Brisk Wind Infuses the U.S. With Zip and Zing

When Mexico and the United States meet, the heavens always rumble — although not necessarily like the nasty storm that blew in Wednesday night before the home team defeated the Mexicans, 2-0, in a World Cup qualifying match.
The rivalry has enough crackle of its own without any help from the winds and heavy rain that blew through at about 5:20 p.m., just when American and Mexican fans were heading toward Crew Stadium.
For a while during the downpour, spectators were urged to stay in their cars, but then the teams took the field on schedule, and the fans braved the elements, even with tornado warnings earlier and falling temperatures during the game.
The United States played wisely most of the time, and produced two finishing goals by Michael Bradley, the son of Coach Bob Bradley, in the 43rd and 92nd minutes. Both goals were the result of hard work and pressure, not easy under the conditions.
The United States has now won nine and drawn two in the last 11 home meetings since March 1999, including three consecutive 2-0 victories over Mexico in World Cup qualifying, at Crew Stadium — in 2001, 2005 and Wednesday.
Mexico still has the edge, with 29 victories and 11 draws in 55 matches in the competition, which has become so intense that Frankie Hejduk, one of the American mainstays, compares it to an American football rivalry. Hejduk, who plays for the defending champion Columbus Crew of Major League Soccer, gets to feel that other rivalry up close.
“This is just like the — can I say the word? The M word?” Hejduk said, joking on Tuesday, knowing that people in Ohio do not even like to utter the name of their rival from the neighboring state of Michigan.
That game every November brings out the extreme partisan in this part of the world. Mexican fans found their way to Columbus on Wednesday, even though the American federation does its best to sell tickets only to American fans. Dozens of fans wearing green Mexican jerseys were walking around a generally desolate downtown.
“If we play in L.A., you’ve got 25,000 Mexican fans,” Hejduk said Tuesday, noting that Mexican fans would find a way to attend any Mexico game in the southern tier of the United States.
“You’re hearing cheers for the other team,” Hejduk, 34, said, repeating the wisdom that causes matches to be placed in heartland cities like Columbus or Birmingham, Ala., or Nashville.
“Here, we’ve got the 12th man,” Hejduk said. He has been part of the national team going back to the 1998 debacle in France, the three humiliating losses in the World Cup.
“We’ve had their number the last few times,” he said of Mexico, adding that it would be fine with him if the Mexicans did have a psychological disadvantage here, “if that’s what it takes.” But he added, “It’s a difficult game.”
Hejduk heard that Mexican entrepreneurs were selling voodoo dolls back home, sponsored by an American company, Blockbuster, instructing fans to stick pins where they wished to inflict pain. “It tells me they’re passionate,” Hejduk said with a smile. “No pain yet. I’m going to get one of those dolls.”
Hejduk, who has scored two of his six international goals against Mexico, was one of the best American players Wednesday, running hard from his right back position. The United States chose to play with the strong wind at its back in the first half but averted trouble in the third minute when Tim Howard made a kick save.
The United States mostly controlled the ball after that, focusing on possession and short passes. Then Hejduk earned a corner kick with a hard run down the right side, tangling with a Mexican defender, both of them slamming into the advertising boards.
DaMarcus Beasley, who was all over the field, swung a long, left-footed kick from the right corner that curled back to Landon Donovan, who headed the ball back across. Oguchi Onyewu headed it on goal, and Bradley slotted home the rebound for a 1-0 lead.
Playing into the wind in the second half, the United States used its height to control the shorter kicks. Mexico did launch an attack of a different kind when the Mexico captain Rafael Márquez kicked Howard in the right thigh on his way down, and earned a red card in the 67th minute, putting the Mexicans down a player.
The United States dominated, and then in extra time outworked the outmanned Mexicans, with Jozy Altidore and Donovan setting up Bradley’s second goal.
The major negative for the United States was that Howard was hit with a yellow card for delay of game after being kicked by Márquez, and must now sit out the next match, in El Salvador on March 28. This meeting was the first in the final round of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. While both teams should be among the three nations from a six-team group guaranteed to qualify, every game between them is an event.
The two rivals are expected to meet next in Azteca Stadium, on Aug. 28. There may not be February wind and rain, but it will be noisy, and the place will rumble.

Armstrong’s Testing Plan Ends Before it Begins

Nearly five months after Lance Armstrong announced with great fanfare that he was returning to cycling and would subject himself to a strict and transparent anti-doping program, that program has been abandoned without ever really beginning.

Don Catlin, the prominent anti-doping scientist who was supposed to run Armstrong’s program, said Wednesday that they had decided earlier in the day to part ways, without Catlin’s ever obtaining a single full blood and urine sample from Armstrong. The program was simply too complex and too costly to implement, Catlin said, and the decision to terminate the program was mutual.
“In the real world, when you try to implement a program as grandiose as what you had in mind, it just becomes so complicated that it’s better not to try,” Catlin said, adding that a contract with Armstrong had never been signed. “We’re all disappointed, but it’s just not going to be possible.”
Neither Armstrong nor Mark Higgins, Armstrong’s manager, immediately returned e-mail and phone messages Wednesday.
Armstrong is still subjected to testing by other anti-doping entities, like the International Cycling Union and the United States Anti-Doping Agency. His professional cycling team, Astana, also has an internal anti-doping program.
Still, Armstrong, the seven-time Tour de France winner who has been dogged by doping allegations throughout his career, made his private anti-doping program one of the cornerstones of his comeback to cycling, after he took three years off. He will begin racing Saturday at the Tour of California, which will be his first major cycling race in the United States since he said he would retire in 2005.
Before the Tour Down Under in Australia last month, Armstrong said that his customized anti-doping program was under way, but he began to back off of his initial announcement to publish all of his biological data online. A news release by Astana on Jan. 18, the first day of the race, said Armstrong would be tested about every three days by Catlin’s program. At that point, Catlin said, Astana had paid Catlin a “small contribution” to begin taking samples.
When asked about the program’s details, Armstrong said Catlin would answer all the questions. Catlin, the former chief of the U.C.L.A. Olympic Analytical Laboratory, is now running the Anti-Doping Sciences Institute, a for-profit research and analytical laboratory based near Los Angeles.
Details of the program remained a mystery, sparking criticism. Dick Pound, former chief of the World Anti-Doping Agency, last week said: “Armstrong made all the big announcements and the testing has dropped right off the radar. No sign that anything is actually getting done.”
Since September, when Catlin accompanied Armstrong at news conferences announcing his return to cycling, Catlin had not returned more than a dozen e-mail messages and phone calls — until Wednesday.
Catlin said he and Armstrong’s representatives had been trying to come to an agreement to implement the program, but the closer the season came, the harder it was to solidify the details. Slowly, the comprehensive program — which Armstrong had touted as “the most advanced anti-doping program in the world” — was being watered down because of logistical problems and cost restrictions.
Armstrong had promised that all of the biological data gleaned by Catlin would be posted on the Internet, a move that Catlin said was necessary to make the program completely transparent. But at the Tour Down Under, Armstrong’s first race out of retirement, he said he was worried that publishing all of his biological data would prompt unfair questions about him from the public. A layman would likely not be able to understand complex information, he said, adding that there are natural fluctuations in some blood levels when a rider travels to a high altitude.
“Not everyone in this room is going to say that means I must have cheated,” he said in a news conference. “But a few of you say it was suspicious.”
In September, Catlin said: “The key is to have the information out there for the public to see and to analyze because it shows you have nothing to hide.”
In recent months, Catlin’s and Armstrong’s representatives discussed limiting the biological information that would be made available to the public. “When you start reducing that kind of program and limiting what you put on the Web, it was difficult to figure out how to accomplish it without running into enormous legal and media issues,” Catlin said.

Catlin said he was still running the internal anti-doping programs of two professional cycling teams, Team Columbia and Garmin-Slipstream. He said those programs were going well and were easier to handle because they are not the comprehensive doping program of a single athlete, Armstrong, who had at first agreed to be tested at any time.
But as of Feb. 4, according to his Twitter page, Armstrong had been tested 16 times, which may or may not have included the aborted collection done by Catlin’s team at the Tour Down Under.
Those collections — and a battery of testing — were done by the United States Anti-Doping Agency and the International Cycling Union, which use laboratories accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency. Catlin said his testers were constantly bumping elbows with other testers.
“There are so many people lining up to test cyclists right now,” Catlin said. “We tried to do one sample in Australia, but we didn’t even get that done because it was so hectic. There are practical issues, but I think someday that will change.”
Testing in all sports — not just cycling — has increased since Armstrong retired in 2005, changing the landscape for athletes hoping to prove they are clean. The cycling union, for example, has a program that collects biological information on each rider and uses it to gauge whether any rider is doping.
Armstrong has been in the out-of-competition testing pool for about six months since deciding to return to competition. According to Erin Hannan, the spokeswoman for Usada, some American athletes were tested as many as 15 to 20 times out of competition in about a six-month time frame last year.
Some athletes, including the swimmer Natalie Coughlin and the decathlete Bryan Clay, were part of a trial program with the agency that set out to prove they were clean. They were also part of their regular out-of-competition testing pool conducted by their respective international federations. It took about four to six blood and urine tests to create an initial baseline for the athletes’ biological profiles, Hannan said.

The bare minimum amount of exercise you need to stay healthy (it's less than you think!)

We've heard time and time again that people should be active almost daily to stave off weight gain and disease. But busy people want to know: What's the least amount of exercise I can get away with and still stay healthy? The answer will shock you...
What number did you guess? An hour a week? A half hour? Try seven minutes.
Check out these exercise trends for 2009!
According to British researchers, just seven minutes of exercise weekly may prevent diabetes by controlling your blood sugar. Type 2 diabetes affects an estimated 246 million adults worldwide and accounts for 6 percent of all global deaths. People with this condition gradually lose the ability to use insulin to convert food to energy.
Here's the catch: The exercise has to be vigorous. (We're talking on the level of an all-out sprint.) But at seven minutes a pop, I can deal with that! And you don't even have to do those seven minutes all at once, either. In the study, volunteers rode exercise bikes four times a day in 30-second spurts twice a week. After two weeks, subjects had a 23 percent improvement in how effectively their body cleared blood sugar from their bodies.
Studies show that vigorous exercise also reduces the risk of breast cancer.

St-Pierre crushes Penn to retain welterweight title at UFC 94

By Sergio Non, USA TODAY

BJ Penn's dream of holding two belts disappeared beneath four rounds of non-stop pressure from welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre.
St-Pierre, of Montreal, thoroughly dominated Penn with a grinding, unrelenting ground-and-pound barrage over the last three rounds of their fight on Saturday at UFC 94, in Las Vegas. Although scheduled for five rounds, the fight was stopped after the fourth round on the advice of the ringside doctor.

Penn never managed any meaningful offense. He spent much of the second and almost all of the third and fourth rounds on his back, smothered by St-Pierre, who wore down Penn with a steady stream of strikes that left Penn bruised and bleeding.
Although Penn resisted St-Pierre's wrestling in the first round, the welterweight titlist started scoring takedowns at will in the second round. The French Canadian said he wanted to neutralize the excellent boxing of Penn, UFC's reigning lightweight champion.

"My strategy was in the first two rounds to make a wrestling match with him, because he has very quick hands and his shoulder is made for boxing," St-Pierre said immediately after the bout. "Because he has small shoulders, by making him wrestle, all the blood would have (to) go into his shoulder and it would have become stiff, and his hand would not come out as it is usually."
The matchup was billed as a bout between two of the world's most skilled fighters, with St-Pierre and Penn rated among the top four in several pound-for-pound ranking lists, including those of Sports Illustrated and Yahoo Sports. Online oddsmakers listed St-Pierre as a slight favorite.
St-Pierre (18-2) has won both of his fights against Penn (13-5-1), whom he beat via split decision in March 2006.
Saturday's bout was only for the belt of the welterweight division (170 pounds). St-Pierre said he now views rising star Thiago Alves as the top contender for the welterweight championship.
Machida KOs Silva
On a night filled with bouts decided by judges' scorecards, it took a light-heavyweight fighter known for decision wins to pull off the show's only conclusive finish outside of the main event.
Lyoto Machida kept his perfect record intact with a first-round knockout of previously undefeated Thiago Silva (13-1). Machida (14-0) followed his usual pattern of evading damage, but with Silva coming straight ahead, the eventual winner took advantage of several openings to land combinations and score takedowns against his fellow Brazilian.
Machida knocked down Silva twice with punches in the first four minutes of the contest, but the final shot had the most impact. As the first round came to a close, Machida tripped down Silva as they clinched against the fence and followed it with a downward right hand that knocked Silva unconscious as he lay on the mat, milliseconds before the bell.
Going into Saturday's event, Machida had won four of his five UFC fights via decision.
After the bout, Machida played to the crowd as he clamored for a championship fight in the light-heavyweight division (205 pounds). "People, do I deserve a title shot?" he asked as the audience cheered.
Other results from UFC 94:
• Light heavyweight: Jon Jones def. Stephan Bonnar via unanimous decision
• Welterweight: Karo Parisyan def. Dong Hyun Kim via split decision
• Lightweight: Clay Guida def. Nate Diaz via split decision
• Welterweight: Jon Fitch def. Akihiro Gono via unanimous decision
• Lightweight: Thiago Tavares def. Manvel Gamburyan via unanimous decision
• Welterweight: John Howard def. Chris Wilson via split decision
• Light heavyweight: Jake O'Brien def. Christian Wellisch via split decision
• Welterweight: Dan Cramer def. Matt Arroyo via split decision

Puyol: "El Barcelona ya pasó su bache"

El capitán del Barcelona, Carles Puyol, pasó por los micrófonos de Radio MARCA, en 'El Intermedio' de Paco García Caridad. Los perseguidores esperan un bache azulgrana para recortar distancias, Puyol advierte: "Todos los equipos pasan baches, sí. Pero nosotros ya hemos pasado el nuestro, en las dos primeras jornadas, que perdimos y empatamos. Fue duro, veníamos de dos temporadas difíciles, pero confiamos en el método de trabajo".
Preguntado por la posiblidad del triplete, el capitán mantuvo la cautela, en la línea de declaraciones del resto de estamentos del club: "Somos conscientes de que esto es muy largo y de que aún no hemos ganado nada. El triplete es muy complicado. Por ejemplo, en la Copa tienes un partido malo y te vas".
"Lo tendrán dificil para llevarse a Messi"Puyol habló de la situación del Real Madrid. "Hay que respetarle, es un gran equipo que lleva 5 victorias seguidas". A propósito del comentado juego 'aburrido' de los blancos: "Lo importante son los puntos, esos te dan confianza y con la confianza llega el buen juego".
¿Qué piensa Puyol del rumor de Messi al Real Madrid? "En el fútbol a veces se publican estas cosas, pero con Messi lo tienen complicado, es feliz aquí". Sobre la gran temporada del argentino, el capitán azulgrana afirmó tajante: "Es el mejor del mundo, no deja de crecer".
A propósito del cambio del Barcelona de la temporada pasada a la actual, Puyol no cree "justo" cargar las culpas en antiguos compañeros como Deco o Ronaldinho: "No es justo, son jugadores que han dado mucho al equipo. Los culpables somos todos, el equipo entró en un bache".

Australian Open midterm grades

After a week of play, the 2009 Australian Open has reinforced what most already thought to be the case in tennis: the men's game is gripping on account of the consistently excellent performances of the top players. The women's game is gripping because of the inconsistency at the top, and the wide open fields it creates. Herewith our midterm grades.
A
Jelena Dokic: The Week 1 story. Back from her exile -- and poignantly candid about what she endured -- the former top-five player reached second the week by winning four three-setters.
Rafael Nadal: For all the talk about his lack of a hardcourt Grand Slam, the Spaniard has looked as sharp as anyone through the weekend.
Andys: Roddick and Murray, both former Brad Gilbert charges, cruise into Week 2 without much challenge.
Mother Russia: Even with Maria Sharapova injured, nearly half of the players in the round of 16 come from the same country.
Father France: Even with Richard Gasquet losing a five-set heartbreaker, three hommes -- Gael Monfils, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Gilles Simon -- remain alive at the time of this writing
A-minus
Roger Federer: Looked decidedly mortal for two sets against Tomas Berdych. But what a comeback, pulling out a five setter.
Amer Delic: Former Illini star serves his way to round three and gave Novak Djokovic a workout.
B
American TV coverage: One wishes the times were more standard but the ESPN/Tennis Channel partnership continues to work well
The Williams Family: Serena is angling for still another title, but Venus goes crashing out early.
Ex-girlfriends of Spanish players: Flavia Pennetta and Gisela Dulko (who gave Serena a good match) impress, while Ana Ivanovic crashes.
B- minus
American men: Roddick and James Blake carry all the water again as the "B" team musters little
The Serbs: Djokovic, the defending champ, is still going strong. But both Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic are upset early. In Jankovic's case, she'll almost surely lose the top ranking as a result.
C
Ivanovic: The backsliding continues. A finalist a year ago -- and world No.1 just last summer -- AI lacks the answer as she falls to Alisa Kleybanova in Round 3. (Get a coach!)
Nicole Vaidisova: Boy, have the wheels fallen off this train.
Ethnic violence: And here we thought "tennis hooligan" was an oxymoron.

Duke makes claim to No. 1 ranking by blasting Maryland

DURHAM, N.C. (AP) — Jon Scheyer was a freshman on the Duke team that lost four straight games to end the season and fell out of the Top 25. So he can't help but feel a little bit of excitement about the possibility of being No. 1 — even if he's quick to say rankings don't matter much.
"Watching Duke when I was in high school, it did seem like they were No. 1 a lot," the junior said. "I feel like this is where we belong."
Gerald Henderson scored 17 points to help the second-ranked Blue Devils rout Maryland 85-44 on Saturday, a victory that likely will propel the Blue Devils to the No. 1 ranking next week.
Scheyer scored 12 points for Duke (18-1, 5-0 Atlantic Coast Conference), which dominated from the opening tip and led 40-15 at halftime. From there, the lead only grew, including a couple of dazzling transition scores that pushed the Blue Devils to a 60-20 lead less than 4 minutes into the second half.
GAME REPORT: Duke 85, Maryland 44
Duke led by as many as 44 points, handing the Terrapins (13-6, 2-3) their worst loss under coach Gary Williams. It was the fourth-largest margin of defeat in school history.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Duke Atlantic Coast Conference Virginia Tech Wake Forest North Carolina State Blue Devils Mike Krzyzewski Terrapins All-America Henderson Terps Gary Williams Jon Scheyer Kyle Singler Nolan Smith Kay Yow Greivis Vasquez Scheyer Brian Zoubek
The Blue Devils haven't been ranked No. 1 since the final poll of 2005-06, but that could change after Wake Forest's home loss to Virginia Tech on Wednesday. Duke had been ranked No. 1 at least once every season from 1998-2004 under Hall of Fame coach Mike Krzyzewski, but had not reached the top spot in the past two seasons.
Fittingly, the Blue Devils' next game is at Wake Forest on Wednesday night.
"It'll be a big deal for our guys and it's a big deal for us because it means we're playing really well," Krzyzewski said of a No. 1 ranking. "We talked about it last week that, just don't worry about anything, let's just play. It's the same thing we're going to tell them going into this next week.
"It's an honor and it says you're playing real well. You don't get anything from it except a really big headline when you lose."
Duke shot just 43%, but hit 12 of 25 three-point attempts and finished with a 56-38 edge in rebounds. More importantly, the Blue Devils completely shut down Maryland's offense early to take the big lead and didn't let the Terrapins have much room to operate after that.
Maryland shot 28%, including 2-for-12 from three-point range.
"I wouldn't use (the word), 'Surprised,"' Henderson said of the lopsided result. "I know how good this team can be when we're playing together and playing defense like we did the entire game. We can be pretty spectacular and explosive. I feel like we should play like that all the time."
It was Maryland's worst defeat since a 39-point loss to Wake Forest in 1963. It was also the Terps' worst ACC loss ever.
Landon Milbourne scored 19 points to lead Maryland, but the rest of the team shot 9-for-48 (19 percent) for the game.
"It wasn't how good they are defensively. What makes them good is their intensity," said Greivis Vasquez, who managed four points on 2-for-10 shooting. "If you don't play as hard as they do, you're not going to win games in here. You've got to play hard. If you don't, you're going to lose by 40."
The frustration was evident early when Dave Neal of Maryland flung his arms into the air in and cursed in disgust after Duke's 7-footer Brian Zoubek beat several Terps to the ball for the second offensive rebound of the possession before drawing a foul.
Things didn't get any better in the second half, which opened with a stretch in which Duke seemed more like it was putting together a highlight reel than playing an ACC opponent.
First came a three-pointer from Nolan Smith, followed by another three from Henderson. Then, after a missed shot, Henderson threw an underhanded alley-oop pass in transition to Kyle Singler for a dunk.
Finally, after another Maryland turnover, Scheyer saved a ball from going out of bounds near midcourt in transition, leading to a perfect touch pass from Smith to Henderson for another score that capped a 14-0 run and pushed the lead to 40 points with 15:28 to play.
"The start of the second half, for about 4 or 5 minutes there, that was as good a basketball as can be played," Krzyzewski said. "It was lights-out basketball for about 5 minutes. I was proud of my team because with a lead, you can have a tendency to let down. And they didn't."
Before the game, there was a moment of silence to honor longtime North Carolina State women's coach Kay Yow — who died Saturday morning after a two-decade fight with cancer — and Bill Werber, who was the oldest living ex-major leaguer and Duke's first All-America basketball player. Werber died Thursday.