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	<title>Sports &#187; Alice Park &#124; TIME.com</title>
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	<description>Where sports is on the mind</description>
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		<title>Sports &#187; Alice Park &#124; TIME.com</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com</link>
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		<title>Study Documents How Brain Damage from Concussions Progresses</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/12/04/study-documents-how-brain-damage-from-concussions-progresses/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/12/04/study-documents-how-brain-damage-from-concussions-progresses/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 04 Dec 2012 21:06:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Boxing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Football]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hockey]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2343151</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Researchers at Boston University conducted the largest study to date on how concussions can damage the brain. By studying brain tissue from deceased athletes and military veterans who suffered head trauma, they say that chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), which results from repeated blows to the head, occurs in four stages. Read more on our companion site, Health &#38; Family.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2343151&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Football</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/football/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>Dara Torres: Oldest Olympic Hopeful at Swim Trials</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/06/27/dara-torres-oldest-olympic-hopeful-at-swim-trials/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/06/27/dara-torres-oldest-olympic-hopeful-at-swim-trials/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 27 Jun 2012 12:25:04 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swimming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dara torres]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[swimming]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2340575</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Dara Torres says there is one major difference between training for the Olympics in 2008 and getting prepped to make the U.S. Olympic swim team this year — hormones. At 45, she is the oldest U.S. swimmer to show up at Olympic Trials, hoping to earn a berth to London. She’s not menopausal yet she says, but her dropping levels of hormones make it harder to recover after workouts. “There are certain times when I can train really hard and I won’t break down as much,” she says. “There are other times when I have to take it easy. If my coach trains me too hard, it’ll be a much longer recovery for me to get back to where I need to be to have a good workout.” Not that you can tell by looking at her. With sculpted arms and famously defined abs (people have stopped her on the street and asked for a peek), Torres looks like the women half her age with whom she trains. If she makes the team, she will be the first U.S. swimmer to make a splash at six Olympic Games (that’s a span of 24 years) and her twelve Olympic medals tie the all-time medal record for a female swimmer with Jenny Thompson. VIDEO: 10 Questions for Dara Torres She logs in nearly two hours of swimming five days a week at the Coral Springs, Fla. facility where she trains, and maintains an intense gym regimen that includes resistance stretching for two hours every other day. (The resistance not only stretches muscles but flexes them at the same time, improving recovery and maintaining tone.) To control those fluctuating hormones, she works with a naturopath to keep her levels productive — and legal. But being the oldest swimmer at Olympic Trials, which conclude on Sunday in Omaha, Nebraska, also means that she can’t do as much as the younger swimmers. In Beijing four years ago, Torres qualified for both the 50m and 100m freestyle, but dropped the 100m event. This time, she has<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2340575&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/144654060torrescrop.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Olympic swimmer Dara Torres</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>Why U.S. Gymnast Shawn Johnson Gave Up Bid for Second Olympics</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/06/04/why-u-s-gymnast-shawn-johnson-gave-up-bid-for-second-olympics/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/06/04/why-u-s-gymnast-shawn-johnson-gave-up-bid-for-second-olympics/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 05 Jun 2012 00:23:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[beijing olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gymnastics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[liang chow]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[london olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[shawn johnson]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[usa gymnastics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2339454</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Most people wouldn’t consider retiring at age 20, but Shawn Johnson has been a competitive gymnast for practically her entire life, ever since she took her first swing from the bars at the gym as a three year old. Johnson turned her rambunctious energy into an enviable athletic career that earned her seven world and Olympic medals, including the all-around title at the world championships, Olympic gold on beam, Olympic silver in the all-around competition, and the team silver medal at the Beijing Games. After two decades, Johnson announced she is retiring from competitive gymnastics. She was training for a chance to make her second Olympic team, but said a knee injury from a 2010 ski accident was keeping her from preparing at the level she needed. &#8220;My body is to the point where I need time to rest and retire so I can be healthy for the rest of my life,” she said to the Associated Press. “My knee just can’t take it anymore,” she said to NBCOlympics.com. “It has been a constant battle since I came back and recently got worse with the higher numbers. I pushed it to a point and tried to get the finish line and I came up a little short. I can’t do it anymore. It was a hard moment. It was hard to sit here and be told your life in gymnastics is over.” In a conference call, Johnson said continuing to train would potentially damage her knee further, and require total knee reconstruction, which could affect her ability to move in coming years. Five of the six members of the 2008 Olympic team, including Johnson, are hoping to make the London squad. But the reasons for her attempted comeback, Johnson told me during a frank talk over coffee last month in her home town of West Des Moines, Iowa, were very personal. MORE: U.S. Rough Start to Gymnastics After 2008, she was finished with gymnastics. “After 2008, I said I was completely done for good,” she said. “I never planned on going<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2339454&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/06/04/why-u-s-gymnast-shawn-johnson-gave-up-bid-for-second-olympics/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/121590884.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Shawn Johnson</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>The Duel in the Pool: Meet Ryan Lochte, the Man Who Beat Michael Phelps (and Wants to Again)</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/21/the-duel-in-the-pool-meet-ryan-lochte-the-man-who-beat-michael-phelps-and-wants-to-again/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/21/the-duel-in-the-pool-meet-ryan-lochte-the-man-who-beat-michael-phelps-and-wants-to-again/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 21 May 2012 21:06:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swimming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[London 2012]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[michael phelps]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ryan lochte]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2339079</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[No one is looking forward to the U.S. Olympic trials more than Ryan Lochte. As the only man to beat the swimming behemoth that is Michael Phelps in recent years, he’ll be the one to watch in Omaha as Olympic hopefuls swim for the 52 coveted spots on the Olympic team. (Lochte and Phelps are expected to go head to head in several races.)  And as much as Lochte feeds off the rush of competing, especially against Phelps, there’s another reason he’s eager to welcome the June 25 start of trials. Trials means he gets a break from training. Ever since he pulled himself out of the pool following his last race in Beijing in 2008, the 27-year-old Lochte has been prepping to make the 2012 team. That mission involves two-hour sessions in the pool nine times a week, with three hours of dry-land workouts to build up the core and two hours of weight-lifting, including flipping some very heavy tires and throwing kegs several days a week. “Hopefully it ends pretty soon,” he told me during a brief sponsor trip to New York in May, clearly looking forward to the taper, which starts about three weeks before any of his big swim meets, when he gets to wean himself off the grueling training regimen in order to preserve his energy for racing. The training is also keeping the free-spirited Lochte relatively under wraps; he skipped an opportunity to meet and greet sports journalists during the United States Olympic Committee’s three-day athlete fair in May. (Phelps and his coach, Bob Bowman, held a 40-min. press conference.) While he appears on the cover of Vogue with other Olympic hopefuls, his agents have been turning down most interview requests — all for the sake of training. The lockdown might be a bit confining for Lochte, who is a natural in front of the camera. Laid-back everywhere but in the pool, the New York native, who now lives in Florida, is known almost as much for his non-aquatic pursuits as he is for<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2339079&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/21/the-duel-in-the-pool-meet-ryan-lochte-the-man-who-beat-michael-phelps-and-wants-to-again/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/lochte1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">lochte</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>He&#8217;s Baaack: Inside the Mind of Michael Phelps</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/15/hes-baaack-michael-phelps-readies-to-make-more-olympic-history/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/15/hes-baaack-michael-phelps-readies-to-make-more-olympic-history/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 15 May 2012 10:00:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bob bowman]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[London 2012]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[london olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[michael phelps]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ryan lochte]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2338927</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[What do you do after you make Olympic history? It&#8217;s not a problem too many Olympic athletes, not to mention many non-Olympians, ever have to worry about. But if you&#8217;re Michael Phelps, it&#8217;s a very real, and very serious dilemma. How do you top winning a record-setting eight gold medals at the Games, of stringing along the emotions of the entire world over a nail-biting nine days of dramatic, often hair&#8217;s breadth wins? What do you do with the single-minded focus that drove you, almost on auto-pilot, for more than a decade to swim mile after mile in the pool? How do you fill the days that suddenly, minus all those hours of training, yawn wide open like both a taunt and a temptation. You do what any other media sensation does in the digital era. You find yourself plastered across fan sites on the Internet. You get invited to pose half-naked with a supermodel. And you find yourself less and less interested in the one thing that had consumed you for so long &#8212; swimming. (MORE: Michael Phelps Has A Problem) &#8220;After 2008, I just didn&#8217;t want to do it,&#8221; Phelps told reporters at the United States Olympic Committee Media Summit in Dallas, Tex. &#8220;I knew deep down inside I wanted to, but I didn&#8217;t want to put in the work. There were times I wouldn&#8217;t come to practice, because it didn&#8217;t excite me. It wasn&#8217;t interesting. I was kind of going through the motions.&#8221; Perfectly understandable. After all, to achieve his goal of becoming the first Olympic swimmer to beat Mark Spitz&#8217;s record of seven Olympic golds in one Games, swimming had been Phelps&#8217; all-consuming passion for more than eight years. After those memorable days in Beijing, the spark that had taken decades to light and nurture was extinguished in an instant. Phelps&#8217; coach could only watch as the fuel that had propelled his star student ran dry. Even his sure-fire method for motivating Phelps, by goading him on with barbs or put-downs from competitors, no longer held<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2338927&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/05/15/hes-baaack-michael-phelps-readies-to-make-more-olympic-history/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/phelps1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Michael Phelps</media:title>
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		<title>Q&amp;A With Olympic Swimmer Amanda Beard: Playboy, Pools and Playdates</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/04/09/qa-with-olympic-swimmer-amanda-beard-playboy-pools-and-playdates/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/04/09/qa-with-olympic-swimmer-amanda-beard-playboy-pools-and-playdates/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 09 Apr 2012 16:00:44 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Swimming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[amanda beard]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[London 2012]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[playboy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[swimming]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2337298</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Amanda Beard became an instant Olympic icon at the 1996 Atlanta Games when she walked onto the pool deck with a teddy bear that endeared the wide-eyed 14-year old swimmer to everyone who watched her compete. She brought home two silver medals and a gold from those Games, but life after the Olympic spotlight would never be the same. Struggling to cope with her parents&#8217; divorce, and crushed by the pressure she felt from public expectations, she developed body image issues and entered into a serious of abusive relationships. Beard earned four more Olympic medals in appearances at the next three Games, and is currently training to make her fifth Olympics. In her memoir, &#8220;In the Water They Can’t See You Cry,&#8221; Beard discusses for the first time her depression and the self-destructive ways she tried to cope with her symptoms — by cutting herself and becoming bulimic. Why open up now about things you’ve pretty much kept to yourself? Honestly I felt like I do a lot things like travel around, talk to a lot of young females, athletes, moms — a whole spectrum of people. I felt like I had so much more I could really share with them, with the life I’ve led, what I’ve overcome and how I dealt with my struggles. I look at people who have dealt with things and come out happier on other side as very inspirational. To me, I thought It would be so cool if I could share my story with people, inspire them, motivate them, give them some sort hope that it’s okay that you’re dealing with things — it’s not embarrassing, and there is nothing to be ashamed about. That you can get happy and healthy. That was my biggest motivation to do it. What helped you to pull out of your self-destructive behavior? I didn’t really realize [how self-destructive it was] until I started therapy and become healthier. When I was in those moments, I was too scared to talk to anybody, and I felt extremely embarrassed<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2337298&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/amanda-beard-horizontal.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Amanda Beard Horizontal</media:title>
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		<title>Olympic Outlook: In Gymnastics, Meet America&#8217;s Flying Squirrel</title>
		<link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/03/16/olympic-outlook-in-gymnastics-meet-americas-flying-squirrel/</link>
		<comments>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/03/16/olympic-outlook-in-gymnastics-meet-americas-flying-squirrel/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 16 Mar 2012 15:50:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[beijing olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gabby douglas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gymnastics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[liang chow]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[london olympics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[martha karolyi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nastia liukin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[shawn johnson]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/?p=2335015</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Gymnastics has Nadia, Mary Lou, Nastia. And now…the Flying Squirrel? That would be Gabrielle Douglas, 16, the sprite-like gymnast who could give the US women a chance to win its first Olympic team gold since the Magnificent Seven (Amanda Borden, Amy Chow, Dominique Dawes, Jaycie Phelps, Shannon Miller, Dominique Moceanu and Kerri Strug) earned the honor in 1996. The Olympic gymnastic season launched at Madison Square Garden on March 3 with the AT&#38;T American Cup, the first in a series of international competitions leading up to the Games in London. And all eyes were on Douglas, who tallied up the highest score of the day among the eight-woman field. Except that she didn’t win the competition. As an alternate for the US team, Douglas, and US gymnast Chris Brooks on the men’s side, were allowed to perform their routines as if they were competing, but their scores didn’t count. And wouldn’t you know it, Douglas soared to the top, besting teammate and current World champion Jordyn Wieber, who won the meet. “That kind of hurts me,” Douglas said of being a virtual winner. “But it gives me an extra boost. If I want to be in, then I have to be consistent, do the same thing, and I’ll be good.” MORE: Gymnastics: Inside Camp Karolyi Being “in,” of course, means joining the elite and exclusive group of women who get to represent the USA at the Olympics in July. The US women have had a perfect record of going from the top of the podium at the American Cup to the gold medal stand at the Games; all three of the American Olympic all-around champions — Mary Lou Retton in 1984, Carly Patterson in 2004, and Nastia Liukin in 2008 — started their journey to the Games with a win at the American Cup. Nobody is hoping that tradition continues more than Douglas, even without a real win. Like many athletes with Olympic aspirations, Douglas sacrificed the comforts of home and family in order to train with Liang Qiao (better<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=keepingscore.blogs.time.com&#038;blog=33268979&#038;post=2335015&#038;subd=timekeepingscore&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Olympics</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/category/olympics-2/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timekeepingscore.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/140628190douglascrop.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Gabrielle Douglas competing at AT&#38;T American Cup Mar. 3, 2012</media:title>
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