Reporters' Notebook

By Alice Park; Josh Tyrangiel; Tim McGirk

ALICE PARK, WHO WROTE OUR COVER STORY THREE WEEKS AGO ON SARAH HUGHES, THIS WEEK COVERS HUGHES' REMARKABLE GOLD-MEDAL PERFORMANCE. Last summer when I showed up in a sweater at the Ice House in Hackensack, N.J., where Sarah Hughes trains, her coach Robin Wagner took one look at me and shook her head. "I've got a coat and some gloves in my office; you'll need those." She was right. I spent hours watching Wagner and Hughes break down the bane of Hughes's existence, the Lutz jump. Judges had penalized Hughes repeatedly for taking off on the wrong edge, and as painstakingly frustrating as it was, Hughes practiced the jump over and over--and over and over. It was my first hint at the type of competitor Hughes is. Even then I could sense the same frustration building in her that had been welling inside Tara Lipinski four years ago: a potential champion wondering why the experts don't think she will win. Having watched Lipinski triumph in Nagano, I thought something similar could happen in Salt Lake. Recent women's Olympic champions were, on the one night that counted, the best skaters. Last Thursday, I was happy to see, the streak continued.

JOSH TYRANGIEL WROTE OUR COVER STORY ON BONO (BEING PHOTOGRAPHED HERE BY SAM JONES), THE MULTITASKING ROCK MUSICIAN. Reporting on Bono means that you get to visit a variety of universes. In New York City you accompany the noted social activist Bono at the World Economic Forum to discuss globalization nonstop. Then in New Orleans you are hanging with the global rock star Bono at the Super Bowl, a nonstop party. I love Keynesians as much as the next guy, but New Orleans and U2 is tough to beat. As the band members made their way from the field to their sky box following their half-time performance, I talked football with Paul McCartney, who sang along loudly to Beatles songs played on the stadium p.a. Sir Paul high-fived me when, as he put it, "the Patriots ran that interference all the way back for a touchdown!" After the game I joined U2 and Ashley Judd for dinner in the French Quarter and spent much of the meal mumbling, "I am not cool enough for this room," and dirtying the tablecloth with sweat from my palms.

TIM MCGIRK HAS BEEN FOLLOWING THE CAREER OF AFGHAN LEADER HAMID KARZAI FOR MONTHS AND RECENTLY SPENT A WEEK WITH HIM. He doesn't strike you as the typical thuggish warrior chieftain. He is too courtly, too intellectual. But when he was in exile in Pakistan, Hamid Karzai had an intensity that attracted all kinds of Afghans to his salons. I remember sitting at a Karzai banquet with an Afghan former communist general, a Kunduz tribal elder and a wizened chess master. Karzai listened to them as equals, and they in turn were inspired by his quiet determination. Then one day I heard that Karzai had hopped a motorcycle, smuggled himself into southern Afghanistan and started his dangerous--but ultimately successful--campaign against the Taliban, all without his having to fire a shot. Today, in his Kabul palace, Karzai says he will stay on as leader if asked by the loya jirga tribal assembly convening in June. Otherwise, he joked, "Maybe I'll end up working in my brother's restaurant in Baltimore."