Olympic Games 1988

LaTaunya Pollard's daughter already speaks Italian. Chiara is 3. No wonder Jennifer Azzi is envious. Azzi, the 1989 NCAA Division I female basketball player of the year, is still trying to master the language after her first season playing in the Italian League. Valerie Still has gone a couple of steps better. A singer, pianist and guitarist in the band Under 99, she has recorded two records and performed at a variety of Italian nightclubs.

Experts in East Germany developed a performance-enhancing nasal spray before the 1988 Olympic Games that had the same effect as anabolic steroids and was virtually undetectable, a leading swimmer alleged Tuesday. Raik Hannemann, who Monday admitted taking performance-enhancing drugs, said traces of the drug's use would disappear after three days.

Former Olympic diver Bruce Kimball will serve less than five years of a 17-year sentence for a 1988 drunk-driving accident that killed two teen-agers, the Florida Parole Commission decided Tuesday. The commission voted to release Kimball Nov. 24, 1993, unless the case is brought back to the commission for disciplinary action by the Department of Corrections, parole spokeswoman Ruth Anne Reese said.

Two years ago in Seoul, Korea, the Olympics suffered through its biggest drug scandal when Ben Johnson of Canada lost his gold medal after testing positive for an anabolic steroid. Rumors were rife in the Olympic village that other big-time athletes also tested positive, but none of those rumors were verified. Still, word of another potential scandal quietly reached the International Olympic Committee's medical commission in Seoul. It involved Stacey Augmon. Augmon, a guard for the U.S.

It was a scene that recalled the golden days for Ben Johnson. Almost. The media were there, as before, chronicling a news conference. Johnson was as before, shy and yet brimming with confidence. There was the bluster, the bragging, the promise of big things to come. This scene, which played out two weeks ago in Italy, was familiar, with one exception. The new element was the pervasive skepticism that now attends Johnson's boasts.

The Olympics are becoming too big, and some events and athletes are likely to be cut, President Juan Antonio Samaranch of the International Olympic Committee said Wednesday in Rome. Samaranch said it is necessary to trim participation to 10,000 competitors. About 13,000 athletes and officials attended the 1988 Summer Games at Seoul, and 15,000 are expected at Barcelona in 1992. He did not say which events might be eliminated.