South Lake Tahoe’s Joanie Anderson and Trevor Ricioli are going for the podium, as both made the finals in their respective sports, boardercross and skiercross.

Anderson is a veteran of the X Games, while this is Ricioli’s first trip.

Anderson has the added twist of having her sister, Jamie, competing at the games. ESPN Action Sports caught up with the sisters before the competition in Aspen started this week. Here is that story.

For Ricioli, he will be facing Olympians Daron Rahlves, who also skis for Sugar Bowl, and Errol Kerr, who trains at Alpine Meadows.

Also representing South Tahoe in the finals is Shaun Palmer in men’s boardercross.

The X Games are televised. Here is the schedule.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

The North Lake Tahoe Chamber Business Mixer at Granlibakken Conference Center & Lodge, Feb. 3, 5-7pm, 725 Granlibakken Road, Tahoe City.

For more information about the mixer, call Kym Fabel at (530) 581.8764 or kym@puretahoenorth.com.

49er Treasure Trail is an interactive all over Amador County on March 26 from 10am-4pm and March 27 from 10am-1pm.

Navigate Historic Amador County by conquering clues and challenges, which are all worth points. Win prizes for the most points, unique costume, most fun team, slowest to finish, traveled the farthest, and more.

Get your clues from your 49er Treasure Trail Guide, available at registration. Clues will lead you to Clue Spots, where you can receive points and tokens. Challenges will come in the form of a game or puzzle. Enter the challenge spot location, play the game or solve the puzzle and earn extra points.

March 25 from 5-7:30pm is registration and kick-off at the ACT Visitor Center, 115 Valley View Way, Sutter Creek.

Results and prizes will be handed out March 27 at 3pm at the Amador County Fairgrounds.

Advance registration: $15 each/$25 per couple. Family of 4: $40. Day of event: $17.50 each; $30 per couple. Family of 4: $50. Kids under 18 must be accompanied by adult in order to win prizes. Registration includes: program with rules and map, gunny sack and lanyard identifying the person as a player, plus a goody bag.

Bicycle parade from the Y in South Lake Tahoe to MontBleu in Stateline.

For more information, call (530) 544.3979.

By Malia Wollan, New York Times

INCLINE VILLAGE — McAvoy Layne climbed the stage chomping on an unlighted cigar, his shock of spray-painted white hair bright in the spotlights. “You can’t beat an audience that’s been waiting 100 years,” he said to the crowd.

Mr. Layne, 67, is a Mark Twain impersonator, and for men in his business this is something of a golden age. Long consigned to the dustbin of historical-society meetings and elementary school classrooms, Twain impersonators are now selling out shows, entertaining at fancy parties, presenting at conferences, making real money and adding new members to their ranks.

They attribute much of this to spinoff attention that came with 2010’s surprise best seller, the 736-page “Autobiography of Mark Twain,” edited by Harriet Elinor Smith and published by the University of California Press on the centennial of Twain’s death. While some of the reviews have been withering, so far some 500,000 copies are in print.

Most in the audience at this tiny storefront theater in a snowy shopping center on the shore of Lake Tahoe had not ventured to buy, let alone read, the hefty hardback. But many had nonetheless been inspired by the book’s promotion to come out to hear Mr. Layne tell Twain’s stories, which they said left them nostalgic for simpler, more adventurous times.

“Mark Twain just makes you feel good,” said Jim Giancola, 62, a retired banker.

Read the whole story

By Sam Stanton, Sacramento Bee

The El Dorado Superior Court in the Phillip Garrido kidnap case has closed jury selection in the upcoming mental competency trial to the media, a move that sparked objections from a lawyer for The Bee and other news organizations.

In a notice posted on the court’s website late Thursday, the court said that “due to the limited number of seats available in the courtroom, the media will not be allowed in the courtroom during Jury selection” when Garrido’s mental competency trial is set to begin Feb. 28. He and his wife, Nancy, are facing charges that they abducted 11-year-old Jaycee Lee Dugard in 1991 and held her captive for 18 years.

The ban on coverage of the process will continue “until a jury has been selected,” the court website stated.

The notice prompted immediate objections from Karl Olson, a San Francisco-based attorney for The Bee and a statewide coalition of media organizations who has been working to open up sealed documents in the high-profile case.

The dispute comes amid preparations for a hearing in Placerville on Thursday that may determine whether Garrido’s mental competency trial actually begins Feb. 28.

Read the whole story

By ESPN

Sarah Burke won her fourth Winter X SuperPipe gold medal Thursday night under the lights at Winter X 15 at Buttermilk, Colo. Winter X rookie Brita Sigourney of Squaw placed second, and Roz Groenewoud rounded out the podium.

Burke, who qualified in the last position for Thursday night’s final, earned the highest score — a 91.33 — for her second run, which included back-to-back flairs, a 720 and a corked 900.

“It feels great,” Burke said, “and all it took was nine hard days of training.” Recovering from a shoulder surgery she underwent this past summer after a disappointing 2010 contest season (she placed sixth in Slopestyle and SuperPipe at Winter X last year), Burke wasn’t cleared by her doctor to ski halfpipe until less than two weeks before Thursday night’s contest.

Read the whole story

Afternoon on the slopes means the sun has had more time to soften things up.

Here is the ski report from Curtis Fong, the Guy from Tahoe.

By Kathryn Reed

People were wincing and audibly uncomfortable. And it wasn’t even their knee being tweaked.

Knees are a big issue – not just with skiers. Two people who have seen their share of knee injuries in South Lake Tahoe spoke to nearly 100 people Wednesday night at Lake Tahoe Community College. Terry Orr, orthopedic surgeon with Barton Health and a doctor for the U.S. Ski Team, along with Chris Proctor, physical therapist with Barton, dispensed a slew of information.

Even though their paychecks are predicated on people injuring themselves, they spoke a bit about how to avoid seeing them beyond the lecture circuit.

Orr said the best ways to avoid injuries are to get in shape, check your equipment, know the weather conditions, avoid collisions, and wear protection.

Much of the Jan. 26 two-hour presentation focused on the anterior cruciate ligament, better known as ACL, because of the four ligaments in the knee it is the one most commonly injured.

Growing in numbers are non-contact ACL injuries. Video of a soccer player going down as he is striking the ball brought forth a chorus of “ohhhs” from the assembled group. External forces, like the turf, contribute to these injuries.

Non-contact ACL injuries used to mostly be seen in females, now guys are catching up.

“You get the right forces at the right spot and you get an injury. It doesn’t take a ton of force,” Proctor said. Much of it depends how a person lands.

Proctor used a sample of 15 females and 15 males, all local, from the last two years to demonstrate how the sexes get injured.

Females: 4 from soccer, 3 basketball, 3 volleyball, 4 skiing, 1 gymnastics.

Males: 4 football, 11 skiing/snowboarding.

“It fits with what the industry is saying. A lot of injuries are attitude related,” Proctor said.

As a physical therapist, he often is seeing patients the day after Orr has performed whatever knee surgery was needed. The goal is to get the person back doing his or her sport six months after surgery. But it could be another year before the person is not thinking about their knee.

Credit was given to Drs. Robert Johnson and Jasper Shealy, and engineer Carol Ettlinger for spending years analyzing 10,000 videos to narrow what happens during ski injuries. The research was whittled down to six elements that lead to ACL injuries:

• Uphill arm is back

• Skier is off-balance to the rear

• Hips are below the knees

• Uphill ski unweighted

• Weight on the inside edge of downhill ski tail

• Upper body generally facing downhill ski.

These factors can be applied to snowboarders, too.

Flexibility in critical, Proctor said, in helping to prevent injuries.

“A lot of people come in with knee pain and we work on hip flexibility,” he said.

Strength, agility and attitude are also important to keeping knees away from the operating table.

Proctor admitted a bit of luck helps too, as a video of Olympian Daron Rahlves flying into the crowd with one ski still on played on the screen. The Tahoe skier walked away from that particular wipeout without needing surgery.

This was one of eight free lectures Barton has scheduled through Oct. 26. The next is Feb. 22. It’s about bone health in the maturing athlete.

Avalon Lodge in South Lake Tahoe is is going through a major remodel. Owners Katy and Deb of Clé Hospitality have donated beds and furniture to Classy Seconds, the income producing thrift shop for Advocates To End Domestic Violence. This nonprofit serves the Tahoe-Reno area.

“Avalon Lodge donated 21 rooms of very nice furniture and like new beds which sold as fast as we could get them in” Lisa Lee, Advocates director, said in a press release. “They could have easily sold the furniture for thousands of dollars, but chose to help a good cause, instead. They also donated to some families in our neighborhood.”