The James Logan Courier

By Kat Glass
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)

WASHINGTON — Cheerleading accounted for two-thirds of sports-related deaths or serious injuries to high school girls over the past 25 years, according to a new nationwide study.

It's because cheerleading increasingly requires complex — and dangerous — gymnastics stunts, said report author Frederick Mueller, who directs the University of North Carolina's National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research in Chapel Hill, N.C.

By Bob Stephens
The Gazette, Colorado Springs, Colo. (MCT)

When Margaux Isaksen moved to Colorado Springs as a 15-year-old, she was considered a prime candidate for the 2012 Olympic team.

Not long after that, Isaksen had a different schedule in mind.

Now 16, she stunned most of the world's modern pentathlon community by qualifying for the Beijing Olympics, where she will be the youngest U.S. competitor in the sport and among the youngest overall.