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August 25, 2004 4:46 pm

Notebook: Greece's golden goddess

By DAVE LUMIA

Gannett News Service

ATHENS, Greece - From a Greek perspective, the individual highlight of the Games has been 400-meter hurdler Fani Halkia.

She set an Olympic record with a time of 52.77 seconds in the semifinals, then easily won the gold medal in 52.82. A flag-filled stadium erupted in cheers and helped ease the shame Greece was feeling over defending 200-meter champion Konstadinos Kederis, who withdrew in controversy following a missing drug test.

``The crowd was amazing from the get go, and the atmosphere they created was unprecedented for me,'' she said. ``I wanted to prove that when the Greeks put their mind to it, they can step up to the highest spot on the podium.

``I believe that what I did today goes to show that Greeks are full of soul, and they deserve recognition from everyone. No one expects the Greeks to have such achievements to show for; it always comes as a surprise, whether you're a Greek fan or not.''

Halkia, whose career best prior to the Olympics was 53.99, is a former high jumper who studied to become a television journalist while injured in 2000-01.

ATHENS, Greece - Egypt's Karam Ibrahim could strike gold twice if he's able to win a gold medal at 211.5 pounds on Thursday in Greco-Roman wrestling.

John Fuller, a USA Wrestling spokesman, said he connected Ibrahim with officials from WWE while the 24-year-old trained in Colorado Springs, Colo., in February.

Ibrahim flew to Cleveland to meet with people from WWE, the televised professional wrestling show built around testosterone, fireworks and blaring music.

``If he wins a gold, they've pretty much told him they're going to offer him big money,'' Fuller said.

Ibrahim won all three of his matches on Wednesday to qualify for the medal round.

VOULIAGMENI, Greece - Triathlon bronze medalist Susan Williams of Springfield, Va., overcame a crash on a downhill portion of the first cycling lap.

``I hadn't had a lot of opportunity to practice on that downhill,'' she said. ``The bike got away from me a little bit and I saw a blue barrier ahead of me and thought to myself `That looks pretty soft' and so I just went into it. I just received a couple of small scratches, and it didn't really slow me down much.''

Williams stopped training for the Sydney Games in 2000 when she found out she was pregnant. Her daughter, Sydney, came with her for this year's competition.

ATHENS, Greece - Rower Diederik Simon of the Netherlands won a silver medal in the men's eights on Sunday, then lost it - in an Athens taxi.

Fortunately for Simon, the taxi driver turned it into the Taxi Drivers Trade Union, which notified the Athens Organizing Committee to take appropriate steps to return it.

No word on the circumstances behind the medal's loss, other than Simon saying he ``definitely made a good time'' in losing it.

ATHENS, Greece - Ticket sales continued to climb in the second week of the Games, according to figures released by the Athens Organizing Committee.

Tuesday's sales were reported at 290,387, or 79 percent of capacity. Track and field, equestrian, team handball quarterfinals, track cycling and synchronized swimming were reported as sellouts.

Women's basketball classification games sold less than 10 percent of available tickets - 989 in a 10,402-seat venue.

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