United States Olympic Sports Festival

The U.S. Olympic Festival this week at Oklahoma City will provide different opportunities for the 75 or so Orange County athletes who will participate. For athletes such as 1988 Olympic shotputters Jim Doehring and Bonnie Dasse and Peter Campbell, a two-time Olympic water polo player, the Olympic Festival represents a chance to get together with friends--and rivals--while competing largely free of high stakes and pressure.

"Fantastic," said J. Carter Brown, breezing into a hotel in Century City and greeting his interviewer as if he couldn't wait to talk about his current projects. Animated enthusiasm and high energy have always been among his strong suits and, in that regard at least, the art world impresario hasn't changed a bit.

It is difficult to picture Tony Jelso as a quitter--a guy who would walk off the court in the middle of a national racquetball tournament saying he'd had it. In the wake of his dominating gold-medal performance in the U.S. Olympic Festival last week, it seems unimaginable that Jelso would ever be eager to pack his bags and slip out the back door. Jelso, 23, of Ventura, was running Chris Cole of Flint, Mich.

You can't blame Dan O'Brien or Rafer Johnson for being bothered by some of the questions they're being asked at the U.S. Olympic Festival. After all, they are two of the United States' most honored athletes. O'Brien is the world-record holder in the decathlon and, a generation ago, America beamed as Johnson won the gold medal in the decathlon at the 1960 Olympic Games, making him only the fourth U.S. Olympic decathlon champion since the modern Games started in 1896.

The future stars of American women's gymnastics sat at a long table in Myriad Arena Thursday, giggling and adjusting their pony tails. Six of them sat on three metal folding chairs. Their futures may be big, but these athletes are not. The smallest, and best, is Kim Zmeskal, who is 4 feet 3 inches tall and weighs 65 pounds. She is 13. The biggest, but not the worst, is Kelly Pitzen, who is 4-10 and 86 pounds. She is also 13.

There was a stage, there was a Fuhrman and there were 20 family members and friends watching. Nobody left disappointed. The spotlight fell on one person Saturday in weightlifting at the U.S. Olympic Festival, which is exactly the way that clan likes it. Diana Fuhrman, a graduate of Van Nuys High who now lives in Simi Valley, dominated the second day of competition as she dominated the 148 3/4-pound class, setting national records for snatch, clean and jerk and combined weight.

It's not the heat, it's the humility. St. Louis has endured some sports scars in recent years. It's a city where the football team left, basketball teams won't come, hockey's ice has melted and the baseball team is so-so. And it didn't get the World Cup. But this is a resilient city that dried itself from last year's floods. So, against the backdrop of an arch that is less familiar to some of today's youth than the Golden Arches, the 1994 U.S.

Ty Price did a double take when he spotted Marin Gjaja's name on the Olympic Festival volleyball roster. "I said, 'Who the heck is this guy?' " said Price, a setter on the South team and a teammate of Gjaja's. "I had never heard of him. I had to ask someone who he was." You can't blame Price. Gjaja, after all, was a football player from Princeton. An Ivy Leaguer playing volleyball, a sport dominated by beach kids? Go figure.

She used crutches to get over to medalists row, her left foot wrapped in a star-covered bandage. Then she performed the crutchless hop to get over to the winner's platform, upon which she did a full double-twist to wave to her hometown crowd. Nothing was going to keep Denise Fierro of Covina from being presented with a gold medal for her beam routine. Not even Shelley Engel. Not even a bruised heel.

You probably remember Chris Drury, even if his name doesn't ring a bell. You might not recognize him at first look. But you remember him. He was the plump pitcher who led the U.S. team to an upset victory over Taiwan in the 1989 Little League World Series, after Taiwan had won six consecutive titles. "Yeah that was me," Drury said. "I was overweight as a kid. It didn't really affect me much in baseball. I was just 12 years old, and you just go out and play, have fun."

So much for sneaking up on anybody. With one punch, and what a punch it was, Lance Whitaker believes he has called for a new world order--at least among amateurs who box in the super heavyweight class. By knocking out Thomas Martin with a crushing right cross 2 minutes 20 seconds into the second round of their Olympic Festival gold medal bout on Tuesday, Whitaker claimed the top spot in the U.S. rankings. Next, he promised, comes the world. Big talk from a big man.

These days, you can find Mike Barrowman on the water instead of in it. After winning the gold medal and breaking the world record in the 200-meter breaststroke at the 1992 Olympics, Barrowman said he was ready to have some fun. "From here on out, I'll be playing," he said at the time. Why not? He had done about as much as he could. The three-time U.S. swimmer of the year went to two Olympics and got a gold medal and a world record to show for it.

If not already destined for the scrap heap, the Olympic Sports Festival is, at the very least, in for a major overhaul. The 10-day, 37-sport event has provided a training ground for almost 70% of the summer Olympic athletes in the United States, but it has been a financial failure in the larger cities that have played host to the event. Last weekend, the U.S.

Things are off to a rocky start in the Rocky Mountain state's U.S. Olympic Festival. Nothing is wrong with the Festival itself, which held its opening ceremony Friday and will have 3,600 athletes competing in 36 sports through the next nine days. Participants and administrators agree that the facilities are great and so is the support.

UC Irvine forward Kevin Simmons, the Big West Conference Freshman of the Year last season, was selected to play on the West team at the U.S. Olympic Festival next month. Simmons, who led Irvine in scoring (14.9 points per game) and rebounding (7.7), was the only Big West basketball player named to play in the festival. Long Beach State Coach Seth Greenberg, who led the 49ers to the Big West Conference Tournament championship and a berth in the NCAA tournament, will coach the West team.

University of North Carolina athletes J.R. Reid and April Heinrichs highlighted the opening ceremony of the U.S. Olympic Festival Friday night, lighting the symbolic flame at Carter-Finley Stadium. Reid, 19, the Atlantic Coast Conference's basketball rookie of the year last season, played in the 1986 Festival at Houston and will play for the South team this year. Heinrichs, 23, was named U.S. Olympic Committee female soccer athlete of the year last season by the U.S.

Archery Jay Barrs of Mesa, Ariz., and Denise Parker of South Jordan, Utah, finished with a series of bull's-eyes to win the preliminary rounds. Barrs, the 1988 Olympic gold medalist who turned 29 Wednesday, closed with 12 consecutive bull's-eyes from 30 meters and finished with 1,320 points out of a possible 1,440. Scoring a personal high of 339 from 50 meters, he was the top scorer from three of four distances.

Everything was great. Quincy Watts was in high gear, sprinting through an account of his rebirth as a dedicated and responsible track star, when his coach interrupted in mid-sentence. "You are not in great shape," Bob Kersee said. "OK," Watts countered. "I feel great." Sitting beside her husband at an Olympic Festival news conference late last week, Jackie Joyner-Kersee smiled knowingly. Even with the most minor details, it's Bob's way or the highway.

Bryan LaCour had the look of a hungry ballplayer. Disappointed when he wasn't a starter for the West team in its first Olympic Festival game earlier this week, the former Chatsworth High shortstop quickly produced once he was inserted into the lineup. LaCour turned two grounders to short into outs and had two hits, including a double, in his only plate appearances. "I was kind of (angry) I didn't start, so I wanted to show something," he said.