Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Olympics Spotlight: A mighty win for the "future of wrestling"

* The “future of (U.S.) wrestling”- Henry Cejudo- captured the gold medal in freestyle wrestling in the 55 kilo weight class. Cejudo‘s mom immigrated illegally from Mexico when he was an infant, and as a single mom raised him along with his five siblings in abject poverty. “We always moved forward. We always moved forward,” said the gold-medal grappler who dedicated his medal to his beloved mami. (For the record, she is now a “resident alien”).

Click here for a brief video of Cejudo’s road to the gold medal, one he shares with his loved ones.

* Earlier today, we pointed out yet another ridiculous “slanty-eyed” photo; this time it was from members of Argentina’s women’s soccer team. However, not all was negative for los albicelestes on Tuesday:

  • The duo of Juan Esteban Curuchet and Walter Fernando Perez surprised the pundits and won gold in the men's Madison cycling discipline. “We've been keeping a low profile, but you can never rule out Argentina in a race like this” said Perez who won with the 43-year-old Curuchet despite placing eighth in this year's world championships.
  • Argentina emerged victorious in their men’s soccer semifinal battle against fellow South American heavyweights Brazil. Argentina came out with guns blazing after a scoreless first half and won 3-0 thanks to a pair from Sergio “el Kun” Aguero and a penalty converted by Juan Roman Riquelme. The argentines move on to the gold medal match against Nigeria in a rematch of the 1996 Olympics gold medal game (which was won by the Africans).

* Lastly, congratulations to Shericka Williams of Jamaica took the silver in the women's 400 meter dash. Williams ran a personal best of 49.69 seconds to give her country its fifth medal of the Games.
Sources- AFP, Sports Jamaica, New York Times, IHT, Xinhua, TVNZ, Guardian UK, TIME, Sports Network, Los Angeles Times, nbcolympics.com

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