2004 Olympics: Top Stories

Expect these veterans to be in the picture when the medals are handed out

02:12 AM CDT on Monday, August 9, 2004

From Staff Reports

Reigning world all-around champion Svetlana Khorkina of Russia has said the Athens Games will be her last Olympics. International gymnastics will miss the pouty drama queen, who won her third world all-around title last August.

Khorkina, 25, fell from the vault and finished fourth in the all-around at the European Championships in the spring. But she proved she had recovered from a foot injury suffered early in the year.

In Athens, she aims to win her third Olympic uneven bars title. Despite an uneven Olympics in Sydney, she returned home to Moscow with three medals. She was among the more visibly upset gymnasts at the 2000 Olympics after it was discovered that the vault was set too low.

Khorkina, who does some modeling and acting, is tall (5-5) for a gymnast. She will stand tall in her sport for projecting personality as well as for her unparalled performances.

— Cathy Harasta

People will be paying plenty of attention to Australian star Ian Thorpe's performance in the 400-meter freestyle in Athens, but not necessarily because he is the world's most dominant swimmer in the event.

At Australia's Olympic Trials in March, Thorpe slipped from the starting blocks and was disqualified. It was a shocking accident, especially in his swimming-mad country. Thorpe, 21, is the defending Olympic champion in the 400. He owns the world record and nine of the 10 fastest times in history.

But after several weeks of controversy, Olympic qualifier Craig Stevens dropped out, which, under Australian rules, resulted in Thorpe replacing him. Stevens claimed he wasn't pressured.

No matter how well Thorpe swims the 400 in Athens, expect that he'll have to keep defending his berth. At least no one's debating his spot in the 200 freestyle. Thorpe, who won three golds and two silvers in 2000, is also the world record holder in that event.

— Rachel Cohen

A year ago, there seemed to be no bigger favorite in track and field than 400-meter runner Ana Guevara of Mexico.

Guevara had not lost a final since finishing third in the 2001 world championships, when the bronze medal made her the first Mexican woman to win a world track medal. In 2003, she won the gold medal at the world championships in Paris.

But Guevara, 27, was plagued by injuries that affected her training in the winter. In mid-June, her 146-week streak atop the IAAF's women's 400-meter rankings came to an end. Then in early July, her finals winning streak was ended at 28 in Rome by Tonique Williams-Darling of the Bahamas.

"My best will come in August, in Athens, not before," she has said.

— Ken Stephens

Kostas Kenteris is on billboards all over Athens. And as one of Greece's few hopes for a track and field medal, he'll get plenty of TV time when the 200 meters comes around.

Kenteris, the surprise winner of the 200 meters at the Sydney Olympics, is one of five track and field gold medalists for Greece in the 108 years since the modern revival of the Games.

Though his time in the 200 in Sydney was the slowest by an Olympic winner since 1980, he reaffirmed that, in the absence of Michael Johnson, he was the best in the event when he won the 2001 world championship.

A poll this year named him the most popular man in Greece. But Kenteris also is a mystery man.

He has rarely run since the 2001 season. He dropped out of the 2003 world championships at the last minute, citing a thigh injury. He also missed an out-of-competition drug test when he was in Qatar after telling anti-doping authorities that he would be training in Crete.

This season, he won the 100 meters at the Greek championships in 10.18 seconds, which was only .03 off his career-best time. Kenteris, 31, didn't run the 200, but nonetheless, he has been named to run it at the Olympics.

— Ken Stephens