Tribune Olympic Bureau

It was still early in Turin. Chad Hedrick had just opened up the 2006 Winter Olympics with the first gold medal for the United States. Everything was looking up. Hedrick...

The team official, a self-described emotional Brazilian, yelled about the meaning. "This is the Olympic spirit, right here," Eric Maleson said. The coach, cool and collected, discussed the practicalities. "German...

It was not the sort of moment Chad Hedrick would have considered courageous two weeks ago, but with the residual ache from competing in five grueling events over 14 days,...

It was a gold-medal run you didn't have to see to believe because you couldn't really see it. Julia Mancuso, a shadowy stick figure representing the United States, descended from...

Only one shopping day remains to pick up your Olympic spirit. After Saturday, the only things left on the shelf are a gold-medal hockey game, a cross-country ski race and...

The guys on the U.S. men's curling team will take home some vivid memories of their time at the 2006 Winter Olympics. Like a visit to the medals plaza before...

Ice rinks are a rarity in Japan, and at the few that do exist, priority goes to people skating for fun. Would-be figure skaters often are banned from trying jumps....

Thanks to Julia Mancuso, the U.S. women's alpine ski team finally found gold in them there hills. Prospects weren't good when Mancuso dug in for the start of the giant...

Shizuka Arakawa's season wasn't going anywhere. The 2004 world champion was as inconsistent as she had been in 2005, when she tumbled to ninth at the world meet and began...

Rosey Fletcher finally won an Olympic snowboard medal, thanks in no small part to a little girl back home named Lillian. And to a cardboard cutout of another little girl...