The Olympics... and beyond

Last April, prior to the Paris Olympics, I made the trip to New York City to attend the Team USA Media Summit, which was a great chance to hear from multiple athletes across multiple sports ahead of the Summer Olympics. I really enjoyed the experience and was looking forward to the possibility of Team USA doing a similar event ahead of the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. Team USA announced the Winter Olympics Media Summit for yesterday and today in New York City. Originally, I was psyched to spend a few days with the Winter Olympic athletes until I realized that I was not going to be able to be there. I had committed to being the stage manager for the Village Players production of Sweeney Todd, which was in tech week last week, meaning we had rehearsal every night and being in New York for a couple of days did not fit into that schedule. I still wanted to be a part of the event, so I registered and then kept an eye on the schedule as to who would be attending. Knowing I had Tuesdays and...

Back in April of last year, I took the train to New York to attend the Team USA Media Summit, which was held to coincide with the 100-day out mark for the Paris Olympics. The Media Summit featured press conferences and chances to interact with athletes who were preparing for the Summer Olympics. You can read about my experiences in the April blog posts from last year  here .  Team USA sent out the invitation to this year's Team USA Media Summit a few months ago and after the great experience I had last April, I eagerly accepted the invitation and was excited for the chance to get to experience some of the athletes ahead of the Winter Olympics in Italy. This year's event was also scheduled to coincide with the 100-day out mark for the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. After I registered, it occurred to me that I likely wouldn't be able to make it to much of this year's event, as I had volunteered to stage manage the Village Players Theater production of Sweeney Todd, which ...

I first started covering the NASCAR Cup Series appearances in Loudon back when there was two visits a year from the cycle and it was still New Hampshire International Speedway and owned by Alton resident Bob Bahre. Over the years, I have missed a race or two, but always try to get to the track for at least part of the race weekend. When I first starting covering these races I marveled at the monstrous undertaking that putting on a NASCAR race was and I remember being impressed at how it was pulled off. I also remembering how cool it would be to cover the races all season long, going from track to track as the series moved around the country. Since that time, I have started covering the Olympics and while NASCAR is a huge undertaking, the Olympics take that to another level. The work that goes into putting on the Olympics is like nothing else on earth, with multiple facilities, thousands of press, volunteers and staff to move around those multiple facilities is incredible. That being sa...

As documented here just a few short months ago, my initial request for credentials for the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics in February was rejected and I ended up on the waiting list before eventually being awarded a credential by the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee.  I am grateful for the fact that a credential opened up and I will get the chance to cover my sixth Olympics. It is one I am greatly looking forward to and I can't wait to get my first up-close look at the mountains of Italy (I flew over them from Switzerland to Milan in late 2001). However, that original rejection was not my only taste of credential rejection in 2025, in fact, there were a couple more events I was looking to cover that I did not receive credentials for.  I applied for credentials to cover the NCAA Ice Hockey Regionals at the SNHU Arena in Manchester earlier this year and that application was rejected, as was the request I made last year to cover the women's Frozen Four at the Whittemore Center ...

Last week I officially accepted my accommodation proposal for next February's Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. It wasn't the ideal situation for me, at least financially, but it was the only real option I had without doing a lot of research on rooms in the Anterselva area, something that I didn't have time to do and also, which from reading other pieces, wouldn't have yielded me any better results. So, on Monday morning, while my laundry was drying in the Wolfeboro laundromat, I made my way to TD Bank, where I spoke with Donna (she and Tammy have facilitated the majority of my Olympic wire transfers) and started the process of getting the first payment for my accommodations to the Milan-Cortina Organizing Committee. Over the years, this has been an interesting process. For Sochi, they actually accepted the funds in US dollars, which was surprisingly easy given the problems I'd have in the future. For PyeongChang in 2018, I was able to send my funds in South Korean cur...

The ramp up to Milan-Cortina is getting pretty real and over the last couple of days it became even more real in a pretty big way. Shortly after I was approved for credentials, I had to submit my request for accommodations in Italy. As has been the case normally when I look for the housing, I am looking exclusively at the price. The money for these trips mostly comes out of my own pocket so I am looking for ways to keep the costs down as much as possible. For Milan-Cortina, I also had to take into account the location for the housing, as the way the venues are spread out over the mountain villages of Italy, it is impossible to stay in one place and see the entire Olympics like I have in years past. I've always loved having the ability to move from location to location and see so many different things but it became very obvious once the venue master plan was released that it would not be possible in this version of the Olympics. It was disappointing, but understandable. So, when I m...