own her face, knotting her hands together in her lap. Im thin

RIO DE JANEIRO -- Kerri Walsh Jennings and April Ross advanced to the quarterfinals of the Olympic beach volleyball tournament with none of the suspense of their previous match.True, the Italians led in each set, but the Americans rallied to put them away 21-10, 21-16 in just 35 minutes. That made it an early night -- of sorts -- for the fans who came out to watch the three-time gold medalist play at midnight.It was the third time in four Olympic matches that Walsh Jennings and Ross were slotted for the midnight match -- the better to showcase them on American television. While previous matches had pockets of empty seats -- this one was packed.And the Copacabana venue was shaking.Among those in the stands: U.S. comedian and Ghostbusters star Leslie Jones, who draped an American flag around her shoulders and led her section in cheering.Walsh Jennings is going for her fourth straight gold medal. Ross won silver in London, losing to Walsh Jennings and Misty May-Treanor in the final. After that match, Walsh Jennings asked Ross to team up for the Rio de Janeiro Games, knowing May-Treanor was retiring.Four years isnt all that long for a beach volleyball partnership, but its an eternity compared to the Italians.Menegatti had qualified for Rio with Viktoria Orsi Toth, finishing a comfortable eighth in the world tour standings that fill out most of the field. But Orsi Toth failed a doping test just days before the Olympics were to begin, and she was replaced by Giombini. Off White x Air Max 90 All Black . Brazilian national coach Luiz Felipe Scolari has confirmed that the veteran goalkeeper is set to join Toronto on loan, saying it will help him be ready for the World Cup. Wholesale Air Max 90 Womens . Colin Wilson had two goals and an assist, and Mike Fisher scored a goal and helped set up two others in the Predators 6-4 victory over the Red Wings on Monday night. http://www.outletairmax90cheap.com/ . Scott Kazmir allowed four hits in seven shutout innings, Michael Brantley hit a two-run homer in a three-run first inning and the Indians maintained their hold on an AL wild-card spot with a 4-1 win over the Houston Astros on Saturday night. Air Max 90 Ultra SE Black White . Booth picked up 65 caps after making her national team debut in 2002 at the age of 17. She most recently played for Sky Blue FC of the National Womens Soccer League. "It just felt like it was my time to move on," she said in a phone interview from her hometown of Burlington, Ont. Wholesale Air Max 90 . -- Teemu Selanne scored the first goal of his 22nd NHL season, and the Anaheim Ducks extended the best start in franchise history with their fifth straight victory, 3-2 over the Calgary Flames on Wednesday night. In November, espnWs weekly essay series will focus on giving.Ive been thinking a lot about losing lately, about its inevitability, and how it hurts just as bad every time. Sometimes it teaches you something, and sometimes it doesnt. Sometimes you fail despite doing everything right.If that big fail happens when youre at the top of your game, it can be a gift, as Ronda Rousey will demonstrate next month when she enters the Octagon for the first time in more than a year.Her return is brave, and I tell myself this a lot: Going back to the spot where you failed and trying again is brave.The last time Rousey was in the ring, after winning and hanging onto the UFC womens bantamweight belt over the course of six fights, Holly Holm destroyed her with a knockout kick to the head.There were, it seems, two reactions to that loss; those of us who thought Rousey was invincible, and then were shocked and disappointed to discover that she wasnt.We like our superheroes to always win. Rousey made winning look easy: fights won in 34 seconds, or 14 seconds, often by arm bar.Then there were the people who emerged to say why they couldve predicted Rouseys loss, why shed been unprepared, or distracted by celebrity and media interviews, and that she was too arrogant for her own good.The former Olympic judo medalist never struck me as arrogant. More like driven. This is a woman who started judo at 11, and whose own mother, a judoka who once won gold at the World Judo championship, used to wake her up by trying to execute an arm bar.Compared to her mom, Rousey thought of herself as laid-back. Of her upbringing, she said, The rule was you could pick anything you wanted to do in the world, but you just had to be the best in the world at it.Just.She did and she tried. She worried her body was too masculine. She binged and purged to maintain her weight class. After she took the bronze in judo in the 2008 Olympics, she struggled with depression, drank, bartended, and at points lived out of her car.When she found MMA, she wanted those wins badly, and along the way, she transformed womens MMA.Whenever people talk about how cocky and arrogant I am, it blows me away, because I worked so hard to develop self-confidence, she told the New Yorker in 2014.Rousey at the top of her game is something to behold. She glares. She struts. She cries after a win. She is an out-there character in a no-holds-barred sport, her quotes provocative, pithy and playful. Every one of my muscles is here for a purpose, she once said. And if she talked smack before fights, it was partly a manifestation of all that will, not to mention a means of making sure shed prove herself right in the ring.ddddddddddddIm willing to die in here, she said in 2014, during blustery pre-game fight interviews.Theres an interview Rousey did with UFC analyst Joe Rogan last year, before the Holm fight, where she talks about seeing herself a bit like actor Heath Ledgers Joker, a villain the audience cant help but root for. Protagonists react, while antagonists make things happen, she says.Rousey is that rare public female figure who is quite open about the fact that she does not care about being liked. After she wouldnt touch gloves with Holm before her fight -- when she lost, Lady Gaga posted an Instagram of her being pummeled with the caption, Thats what you get for not touching gloves! -- those of us that loved Rouseys swagger felt the familiar sting at a woman getting her comeuppance. We wondered when the sports world -- heck, when the rest of the world -- would be ready for a female antihero.In the months since that fight, Rousey has talked about how it felt to lose. After she got clipped by Holm, she said, I wasnt really there anymore, using language shed once used triumphantly to describe her effect on another opponent. The master of her own body, who trains by climbing trees, who describes herself as a ninja when shes feeling good, didnt even feel like she was inside it. And everybody was watching.Afterward, she told Ellen DeGeneres she felt suicidal. I was like, What am I anymore if Im not this? She said this with tears running down her face, knotting her hands together in her lap. Im thinking what my actual purpose is, and maybe just winning all the time isnt whats best, she added. Maybe I just had to be the example of picking myself up off the floor for everyone. Maybe thats what Im meant for.Ive been thinking a lot about winning lately -- about what it gives you, and what it deprives you of. How we get virtue and victory mixed up sometimes, and wind up valuing the wrong thing. The truth is, most of us dont win all the time; heck, most of us dont win half the time. Most of us know that feeling of losing better than we know the feeling of winning.Next months bout might be one of Rouseys last. I want her to win again. Im a courageous person because Im a scared person, Rousey said years ago.I believe her. ' ' '