May 2010 Archives

I'm sure I'm not the first person to stumble upon this coincidence, but after spotting the mug shot of Minnesota Twins outfielder/DH Jason Kubel (below) in today's San Bernardino Sun, I couldn't resist.

The resemblance to actor Jerry Ferrara (AKA "Turtle" from Entourage) is uncanny:

Here's the historic blog post, confirming Big Bear Lake 13-year-old Jordan Romero as the youngest person ever to summit Mt. Everest.

Leave a comment on his blog, or on his Facebook page for a historic job well done (to put it mildly).

Peter Sagan of the Liquigas-Doimo team has won Stage 6 of the Tour of California, sprinting to the finish line in Big Bear Lake ahead of Rory Sutherland. Overall leader Mick Rogers of HTC-Columbia finished third.

David Zabriskie of the Garmin-Transitions team trails Rogers by 4 seconds for the leader's jersey. Sagan got a 10-second bonus for winning the stage, and three-time defending champion Levi Leipheimer (RadioShack) is 14 seconds behind in fourth place.

More details in tomorrow's editions of the Sun and Daily Bulletin.

Jordan Romero, a 13-year-old from Big Bear Lake, has begun his final climb to the summit of Mt. Everest. If everything goes according to plan, he will reach the top of the world's tallest mountain Saturday.

Whether Jordan makes it or not, this is the biggest local sports story of the year. It's also the biggest local sports story that is impossible for me to cover in person. Fortunately Jordan is doing a great job updating his blog, his Twitter (@TeamJordanR), and his Facebook account, and if you haven't bookmarked them yet you should.

The New York Times just jumped on the Is-13-Too-Young? question. Two years ago, I asked the "Is-11-too-young?" question in an article that ran in The Sun. Click below for the full text.

Todd Jenkins, who helped coordinate Sunday's sled hockey clinic at Center Ice Arena in Ontario, passed along this YouTube montage of photos taken at the clinic ...

And here is the story about the clinic that ran in Wednesday's Daily Bulletin.

The Rancho Cucamonga Quakes' game against the Inland Empire 66ers will not be heard on "The Spa" today due to a technical malfunction ... involving bees. The game can be heard on KCAA (1050-AM) via the 66ers' home broadcast.

2:20 p.m. update: "We are bee-free," I have been told, and the broadcast is ready to begin.

Kori Carter competed in four events at the Baseline League track finals on Friday at Claremont High School. The 12th grade phenom ran a 13.78 in the 100 hurdles, 11.76 in the 100, 41.99 in the 300 hurdles, as well as the anchor leg of the 4x400 relay team that finished second in 3:57.46. Add it up, and that's a wind-aided five minutes and five seconds during which Carter looked nothing like a 17-year-old girl.

Between races, she came back to Earth.

After winning the 300-meter hurdle event going away - Carter could have phoned Stanford with her time before Etiwanda's Jordie Munford crossed the finish line 2.58 seconds later - she leaned over a cyclone fence to chat with some friends and hug another, which probably had nothing to do with winning a race. Carter then walked back across the track to the infield. Time for an interview.

I follow her to her duffel bag, from which she retrieves a bottle of water and starts squirting all over the place, trying unsuccessfully to hit her mouth.

"I'm the klutziest hurdler," Carter says.

"That's not a good event to be klutzy in, is it?"

"That's where everything makes sense. On the track," she says. "Everything off the track doesn't make sense."

Like drinking from a water bottle, apparently.

"Can you jog?" she asks. Suddenly I'm jogging across the Claremont football field with the fifth-fastest high school girl in the state of California. We reach the 30-yard line and stop.

"Wait, is Andy jumping?" she asks, rhetorically.

We jog a little further. Carter is trying to find Andy.

"Do you still have another event today?" I ask.

"Yes, the 4-by-4."

We agree to meet up after her final race, and I reach out to shake her hand.

"I'm a hugger," says Carter, now embracing this complete stranger. She runs off - maybe to find Andy - and I scribble something down in my notebook: Kori Carter does not break a sweat after running a race.

"The Los Osos team just got DQ'd," Carter tells me. "I'm really sorry. I want to go calm them down."

I tell her to go on ahead then come back to the infield, but Carter doesn't trust herself. We have to "pinkie swear" (her idea, not mine) and she initiates an elaborate ritual in which we wrap pinkies, then touch thumbs, then release the pinkies and form a heart shape with our opposable digits.

This must be what sealed the deal for Stanford.

A few minutes later, Carter encounters a Los Osos sprinter on her way back to the infield. Amidst their friendly banter she tells him that the 100 is "too long and boring," and I have my first question.

"The 100 is the shortest race. How can it be long and boring?"

"OK, hurdles is like, 'Run-run-run, jump. Run-run-run, jump. Run-run-run, jump.' But the 100 is like run-run-run-run-run-run-run-run-run. ... I really think I have ADD."

"So do I."

The story that resulted from the rest of our interview can be read here.