Friday, August 15, 2008

Italy Wins Two More Golds, Shooting and Wrestling for Total of 13, Tied for 7th Pace with Germany

The ANNOTICO Report

 

Andrea Minguzzi won the Gold Medal in Men's Greco-Roman 84-kilogram Finals, and Chiara Cainero won Gold in the Women's Skeet Shooting. In the Beijing 2008 Olympics so far the Italians have a total of Six (6) Golds, Four (4) Silvers, Three (3) Bronze for a TOTAL of Thirteen (13) in Seventh place tied  with Germany.

 

Minguzzi of Italy gets unexpected win in Greco-Roman

 

International Herald Tribune
From  Associated Press

Thursday, August 14, 2008

BEIJING: Andrea Minguzzi did a backflip, hoisted his coach and hauled him to the middle of the mat, wrapped himself in the Italian flag and ran a victory lap around the arena.

A happy winner, obviously, after coming from nowhere to steal wrestling's most coveted prize when he defeated Zoltan Fodor of Hungary in the 84-kilogram finals Thursday.

"To me, it is worth the world," Minguzzi said. "I am ecstatic right now. I couldn't be happier."

The win makes him Italy's first Olympic wrestling champion in 20 years.

Fodor, also an unlikely finalist, was eighth in the world last year and, only three years ago, was 30th in the world juniors.

But not as unlikely as Minguzzi, who had finished 45th, 18th, 17th, 28th and 27th in his previous five world championship tournaments.

The bronze medals were won by Nazmi Avluca of Turkey and Sweden's Ara Abrahamian, the silver medalist in Athens.

Fodor won the first period of the gold-medal match 1-1 on tiebreaker, but Minguzzi won the second by the same score before throwing Fodor in the third to win 4-0 and finish off the day of his life.

In order, the 26-year-old Italian policeman:

_Upset 2004 gold medalist Aleksey Mishin, last year's world champion, in what may go down as one of the biggest shockers in Olympic wrestling. Mishin is a four-time European champion who was in control after winning the second period 3-0, only to lose 2-1 in the third.

_Turned a disputed point into a semifinals surprise ? that word keeps coming up with him ? against Abrahamian. Sweden coach Leo Myllar used words much stronger than disputed.

"It's all politics, and it's all corrupt," he said.

In the oft-mysterious world of international wrestling, in which the rules are quirky and can be interpreted in widely varying ways, sometimes it's all in the game.

After he took the bronze, two-time former world champion Abrahamian said, "I don't care about this medal. I wanted gold. This will be my last match. I wanted to take gold, so I consider this Olympics a failure."

Abrahamian's unhappiness doesn't take away from Minguzzi's accomplishment.

Minguzzi's golden day proved that even a relatively obscure wrestler ? despite his third-place finish in this year's European championships ? can get hot and win the Olympics, especially with all matches in a weight class now wrestled in one day.

Minguzzi certainly couldn't hide his delight, hugging and kissing the flower girls on the medal stand, biting into his gold medal and playing to the crowd, which reveled in his enthusiasm.

Before Minguzzi, the last Italian to win an Olympic wrestling gold was Vincenzo Maenza, who won at 48 kg in 1984 and 1988.

Maybe that proved some inspiration as Minguzzi's father, himself a former wrestler, taught him the sport from an early age.

"It's the only sport I've ever practiced," he said.

Brad Vering, last year's world silver medalist from the United States, lost to Denis Forov of Armenia in the round of 16 and did not medal. He plans to retire.

"It doesn't end up the way I wanted it to end up, but I'm not going to let my whole career just ride on one loss in the Olympic Games," said Vering, a former NCAA champion at Nebraska.

 

 

Italy's Cainero tops American, German in women's skeet shoot-off


International Herald Tribune

From The Associated Press

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Chiara Cainero of Italy won the gold medal in women's skeet shooting Thursday, beating Kim Rhode of the United States and Christine Brinker of Germany in a shoot-off.

The three finished tied at 93 targets and Cainero hit the first two targets of the shoot-off. Rhode and Brinker each missed one. The shoot-off continued to determine second place. Rhode ended up winning the silver, and Brinker took the bronze.

It rained throughout the competition, with the downpour intensifying near the end of the finals.

"Certainly, the weather has influenced this competition," Cainero said. "We had bad vision. If there is no sun it is very difficult to tell the color of (targets) - really not easy."

Cainero said she has trained in heavy rain in the last two months and that helped her on Thursday.

Cainero led after qualifying with a score of 72, but she hit only 21 of 25 targets in the final round, enabling Rhode and Brinker to catch up.

Rhode won gold in double trap in 1996 and 2004, but that event was eliminated for women before the Beijing Games. Forced to focus on skeet, she added another medal to her collection.

"After double trap was eliminated in 2004, I'm very happy just to be here at the Olympics and represent my country well," she said.

 

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