g rightfully assumed the status of Indias premier Olympic sport.Quite clearly, Rio has stalled the engin | Forum

Former Alabama?cornerback Maurice Smiths transfer saga is over. Air Max Wholesale Free Shipping . Hell be allowed to transfer to Georgia, the SEC announced Friday.The SEC granted a conditional waiver for Smith to transfer to Georgia for the 2016 season after a battle with his former team that lasted nearly two months.SEC bylaws typically require that a graduate transfer have two years of eligibility to transfer to an SEC school and also require a player transferring from one SEC school to another to sit out a year.?Neither will be the case for Smith, who has one year of eligibility remaining and will be allowed to join the Bulldogs immediately.SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said Smith earned the exceptions by graduating from Alabama in three years.The standard for granting waivers has been clear and compelling evidence that there is reason for allowing an exception to SEC rules, Sankey said in a statement. I found, among other contributing factors, that a student-athlete who graduates in three years and exhibits a strong commitment to his or her academic future provides compelling motivation to help them achieve their goals on and off the field.Sankey also said Smith has clearly and passionately stated his desire for a graduate degree in Public Health.Smith had asked Alabama in June for permission to contact other schools with intentions to transfer.Smith wanted to follow new Georgia head coach Kirby Smart, his former defensive coordinator at Alabama. When Smith originally met with Alabama coach Nick Saban in June regarding the matter, Saban told Smith that he would not release him to an SEC school, according to a letter Smith wrote to the Alabama appeals committee and obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.Smith later claimed that his locker was cleared out, all his personal belongings were thrown in the trash and he wasnt allowed to enter the Tides football facilities.Saban said on Aug. 4 that we support the SEC rule of not granting guys releases to go to other SEC schools. It has been our policy here not to do that unless there was a special circumstance.On Wednesday, however, Saban changed that stance and granted Smith a full, unconditional release -- leaving the decision in the hands of the SEC.Smart thanked the SEC for granting the waiver, which will allow Maurice Smith to pursue his dreams at the University of Georgia as a graduate transfer.This has been a difficult situation to navigate, and we are grateful to all who have been involved in bringing it to a resolution, Smart said in a statement released by Georgia on Friday night. Now that it is behind us, we are all anxious to move forward.Smith recorded 15 tackles, one sack and one forced fumble and had one fumble recovery in 15 games as the nickelback for the Crimson Tide. He ended spring football in Alabamas starting secondary rotation.The Associated Press contributed to this report. Cheap Air Max Ireland . 9. Price, heading to the 2014 Olympics for Canada, was named the First Star after posting wins in three starts with a 1.00 goals-against average and a .971 save percentage. Nike Air Max Ireland Sale . Defenceman Yannick Weber scored the go-ahead goal early in the third period and the Canucks breathed a sigh of relief with a 2-1 win on Saturday night. http://www.irelandairmax.com/ . -- Edmontons Val Sweeting is two wins away from a trip to Winnipeg to play in Canadas Road of the Rings in December. Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra has been asked to head an independent inquiry set up by the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) to examine the reasons for the shooting contingents failure to win a single medal at the Rio Olympics despite its largest-ever presence with 12 shooters qualifying for the Games.ESPN understands that Bindra awaits an official intimation from the NRAI on the objectives and frames of reference of the panel before announcing his decision on taking up the role.Bindra, participating in his last Olympics, came the closest among the shooters to winning a medal, finishing fourth in the 10m Air Rifle.The head of the panel will be assisted by an eminent sports administrator and a couple of members of the media, with a mandate to look thoroughly into every aspect of the shooting fiasco in Rio. NRAI President Raninder Singh told ESPN that he expects the inquiry to be complete in the next 2-3 weeks but insisted that he will not be putting in his papers although India has failed to win a shooting medal for the first time since the 2004 Athens Olympics. Raninder said, I am absolutely astounded that we are going back empty handed.He said, Based on data, watching my athletes prepare and their performances in the build up including the last World Cup a month ago, I was absolutely convinced we should have won three medals. It is a big setback for me and the federation but that doesnt mean you sweep it under the carpet and dont deal with it head on.My sport is the only one at the Olympics where weve had so many athletes get so close to getting into finals or actually getting into them. It is not an excuse for not winning medals but you have to see the role of an administrator separately from the role of an athlete. I have taken responsibility for it but I see no reason to be unceremoniously told to march off into the wilderness. I think I can serve my sport better if I use my experience of what Ive seen and learnt over here and after interacting with my athletes and coaches.Besides Bindra, only one other Indian shooter reached a final at Rio - Jitu Rai in the 10m Air pistol, where he finished eighth among the eight finalists in the field. Several others missed earning qualification to the finals by a whisker. Jitu himself, in his preferred event the 50m Pistol, dropped points in his final series to fall out of contention. In the 50m Prone, four-time Olympian Gagan Narang experienced a similar meltdown, with one poor shot ruining his chances of making the cut after a solid start. In the 25m Rapid fire pistol Gurpreet Singh in his first Olympics ended 7th, with the top six making the final. Similarly in the Rifle 3 Positions, Chain Singh and Skeet, Mairaj Khan, faded towards the latter half of their qualifying rounds after igniting hopes of making the cut. Raninder, who watched most of these competitions from the stands, believes this trend needs to be carefully examined.In case of Jitu, I am completely convinced that he misread the wind, he said. In most cases of our athletes we have had a petering out in the last series. This obviously means that there are deficiencies that our athletes have come into the Games with. One is endurance, both mental and technical. It is difficult to quantify this but yes endurance is an issue we have to look into.While some shooters such as Jitu and Narang could count themselves as unlucky to have been waylaid by the elements, others produced performances well below their personal bests. Apurvi Chandela and Ayokina Paul finished 34th and 47th in thhe 10m Air Rifle, the event that kicked the shooting programme off, recording scores much lower that they were registering in earlier competitions. Nike Air Max Online Ireland. Heena Sidhu faltered similarly in both her events, finishing 14th in the 10m Air Pistol and 30th in the 25m Pistol, an event she made the final for at the World Cup in Baku barely a month ago. Narang too struggled in his other two events, the 10m Air Rifle and the 3 Positions. The experience of having participated in three previous Olympics counted for little for Manavjit Singh Sandhu in the Trap, as he finished 16th.Eight members of our team were first timers, it was a young team, justifies Raninder. There are people who have not performed also, I am not going to vilify people by taking names but I know who they are, we are going to look into everything.While the here and now of the catastrophe in Rio will be scrutinised thoroughly, more systemic issues require attention as well. Boosted by funding from the government as elite athletes to help them prepare for the Olympics, several shooters such as Ayonika Paul in the 10m Air Rifle, Prakash Nanjappa in the 50m Pistol and Kynan Chenai in Trap, chose to work with their private coaches. Others like Jitu Rai and Gurpreet Singh received expertise from coaches at the Army marksmanship unit in Mhow.This created an unusual situation, with national coaches appointed by the Federation, offering their counsel and guidance but the shooters also turning to their individual coaches for advise. Unlike expenses for trips for foreign exposure, training camps and foreign coaches, that are also borne by the government but routed via the Federation, this funding is delivered directly to the shooters. With the benefit of hindsight, Raninder believes that has contributed to the underperformance of some shooters.This is a new phenomenon at least in shooting, he says. In the past it was always the national coach along with the support staff that would bring the team into the Olympics. Now we have found that funding has been provided at the request of the athletes for individual coaches. You train for one year with a particular coach, who has his own style and an independent thought process. Suddenly they switch to someone else who will obviously have his own take on how things should be done. This multiplicity of everyone trying to help it layers the athlete with more information than he or she needs. I am pretty sure it has caused some damage to us.This sudden downward spiral in Rio notwithstanding, the graph of Indian shooting has been on the upswing over the last decade or so. Once Rajyavardhan Rathore broke a glass ceiling by clinching silver at Athens in 2004 and Abhinav Bindra followed up with his historic gold at Beijing in 2008, academies and training centers sprouted up across the country. Participation at national level tournaments went through the roof and Indian shooters started to win medals at international competitions consistently. Once pistol-shooter Vijay Kumar and Gagan Narang delivered two medals at London in 2012, shooting rightfully assumed the status of Indias premier Olympic sport.Quite clearly, Rio has stalled the engine of a smoothly functioning vehicle that was expected to gain speed over these last couple of weeks. The challenge will be to get the repair work started in earnest at the earliest so podium places can be claimed at Tokyo in four years from now. ' ' '