News stories tagged with "vancouver"

(03/09/10) Lake Placid-based photographer Nancie Battaglia was NCPR's eyes, and ears, during the Vancouver Olympic games. Battaglia came to Lake Placid to document the 1980 Winter Olympics, and she's is now an experienced Olympic "regular." Vancouver was her eighth games, seventh winter games. She shoots for a number of publications, including Sport Illustrated. This year she not only sent us great shots of local athletes at the games, she found their families and fans, too, and checked in on-air during breaks in the action. Martha Foley called her for a final conversation this week. She's been back for about a week, catching up, catching her breath. She left early on the final Sunday - missing the climactic US Canada hockey game, but also ahead of the crowds that jammed the region's airports that night and the next day.

(03/08/10) A huge crowd turned out Friday afternoon in Saranac Lake for a parade through the village's downtown to honor the North Country athletes who competed at the Vancouver Winter Olympic Games. Organized by the Olympic Regional Development Authority, the Women's Civic Chamber and the Saranac Lake Area Chamber of Commerce, the event brought together eight local Olympians, led by nordic combined gold and silver medalist Bill Demong of Vermontville. As Chris Knight reports, the parade was just as important to the athletes as it was to the local residents who cheered them on in Vancouver.

(02/26/10) Vermontville's Bill Demong gave the United States its first Olympic gold medal ever in a Nordic event as Americans posted a 1-2 finish in the Nordic Combined ski event at the Vancouver Olympics yesterday. Teammate Johnny Spillane captured the silver.
Demong surged from sixth place after the ski jump to win the 10-kilometer cross-country leg by four seconds. Bernhard Gruber of Austria, who had a head start after jumping the farthest off the large hill, took the bronze.

Demong will be flag bearer for the U.S. Olympic team at the Olympic closing ceremony Sunday.

(02/26/10) Lake Placid plans a first Olympic celebration this afternoon at 4, starting near the Olympic Arena, to celebrate alpine skier Andrew Weibrecht's bronze medal in Super-G. There will be more celebrations once all the region's Olympic athletes come home from Vancouver, with Saranac Lake planning a parade on March 13th. The two Adirondack communities combined to produce ten percent of the total U.S. medals so far in Vancouver. Martha Foley has more.

(02/26/10) While North Country athletes competing at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver have been grabbing the headlines, and rightfully so, another group of local residents has been making a quieter contribution to the games.

People from the Saranac Lake and Lake Placid area have been working at the Olympics, helping to run bobsled, luge and skeleton races, setting up interviews and photo shoots for athletes, organizing events for sponsors, and playing a host of other behind-the-scenes roles. Chris Knight reports.

(02/24/10) Vermontville's Bill Demong captured a silver medal yesterday afternoon in the Olympic Nordic combined competition in Vancouver. Martha Foley has more.

(02/22/10) The Olympic buzz in Lake Placid over the weekend was all about native son Andrew Weibrecht. On Friday afternoon, the 23-year-old downhill skier claimed the bronze medal in the Super-G competition in Vancouver. He was edged by a fraction of a second by fellow American Bode Miller, who won silver. Peter Crowley with the Adirondack Daily Enterprise is in Vancouver. He spoke with Brian Mann last night about Weibrecht's win.

(02/18/10) This afternoon in Vancouver, North Country biathletes Lowell Bailey and Tim Burke could have their best shot at winning an Olympic medal when they compete in the 20 kilometer individual race. Bailey, from Lake Placid, and Burke, from Paul Smiths, have been friends and training partners since they were little boys. They raced together at the Torino Winter Games in 2006. Both men sat down with their former coach, Kris Cheney Seymour from Saranac Lake, to talk about their lives and their careers. Their conversation, recorded in 2008 as part of the national StoryCorps project, offered an intimate and personal look at what it means to spend decades chasing an Olympic dream.

(02/17/10) It was a tough day yesterday for North Country biathlon skiers competing in Vancouver. Lake Placid's Lowell Bailey finished 36th in the 12.5 kilometer "pursuit" competition. Tim Burke from Paul Smiths finished in 47th place. Both men will have at least two more chances to reach the podium in the sport, which combines rifle shooting with endurance cross-country skiing.

Tomorrow during The Eight O'Clock Hour, we'll have a special Winter Olympics edition of StoryCorps. Bailey and Burke will talk with Kris Seymour, one of their early coaches, about what it was like to grow up competing in the Adirondacks.

(02/12/10) Sixteen year-old Peter Frenette of Saranac Lake had to jump well in the qualifying round at the Vancouver Games Friday. Photographer Nancie Battaglia was there as Frenette, the youngest competitor at the Games, made his successful jump.