Olympic Games 2002

Ski jumping is currently a sport of Austria, Finland and Japan, and those are the countries most likely to emerge with spots on the victory stand after today's K120 competition. The U.S. team will be led by Alaskan Alan Alborn, the 5-foot-10, 128-pounder who said after the earlier jumping competition that this probably would be his last Olympics. Others teaming with Alborn in the joint medal effort are Brian Welch, Tommy Schwall and Clint Jones.

Finland won its second consecutive Nordic combined gold medal of the Olympics by adding to the big lead it built during Saturday's ski jumping and then coasting to the gold in the 20-kilometer cross-country relay at Soldier Hollow. The Finns, who entered the Games without a gold medal in the jumping-racing hybrid since 1948, finished the relay in 48 minutes 42.2 seconds.

Skip Kari Erickson made two difficult shots late as the American women curlers stayed in contention for a medal by beating Britain, 6-5, Sunday in extra ends. Trailing, 5-3, in the last end, or inning, Erickson knocked out a British stone and made hers stick inside the scoring circle near another U.S. stone. That gave the U.S. team two points and a 5-5 tie at the end of regulation. In the 11th, Erickson again made a shot that gently bumped the British stone and put herself in scoring position.

Holding hands as they climbed to the top of the medal podium, figure skaters Jamie Sale of Canada and Elena Berezhnaya of Russia put a good face on an ugly moment for figure skating and the Olympics. Sale and partner David Pelletier were given the pairs' gold medals they narrowly missed winning last Monday, when they lost a 5-4 decision to Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze.

It doesn't matter now that Michelle Kwan doesn't have a coach to sit beside her in the kiss-and-cry area. Or that Russians Maria Butyrskaya and Irina Slutskaya endured inconsistent seasons. Forget, too, Sarah Hughes' flutzes and Sasha Cohen's unsuccessful attempts to land a quadruple jump.

Thanks to Uschi Disl's strong skiing and Andrea Henkel's precise shooting, Germany confirmed its status as the world's best women's biathlon team. Quickly making up time after a bad first leg, the favored Germans won their second consecutive gold medal in the 30-kilometer relay Monday. By the time anchor Kati Wilhelm finished her 7.

Today Bobsled: Two-woman Cross-country skiing: Women's 1.5k; men's 1.

Women's 4x7.

Today's subject: anti-Americanism. Why are we so disliked by so many people? Many Americans have asked that question in regard to much of the Muslim world since Sept. 11, since we saw the chilling video of Palestinians figuratively dancing on the graves of those killed in terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. The first time I asked that question was 19 years ago at the opening ceremony of the 1983 Pan American Games in Caracas, Venezuela. When the U.S.