Olympic

EUGENE, Ore. - Jenn Suhr's pole vaulting career has taken off since she won the silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, but her training situation remains grounded. Suhr, known as Jenn Stuczynski before she married her coach, Rick Suhr , still trains in a cramped airplane hangar behind her home near Rochester, N.Y. Suhr has come close to hitting the hangar's ceiling in practice several times, but she didn't have to soar quite that high at Hayward Field on Sunday to triumph at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials and win a berth at the London Games.

Stroking through the water confidently and surely was as satisfying as Janet Evans remembered. So was the pure joy of getting her body to obey her mind. But soon after the five-time Olympic medalist began training for a return to competitive swimming she was reminded of aspects of athletic life that had — mercifully — slipped her mind. "I'd forgotten how cold pools can be at 4:45 in the morning," she said. "I'm always the last person in the water. " Then there was the night officials of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency arrived on her Laguna Beach doorstep around 10 o'clock to collect a urine sample for drug testing.

This is the 11th story in a series looking at local athletes as they try to make the Olympic team. Chasing Olympic medals can put a real strain on a family. Take Tony Gunawan as an example. He'll be playing badminton in England, eight time zones from home, when his youngest son turns 2 in August. And while he's away, his wife, Eti, will have to teach the private - and expensive - lessons Gunawan gives at the San Gabriel Valley Badminton Club. It will mean less sleep for her but lots of overtime for the family baby sitter.

Reporting from Mammoth Lakes -- Meb Keflezighi has been to the mountaintop. And he liked it so much he decided to buy a house there. That was 11 years, three daughters, one American record and an Olympic medal ago. Now Keflezighi is as comfortable at high altitude as the Abominable Snowman — and that, he says, is what made a lot of those other things possible. "We had a vision to be able to change U.S. distance running by coming here," says Keflezighi, the Olympic trials marathon champion and a medal hopeful at this summer's Games in London.

LONDON — The congratulatory telegram is so last century, the congratulatory phone call so last decade. When Michael Phelps awoke on Wednesday, he scrolled through his Twitter feed and discovered a congratulatory tweet from President Obama . "Congrats to Michael Phelps for breaking the all-time Olympic medal record," Obama tweeted. "You've made your country proud. -bo" Phelps tweeted back: "Thank you Mr. President!! It's an honor representing the #USA !! The best country in the world!

It is a cool, overcast morning in Irvine and 10 swimmers of varying skills are taking a lesson in one corner of the William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Center. Some bellies hang over the swimsuits and a woman keeps mumbling about getting water in her ear. These aren't pros or even talented youngsters. They are in their 20s and 30s and are so different from the solitary man in the fifth lane who has arrived carrying a black mesh bag that holds goggles, a pair of fins, a small parachute and a snorkel that looks like one your 10-year-old might take to the beach.

LONDON - He changed the training site from Colorado Springs, Colo., to Anaheim. He changed the culture from one of rigid structure to one of freedom yet accountability. Now, Coach Hugh McCutcheon hopes to change the U.S. women's indoor volleyball team's medal color. And though the affable-yet-intense New Zealand native asks, "Have you got a big notepad?" when asked about their main challengers, Team USA is the favorite to win gold for the first time. If that happens, McCutcheon, who led the men's team to gold at Beijing, will become the first coach to win consecutive golds with a men's and women's team and just the second overall to do so.Brazil'sJose Roberto Guimaraes, who led the Brazilian men to victory in 1992 and women in 2008, is the only other coach to perform this feat.

LONDON -- The Olympian without a country is not without a budget. Guor Marial shows up for an interview at the Olympic village dressed in jeans and a polo shirt purchased from Target. He trains in old gear from Iowa State University. He will run the marathon Sunday in shoes purchased online. "If you want the really good shoes, the ones you can use for the Olympics," he says, "I can get those for a hundred bucks. " The Olympian without a country is not without feelings. Guor Marial has painfully felt the differences while wandering through the first week of these Olympics without any national logo on his sweats, without teammates at his side during training, and without any real buddies except an advisor who serves as his coach, sports committee and roommate.

The rain drizzled and the air chilled on that dreary night of Aug. 21, 2008, in Beijing. It was the end of something that had had such a nice beginning. It was a night when sadness was understandable, even while a group of Japanese women deliriously celebrated what they had just achieved. Through the mist and gloom, Don Porter saw the glass half full, as usual. In sports significance and popularity, what happened on this Olympian night didn't even make the scale of 1 to 10. This wasn't about a dream team, just a dream.

LONDON -- Even with a painful shiner, Abby Wambach was able to keep her eyes on the prize Saturday: another Olympic gold medal in women's soccer. After a sucker punch from Colombian forward Lady Andrade blackened her right eye late in the first half Saturday, Wambach delivered the punch that knocked the South Americans out in the second, scoring to break open a tight game and send the Americans on to next week's quarterfinals with a 3-0 victory....