.S. Olympic Committee and IOC are locked in a long-running dispute over the 12.75 percent share of television rights and 20 percent cut of marketing rights the USOC gets from the IOC. The two sides are talking but progress has been halting.

There's no bid until there's a new deal, and it's not clear a deal will get done while Rogge is in office. He's president until September, 2013. That doesn't leave a lot of time to get a bid together in time for a 2015 vote for 2022; a bid these days typically runs north of $50 million.

As for Denver: they have to contend in Colorado with the 1970s Olympic give-back (still); the haul up to the mountains from Denver proper; and the environmental and financial issues inherent in building a bobsled track. Like, do we need another one in the American West when there's one next door in Utah?

Reno increasingly seems to be trying to package itself with California -- the Nevada-California border is right there -- and with San Francisco, four hours away.

Which only begs the question, right? Why go to Reno when you're inevitably drawn to San Francisco? That's one of the challenges the Reno bid is going to have to answer. Even in 1960, when the Winter Games were held in Squaw Valley, in the Sierras by the California-Nevada line, building on the same idea the Reno team is floating for 2022, the IOC held its session down in San Francisco.

It is true that the United States has become a Winter Games power and the finances of the movement have made staging the Winter Olympics a much more attractive option than ever before. But the primary play is, and always will be, the Summer Games.

There are lots of reasons San Francisco has never staged the Games. The politics are complicated; same for the traffic. But perhaps the main issue has always been, what about a stadium?

Earlier this month, the NFL announced it would give the 49ers $200 million toward a $1 billion, 68,500-seat stadium in suburban Santa Clara. Site work began in January. The stadium could open as soon as the 2014 season, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Unclear is whether the stadium could be configured for track and field or whether it's football-only.

Let's get back to Salt Lake. All the it-can't-happen evidence in this column -- people in Utah surely stand ready to dismiss it, eager to point to "sustainability" and to Mitt.

It is indisputably true that the facilities that helped Salt Lake stage the 2002 Games are still there. The airport; the venues; the mass-transit system; Interstate 80; all of that.

Doesn't matter.

For one, come 2022, that bobsled track -- just to pick one venue - is going to be 20 years old. It's not going to take some upgrading? That's not going to cost some money?

Beyond which -- those kinds of venues, facilities and things on the ground are what the IOC calls the "technical" stuff.

The technical stuff doesn't win votes. New York had a great technical bid and got 19 votes, eliminated in the second round. Chicago had a great technical bid and got bounced in the first round, with 18 votes.

The IOC likes to talk about "sustainable" Olympics. Then it goes and awards Games to London (2012 - huge construction project), Sochi, Russia (2014 - huge construction project), Rio (2016 - huge construction project) and Pyeongchang (2018 - huge construction project).

Someday, perhaps, that string will be snapped. But why would it be Salt Lake?

Olympic bids are won on emotion, on story-telling, on connection.

The memories that we Americans have of those Games as a patriotic expression of can-do just five months after 9/11?

Within the IOC, "Salt Lake" is still remembered for the bid scandal, for the sense of having to move within a post-9/11 armed camp, even for President Bush's addition to the opening-the-Games formula. He added, "On behalf of a proud, determined and grateful nation" to the traditional formula, "I declare open the Games of Salt Lake City," and within the protocol-sensitive IOC you bet they still remember.

If the bet within Salt Lake City is that Mitt Romney, now running for the Republican nomination for U.S. president, would once again be cast as savior -- the position here is clear.

Romney, along with Fraser Bullock and the rest of the SLOC team, and the volunteers, deserve enormous credit for turning around the 2002 Olympics. The situation when he was brought in was, if not grim, pretty close to it. He and his team -- and everyone in Utah who contributed -- deserve full recognition for the success of the 2002 Olympics, and the $100 million surplus.

"I'm delighted that Utah is thinking about bidding for the 2022 Winter Olympics," Romney said, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. "Our great nation is wonderfully suited to host the world's greatest sporting competition."

It's quite a proposition, though, that Romney as president would sway the IOC. First, he would have to get the Republican nomination; then be elected president of the United States; then convince the IOC. That's a lot of dominoes.

Remember that President Obama went to Copenhagen in 2009 to lobby the IOC on behalf of Chicago, his hometown, and to little effect.

Presumably, Romney would be greeted by the IOC as an Olympic insider. Then again, it's the IOC. One never assumes.