Anna Tunnicliffe's (Plantation, Fla.), Molly Vandemoer (Stanford, Calif.) and Debbie Capozzi (Bayport, N.Y.) won the ISAF Sailing World Championships in women's match racing, defeating Great Britain's Lucy MacGregor in four straight matches. Meanwhile, Mark Medelblatt (Miami, Fla.) and Brian Faith (Miami, Fla.) earned a bronze medal in the Star class and Paige Railey (Clearwater, Fla.) earned a bronze in Laser Radial.
DUEL WINNERS
Team USA defeated the European All-Stars, 181.5-80.5, in the Mutual of Omaha Duel in the Pool in Atlanta. The U.S. women's 400-meter medley relay team set a world record on Dec. 16 when Natalie Coughlin (Vallejo, Calif.), Rebecca Soni (Plainsboro, N.J.), Dana Vollmer (Granbury, Texas) and Missy Franklin (Centennial, Colo.) finished in 3:45.56.
BIATHLON
Team USA wrapped the E.ON IBU World Cup 3 with a 14th -place finish in the mixed relay on Dec. 18 in Hochfilzen, Austria. Team USA's squad - Sara Studebaker (Boise, Idaho), Annalies Cook (Saranac Lake, N.Y.), Tim Burke (Paul Smiths, N.Y.) and Leif Nordgren (Marine, Minn.) - posted a time of 1:16:11.5 (0+5 0+5) to finish 2:38.1 back from Russia. In addition, Jay Hakkinen (Kasilof, Alaska) led Team USA with a ninth-place finish in Dec. 17's 12.5km pursuit.
BOBSLED & SKELETON
The Intercontinental Cup tour continued in Sigulda, Latvia, with a two-race series over the weekend. All five athletes on the U.S. roster met the demanding Latvian course for the first time and had only a handful of runs to solve its complicated sequence of curves. Luke Schulz (Davenport, N.D.) led the U.S. team after clocking combined times of 1:49.50 and 1:47.98 to finish 10th in the two-race series.
The USA-1 four-man bobsled team of Steven Holcomb (Park City, Utah), Justin Olsen (San Antonio, Texas), Steve Langton (Melrose, Mass.) and Curt Tomasevicz (Shelby, Neb.) finished just 0.04 seconds from the medals in the final Winterberg World Cup event on Dec. 18 to maintain its third overall ranking. The day prior, Elana Meyers (Douglasville, Ga.) and Katie Eberling (Palos Hills, Ill.) also capped the first half of the season with a fourth-place finish, while Holcomb and Tomasevicz were challenged by a forceful headwind mixed with snow and finished 13th in the two-man. Also on Dec. 17, Katie Uhlaender (Breckenridge, Colo.) led the U.S. women with a fifth-place skeleton finish just one week after her return to the world cup circuit.
DIVING
2008 Olympian Haley Ishimatsu (Seal Beach, Calif.) won gold in women's 10- meter, and Summer Allman (Lansing, Mich.) claimed the victory on women's 1- meter on Dec. 18 at the USA Diving Winter National Championships in Knoxville, Tenn. Meanwhile, three-time Olympian Troy Dumais (Ventura, Calif.) and Kristian Ipsen (Clayton, Calif.) claimed the gold medal in the men's synchronized 3-meter contest. All four athletes earned spots on the U.S. team for the 2012 FINA World Cup, set for February in London.
FIELD HOCKEY
Team USA lost the final four games of a series against world No. 4-ranked Great Britain last week in Chula Vista, Calif. The U.S. was winless in the five-game stint, which concluded on Dec. 18.
Matt Mortensen (Huntington Station, N.Y.) and Preston Griffall (Salt Lake City, Utah) gave the United States luge team its best world cup result of the season when the doubles team finished fifth on Dec. 17 in Calgary, Alberta. The members of the Army National Guard's World Class Athlete Program uncorked the fourth-fastest second run, bringing them all the way up from ninth place. Meanwhile, on Dec. 16, 18-year-old Emily Sweeney (Suffield, Conn.) posted a 12th -place finish on the women's side, marking the best world cup result of her budding career.
SKI & SNOWBOARD
Bode Miller (Franconia, N.H.), an Olympic champion and two-time world cup overall winner, took second in the super G on Dec. 16 for the top U.S. finish at the Audi FIS Alpine World Cup event in Alta Badia, Italy. Ted Ligety (Park City, Utah), the reigning world cup champion in the giant slalom, missed the podium by one-hundredth of a second on Dec. 18.
Tom Wallisch (Pittsburgh, Pa.) kicked off the season with a big win in the first slopestyle skiing contest at the Dew Tour stop in Breckenridge, Colo. Teammates Kelly Clark (West Dover, Vt.) and Gretchen Bleiler (Toledo, Ohio) took first and second in the snowboard halfpipe competition. In the men's snowboard halfpipe, Olympic champion Shaun White (Carlsbad, Calif.) took first, while Louie Vito (Columbus, Ohio) was second.
Nick Baumgartner (Iron River, Mich.) teamed with Jonathan Cheever (Saugus, Mass.) to take second in the Paul Mitchell Progression Session team SBX event at the USANA Snowboardcross Cup in Telluride, Colo., barely losing to France in a photo finish. Lindsey Jacobellis (Stratton Mountain, Vt.) broke the ice with the first U.S. win on Dec. 16, cruising to victory in the in the opening SBX event of the LG FIS Snowboard World Cup.
SOFTBALL
The United States claimed the 2011 ISF Junior Women's World Championship on Dec. 17 in Cape Town, South Africa, with a 4-1 defeat of Japan in the gold- medal game. After a semifinal loss to Japan on Dec. 16, the Americans topped Chinese Taipei, 12-3, in the six-inning bronze-medal game and then beat Japan to secure the title. The U.S. went undefeated in pool play, adding three wins last week, before opening the playoffs with a 7-4 victory over Australia on Dec. 15.
SPEEDSKATING
Jonathan Kuck destroyed the previous track record on Dec. 18 to win the U.S. Speedskating Championships 10,000-meter title in Milwaukee. He finished in 13:17.28 to take 5.64 seconds off the previous record set by U.S. Olympian Chad Hedrick in October 2005. Meanwhile, Jilleanne Rookard (Woodhaven, Mich.) won the ladies 5,000m with a time of 7:08.58; Heather Richardson (High Point, N.C.) was named ladies' Overall Sprint Champion after winning the 500, 1,000 and 1,500; Tucker Fredricks (Janesville, Wis.) won the 500 and was named Overall Sprint Champion for the men; and two-time Olympic medalist Shani Davis (Chicago, Ill.) won the 1,000 and 1,500.
TABLE TENNIS
Ariel Hsing (San Jose, Calif.) won the women's singles title and was part of the mixed doubles championship team at the U.S. National Table Tennis Championships, which concluded on Dec. 17 in Virginia Beach, Va. Timothy Wang (Houston, Texas) joined Hsing in mixed doubles and Han Xiao (Germantown, Md.) for the men's doubles championship. Peter Li (Laurel, Md.) swept Xiao for the men's singles championship in four straight. Erica Wu (Arcadia, Calif.) and Jun Gao (Gaithersburg, Md.) won the women's doubles title.
WRESTLING
Justin Lester and Helen Maroulis were named Outstanding Wrestlers during the U.S. Open for Greco-Roman and women's Freestyle in Arlington, Texas. Lester won the 74 kg title on Dec. 16, while Maroulis won the 55 kg title on Dec. 17.
UPCOMING CALENDAR - DECEMBER
15-22 - Diving Knoxville, Tenn. USA Diving Winter National Championships and World Cup Trials
17-23 - Tennis Coral Gables, Fla. 2011 Junior Orange Bowl International Tennis Championships
18-22 - Ski & Snowboard Copper, Colo. U.S. Revolution Tour #1
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