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Tornado alert Belmondo quietly caps Olympic career with silverPosted: Monday February 25, 2002 1:00 AMUpdated: Monday February 25, 2002 1:38 AM
MIDWAY, Utah -- The headlines Sunday once again went to Larissa Lazutina of Russia. The winner of nine Olympic medals had her 10th, a gold medal in the 30-kilometer race, stripped for blood doping, the same reason that she was disqualified from the women's 20-kilometer relay last Thursday. What's really awful about Lazutina's story is that it overshadowed the apparent end of the Olympic career of her Italian rival Stefania Belmondo. She finished third in the 30-kilometer classical on Sunday, but she went home with the silver after Lazutina's disqualification. Belmondo has won two golds, three silvers and four bronzes over the last five Olympiads. Belmondo, 33, has been called the "Tiny Tornado." In a sport that appears to favor muscular women, Belmondo, at first glance, doesn't fit the stereotype. She claims to be 5-foot-3. If she weighs 100 pounds, it's with her ski boots on. If she is built like a steel rod, there's a reason. No one has been a tougher competitor for longer. She won her first World Cup event 13 years ago in, of all places Salt Lake City. The Tornado refers both to her speed and her competitive ferocity. She is unmatched in her training. Her former coach, Alberto Berto, said that Belmondo skis 10,000 kilometers per year. He never doubted her, even when she began working with him as a teenager so small that she had to fudge her height in order to join the Italian military forest service. "when I saw her work out," Berto said, "I was convinced." Added Gianni Merlo of La Gazzetta delle Sport, "She is so aggressive. She's tough in everything she does. She has a great will. So small, but she never gives up." You want toughness? She won the gold medal in the 15-kilometer free race on the opening day of the Games at Soldier Hollow despite snapping a pole with 4 1/2 kilometers to go. Skiing with one pole, crying and angry, Belmondo fell back to seventh. When a coach brought her a replacement, she renewed her vigor and chased down -- wouldn't you know it? -- Lazutina, beating her in the final 100 meters. When you've won eight Olympic medals, they are all special. For Belmondo, the 15-kilometer gold is her favorite. "I am very, very happy," she said. "[I won] 10 years after Albertville." At the 1992 Winter Olympics, Belmondo won the gold in the 30-kilometer classical. She won with some 80 people from her village of Ponte Bernardo in attendance, which is really impressive when you consider there are only 160 people living in the entire village. Belmondo, along with many other Nordic skiers, spent several days training in Sun Valley, Idaho, prior to the Olympics. On the morning of Jan. 29, Belmondo went to the trailer where the Italian team stored its skis at the Sun Valley Gun Club only to find her locked compartment had been broken into. Eight pairs of classical and free skis had been stolen, both new skis that Fischer had made especially for Belmondo and three pair of older skis with which she had won many races. Early the following morning, someone found the three pair of older skis in a garbage can at the site of a cross-country race scheduled for 10 a.m. that day. "Found: please return to the Italian team at the gun club by 10 a.m," read the note. It was signed, "Kroatia." Sun Valley police chief Cam Baggett said, "The Croatian team wasn't even here. We have no real suspects." Belmondo overcame the theft of her skis, the snapping of her ski pole, the apparent blood doping by one of her biggest rivals. She may stick around in the sport long enough to ski the world championships next year in Italy. No one expects her to still be skiing when the Winter Olympics come to Turin in 2006. But given her attitude, it would surprise no one if she hung around to win that 10th Olympic medal.
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