Posts tagged "features"

BSU at the Games continues its daily video series introducing you to athletes from Team USA. Today, meet USA Wrestling’s Sam Hazewinkel prior to a recent practice in London for the Olympic Games. Hazewinkel competes Friday.

Sam Hazewinkel – USA Wrestling

BSU at the Games provides this update on events to watch in the closing days of the Olympic Games. Featuring USA Track & Field’s Wallace Spearmon and USA Swimming’s Alex Meyer.

Update from London

Above the water, their routine is simple. Under the water, Mary Killman and Mariya Koroleva would say differently. BSU at the Games takes you “behind the scenes” with Team USA’s only two synchro athletes at the Olympic Games.

Under the water with U.S. Synchro

His journey began inside a run-down boxing gym in southern Dallas. Now the No. 1 U.S. welterweight boxer, Errol Spence Jr., finds himself fighting for a medal in the 2012 London Olympic Games.

The Errol Spence Jr. Story

BSU at the Games continues its daily video series introducing you to members of Team USA. Today, meet USA Track & Field’s Lance Brooks who didn’t begin his career as a discus thrower.

Lance Brooks – USA Track & Field 

BSU at the Games provides this “behind-the-scenes” look from a recent USA Men’s Basketball Team practice in London. Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, Kevin Durant, Coach K and more visit with our crew.

USA Basketball All-Access

By Jack Meyer | BSU at the Games

Passing customers stop to order some of Pit Cue Co.’s beef brisket. The American-style pulled pork barbecue sold out before closing on Sunday evening.

Jamie Berger stuck his head out of his metallic food truck parked on the South Bank of the Thames Sunday night, selling the last of his American-style barbecue to passing Olympic goers and London natives.

Berger is just one of a number of entrepreneurs cashing in on London’s desire for such fare, which Berger says has been growing in recent years.

“When we started there were really not very many at all,” Berger said. “There’s certainly been an interest in barbecue in places like New York and on the East Coast, so it’s kind of a natural progression for it to come over here.”

Berger, a Georgia-born American who has lived much of his life in London, started his business, Pit Cue Co., two years ago with a single food truck parked just a few minutes’ walk from the London Eye. Since then Berger has opened shop in a permanent space in London’s SoHo and plans to open a second, larger restaurant at the beginning of 2013.

Two Londoners sat between Berger’s truck and the Thames Sunday afternoon munching on some of the last of the day’s beef brisket, which is served the American way with sides of pickles and coleslaw.

“I’ve had it before, and it’s really good. Proper American barbecue,” said London native Niiamu Swaniker. “I’ve been to America a lot, so I’ve had it over there. It isn’t represented really well here, so it’s nice to find a place that does it really well.”

Berger said his business model doesn’t involve trying to make a direct copy of the pit-style fare that is well know, in the southern Unites States.

“We’re not trying to replicate any one regional kind of barbecue,” Berger said. “We’re seeking to take the best of American techniques and marry them to old rare-breed English pigs and cows to create something rather unique.”

Although Berger is selling barbecue in England’s capital, he said many of his customers are Americans who are familiar with his product but are often surprised to see it across the Atlantic.

“Often they are very surprised and somewhat incredulous,” Berger said. “They are also rather, ‘How can you have pulled pork over here?’ Then we kind of have to explain the story and then they try it and realize it’s very delicious.”

Jack Meyer is a senior news journalism major at Ball State University and features reporter for BSU at the Games. Follow Jack and the BSU team at @bsuatthegames and www.facebook.com/bsuatthegames.

Here’s a sneak peek of Monday’s BSU at the Games exclusive with USA Boxing’s Errol Spence, Jr.

From the age of 15 boxing in Dallas at the tiny Vivero Boxing Gym, to Maple Avenue Boxing Gym in downtown Dallas to seven national championships – Spence has his sights set on Olympic gold in London.

The Errol Spence Jr. Story promo

“Boxing saved my life.” Those words, spoken by Rau’Shee Warren echo the harsh past he left behind when he started boxing for Team USA.

Now competing in his third Olympic Games, Warren fights for a chance to bring gold back to his hometown of Cincinnati, where crime devastated the streets he grew up on.

The Rau’Shee Warren Story

BSU at the Games followed USA Boxing’s Joseph Diaz Jr. on his journey to the Olympic Games. At a team practice in London, Diaz Jr. gives his appreciation for our students and their coverage of his sport.

Joseph Diaz Jr. thanks Ball State