SPORTS SATURDAY, JANUARY 11, 2014 Pregnant Ennis-Hill to miss the Commonwealth Games LONDON: Olympic heptathlon champion to think about things from a career point “I think she’ll be able to come back and feed responded to her announcement by Jessica Ennis-Hill announced yesterday of view I am 100 percent set on returning compete. The question is: in what event?,” saying: “Congratulations to Glasgow2014 she is pregnant and will miss the to full-time athletics once our baby is born Hazel said. “Will she be able to get back to ambassador @J_Ennis & husband Andy on Commonwealth Games. “I am sorry I and go for a second gold medal at the Rio the same form she’s been showing in the exciting news that they’re expecting won’t be in Glasgow for the Olympics in 2016 — that challenge really recent years and be competitive?,” added their first child.” Commonwealth Games, but know it will excites me. Hazel, the Commonwealth Games title- Gold in the Commonwealth Games has be an amazing occasion. I will be at home “But in the short term I will make our holder who won in Delhi in 2010, when so far eluded Ennis-Hill, who took bronze awaiting the arrival of a little Ennis-Hill,” baby a priority and enjoy the whole expe- Ennis-Hill did not compete. “You have to in 2006 in Melbourne behind fellow she said. The child will be the first for the rience as much as possible.” While several look at people like (England’s) Katarina Englishwoman Kelly Sotherton. Ennis-Hill 27-year-old athlete and her husband female athletes have returned to high-lev- Johnson-Thompson, who’s been breaking went on to win the 2010 European Andy Hill, who wed last year. el competition after giving birth, fellow Jess’s junior records non-stop,” said Hazel, Championships before taking silver at the Ennis-Hill, one of the poster girls of the British heptathlete Louise Hazel ques- who has since retired from heptathlon but following year’s World Championships 2012 London Olympic Games, said she tioned if Ennis-Hill could do so while is looking to continue her athletics career behind Tatyana Chernova. However, she hoped to return to training after the birth remaining in the seven-discipline event. in other events. made light of the pressure of being a local and compete at the Rio Games in 2016. “Is it possible to be an elite sportswoman Ennis-Hill’s absence deprives Glasgow favorite in London with a personal best “We are completely overwhelmed, with and have a baby? Yes. Is it possible to of one its major crowd bankers amid points score as he took Olympic gold in excitement and a degree of anxiety that I come back from Olympic gold as a hep- ongoing doubts over the participation of commanding style. However, Ennis-Hill am sure all first-time parents will relate tathlete and go on to Rio... it throws a her fellow London 2012 gold medallists has made few competitive appearances to,” she said in a statement. “My plans for huge question over the continuation of a Usain Bolt, the Jamaican sprint star, and since the Olympics and missed last year’s 2014 have been completely turned upside career as a heptathlete and that’s just Mo Farah, the British long-distance run- World Championships in Moscow with an down, but having had a couple of weeks being realistic. ner. Meanwhile the Glasgow 2014 Twitter Achilles injury. — AFP Sochi 2014 price tag is bad Hoefl-Riesch to defend example but Games is ‘safe’ narrow World Cup lead ALTENMARKT: Overall World Cup leader Maria Hoefl-Riesch has her work cut out this weekend if she wants to retain her BERLIN: The $50-billion price tag for the top place amid strong challenges from her young rivals, four Sochi Olympics is a “bad example” for weeks out from the Olympics. Liechtenstein’s Tina Weirather future candidate cities but Russia’s first is just two points behind in the standings, and Swiss skier Winter Games will be secure despite Marianne Kaufmann-Abderhalden is also hot on her heels in mounting safety concerns, international the downhill. Anything less than a win today could see the skiing chief Gian-Franco Kasper said yes- German double Olympic champion toppled from her posi- terday. The Swiss sports administrator, tion as number one. who has been critical of the Sochi Weirather, 24, who has had a surprising run this season Games in the past, said such investment with six podiums already, returns to the hill where she was in the two-week event and in related crowned downhill junior world champion seven years ago. infrastructure projects would scare off Austria’s Anna Fenninger is also within reach of an overall traditional winter sports nations and World Cup lead, just 14 points behind Hoefl-Riesch. In a first damage the brand. “It is an enormous training run on Thursday, 2011 world champion Fenninger cost. It could be that Sochi is more laid down a marker, scoring the fastest time on the 3,005- expensive than Beijing 2008 which was metre (9,859 foot) Kaelberloch slope, ahead of Switzerland’s the much bigger summer Games,” Lara Gut and Slovenia’s Tina Maze. “I didn’t actually have a International skiing federation (FIS) pres- 100-percent good feeling, I slid out in a few places and didn’t ident Kasper told Reuters in a telephone really keep to the line,” she said. interview. “It’s a bit of a surprise,” said the 24-year-old, trying to miti- Beijing cost an estimated $40 billion gate her result. “You shouldn’t really overrate a best time in though the exact cost of staging the training.” Weirather admitted it would be hard to beat Hoefl- summer Games in China is not known. Riesch, who already secured the overall World Cup title in “Those costs in Sochi are enormous and 2011, but showed she was up for a challenge. “It’s always nice a bad example for future candidates. to come to a place where you have good memories, where Most nations cannot afford it. you know you were fast and you can be fast again.” Switzerland, France could never afford “I am going to take my chances,” she added. Gut, who such amounts. Particularly for winter won the super-G at the venue in 2011, praised a slope that games,” the 69-year-old said. Russian SARANSK: A torchbearer rides a bike with an Olympic torch at a cycle track in was demanding but satisfying, with skiers going into a steep President Vladimir Putin has staked his Saransk, the capital of Russia’s republic of Mordovia, 514 km (320 miles) east incline straight out of the start gates and hitting 100 kilome- personal political prestige on staging a of Moscow. — AFP ters per hour (62 miles per hour) within seconds. “At first, if you don’t know the hill, you have a lot of respect because successful Olympics, which officials said security for all events in the mountain But we know that we need security. We would cost $50 billion. Kasper did praise you’re thinking if you miss one bend, you land in the security area is that they (organizers) cut the know there is a terrorism problem not nets.” “But in the end, if you’re well on your skis, it’s pretty the Russians’ ability to construct an number of spectators by almost 50 per- only in Russia but all over the world.” entire industry out of the ground and simple,” said the 22-year-old, who began the season with cent in the past two years. That of He said the atmosphere in the ven- three back-to-back wins but has since fallen behind.” surrounding mountains in less than a course makes it very difficult and really ues could be affected by the local fans’ decade. The weekend’s races in Altenmarkt include not just the does not help to create a special atmos- lack of deep interest for winter sports downhill today but also a super-combined tomorrow-one of MASSIVE CONSTRUCTION phere,” he said. other than ice hockey. “We know we only two such events this World Cup season and the only one The Games open on Feb. 7 in the might have a problem with ambiance “We have to see that what we did in before the Olympics in Sochi next month. With US ski star Black Sea resort on the western edge of because the Games are in an area where Lindsey Vonn out for the season due to a knee injury that will the Alps we needed 150 years and they the Caucasus mountains where insur- there are not really winter sports.” But had to do it in five years. If you see that see her miss the Olympics, Hoefl-Riesch could well win in a gents want to carve out an Islamic state. he was quick to shrug off the absence of discipline in which she has excelled in the past. then it shocks you,” he said. “But the Russian forces have gone on combat American skier Lindsey Vonn, whose Games will be terrific and we will have The question is whether Maze-last season’s overwhelm- alert this week in Sochi and about withdrew injured, has deprived the ing winner with three world championship medals and the most modern venues you can imag- 37,000 personnel are now in place to Sochi Games of arguably the most three World Cup crystal globes, including the overall-can ine.