USADSF board and committee members cheer the women's team as they go up against Chinese Taipei.

Bowling has had great luck and a lot of close competition. Lindy Decker is a stand-out athlete, winning the gold medal in the women's singles and beating Benedetta Fodera of Italy by 57 points, her total being 1185. The women's trio (three women bowlers each trio) has also won the silver medal and the bronze medal.

The women's team consisting of five players, Decker, Patty Brothag, Cheyenne Rogers, Sharon Rutherford and Jerilyn Keller, are up against Chinese Taipei for the gold medal. The USA team is behind by 108 points with 2607 total, currently in second place. In this match, Decker has been trying to find her line and bowl some good numbers. Once the team racks up more points today and finds their niche, they might snatch the gold medal out of Chinese Taipei's hands.

They will play against Italy tomorrow, continuing their quest with no mercy.

Track and field had quite some memorable moments and not so memorable ones during the Deaflympics this week.

Patrick Southern won the gold in pole vault and there were silver and bronze medals, such as Andrew Cohen getting the silver medal in discus. Yesterday was a good day for track and field. Today things shifted a bit. There were a lot of USA contenders today in the high jump, men's javelin, and men's and women's relays.

Seasoned Deaflympican and high jumper Tony Berrigan lands fourth place.

Tony Berrigan got fourth place in the high jump and Cohen got seventh place in men's javelin. In the men's and women's 4x100m relays, both teams got fifth place. During the men's and women's 4x400m, both got sixth place.

Ukraine was the team USA men had to try to beat. The team consisted of Charles Blackmon, Patrick Southern, James Markel and Adam Cross. All are great runners, but nothing could compare to the Ukraine relay team who flew around the track. As one of the USA 4x400m participants said, "Ukraine gets the funds to train and they stick with the same relay team all the time so they become a powerhouse. We don't have that luxury." Today was the last day of track and field events except for the marathon on Saturday

Freestyle is one of two styles of wrestling in the Deaflympics. The other is Greco-Roman, which has wrapped up with Jason Jacubowski getting fourth place. In freestyle, wrestlers are encouraged to maintain the offensive and can be penalized for being passive. They are cautioned for irregularities and three cautions mean disqualification. A fall is awarded when one contestant holds both of his opponent's shoulders to the mat for a length of time.

For Jacubowski's match, there was a forefeit by Bulgaria in the 84kg level. Bulgaria also forefeited a match between one of their players and Donavin Figueroa in the 66kg level. Armenia forefeited a match that included USA's Tairbek Tablov in the 60 kg division. Bryce Gertino lost out to Iran in the 96kg level. Figueroa lost out to Mongolia in the 66kg division, the score 4-11. But Jacubowski won 12-9 against a Cuban in the 84kg category. That was good news for the wrestling team.

The USA team was optimistic about their game against Greece at 6 p.m. The tense defensive battle ended regulation with a score of 0-0 and few scoring attempts by either team. Then the excitement began in the first fifteen minutes of the overtime period.

With attacking confidence USA overwhelmed the Greek defense and in the fifth minute Mike Lawson punched in a goal. A few minutes later, a Greek player was excused with a red card after kicking an USA player. The game was effectively over when Adam Ramey scored in the second goal of overtime.

2-0 was the final score. Standouts also included Elijah Gold and team captain Mike Higgins. Their next game is against Czech Republic to secure either a ninth or tenth place rank for men's soccer in the 2005 Summer Deaflympics.