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Viva Italia!

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Submitted by davidnielsen on Tue, 02/21/2006 - 13:41
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So I go to the men’s 1500-meter speedskating event Tuesday, hoping to see my first American gold medal here.

I figure we have a very good chance, since the American skaters are 500-meter gold medalist Joey Cheek, 1,000-meter gold medalist Shani Davis, 1,500-meter world record holder Chad Hedrick, and the 1,500-meter gold medalist at the 2002 Salt Lake Olympics, Derek Parra.

Curses, foiled again!

Davis won the silver. Hedrick won the bronze. Cheek finished 9th, and Parra finished 19th.

Italy’s Enrico Fabris was the surprise gold medalist.

So I still haven’t seen an American gold medal. But I’ve seen Italy’s only two individual gold medals: Fabris and luger Armin Zoeggeler.

I missed Italy’s golds in the speedskating men’s team pursuit and the 4 x 10 km cross-country skiing relay.

If I had witnessed those events, I suspect that the Italian Olympic Committee would have prevented me from boarding my plane home next week.