He's not expecting, but his partner Dan Joye recently became the father of a daughter born two months early in an emergency premature Caesarian. The baby and mother were in stable condition yesterday in a Bay Area hospital, USA Luge announced.

Joye will remain with his family for at least several weeks. That leaves Niccum, a 2006 Olympian, alone to train on a singles sled in Lake Placid, N.Y., in the interim. Niccum and Joye had slid to 12th, 10th, fifth- and ninth-place finishes on the World Cup tour this season.

It's unclear if the duo will be back together for a Feb. 21-22 season-capping race at the new Whistler Sliding Centre in British Columbia. That race will be a test event for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.

Niccum, 29, a four-time Junior World Doubles champion with previous partner Matt McClain, finished 23rd in luge singles at the Turin 2006 Games.

Photo: USA Luge

Just for the record, here's what official rejection looks like:

(begin clip)

*** COSPORT TICKET REQUEST - NOT CONFIRMED ***

Dear Mr. Ron Judd

This is to advise you that after the completion of the ticket lottery process, unfortunately, due to the high demand for the events requested, this Ticket Request was not allocated any tickets for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games.

Please note that you will still have the ability to participate in the forthcoming pre-sales phase, currently scheduled to take place end of January, 2009. Further details regarding this pre-sales phase will be sent to all Ticket Request account holders in several weeks.

Your credit card has not been charged for any amount relating to this Ticket Request.

(end clip)

No surprise. As mentioned earlier, I requested only two pairs of tickets to high-demand events. Like a lot of other readers who've written in or posted, I found the process sort of unnerving: It was tempting to request dozens of tickets for multiple events. But who knew what the odds of success were? If you asked for 30 tickets and got even half of them, you'd be staring at a frightening credit-card bill, with no opportunity to decline the tickets you'd been awarded. As it turns out, because of the incredibly long-shot odds (the total U.S. allotment was about 3 percent of the total), those who played it safe in many cases got nothing, while those requesting many tickets received about 20 or 30 percent of them.

In my case, it's less than a heartbreak: I'll likely be at the Olympics, anyway, working, and had planned to sell any tickets won at face value to someone else. For others, it's pretty disheartening.

Even many successful ticket bidders we've heard from say they're uncertain whether they'll actually use their own tickets. If you scored tickets for curling and luge, for example, and they're four days apart, is it really worth the trip to Vancouver, the border lines, the exhorbitant hotel rates and all the rest? Good question.

At any rate: We like the spirit of James from Seattle, who posted below that he got skunked, as well, but plans to sink the money he would have spent on figure skating on a pair of recliners to watch at home in HDTV.
To which we can only say:

That's the spirit, dude.

But be prepared for that three-hour NBC delay.

After a 16-year run, Home Depot Wednesday announced it's dropping its USOC sponsorship. That will leave a hole in the budgets of as many as 100 Olympic athletes. Over the years, Home Depot's Olympic jobs program has become a staple for many Olympic hopefuls. The company has paid full-time wages and benefits for part-time work, giving athletes more time to train. The program grew into a tradition in the Olympic community, helping athletes -- most of whom earn little money from sponsorship deals -- solve the problem of how to make a living and devote huge hours to training and other athletic endeavors.

The program also gave the public a chance to rub elbows with elite athletes clad in orange aprons -- some of them the best in the world. Over the years, Home Depot says it employed 660 athletes, 300 of whom made Olympic and Paralympic teams, resulting in 150 medals -- 95 of them gold. Athletes currently in the program will be allowed to work part-time, or apply for full-time jobs as they come open.

A company spokesperson was quoted as saying the decision was not related to the current economy, in which Home Depot recently saw its quarterly earnings decline by more than 30 percent.

It's a significant, although not unexpected, loss for the USOC. Home Depot officials hinted that the progam was under review before last summer's Beijing Games. USOC officials are likely to shop for a replacement jobs program.

Meanwhile, it's unclear what other support will be available for affected athletes. Some of them apparently will get help from the USOC itself. Seven athletes in the USOC's home city of Colorado Springs, Colo., for example, will get stipends and medical insurance from the USOC, the Colorado Springs Gazette reported.

The Home Depot contract brought the USOC $15 million to $20 million over four years, the Gazette reported.

"We're sorry to see The Home Depot go," USOC spokesman Darryl Seibel told the newspaper. "We appreciate their desire to extend employment opportunities to the athletes."

Hate to add fire to paranoia, but...we here at the Oly Dept. haven't heard from CoSport yet about our ticket request, either. We asked for two things we knew would be tough to get -- the men's downhill and short track -- just to get a feel for the process. We'd be surprised if we scored either, so maybe there's something to that no-news/bad news theory. Anyone else?

CoSport, which today began notifying fans which tickets -- if any -- they will receive for the February, 2010 Games, said in a news release that 40 percent of its 14,179 ticket orders (with requests for 166,800 individual tickets) came from Washington state. The next closest state was California, with 16 percent.

Overall, the agency, which has rankled some U.S. customers with its automatic 20-percent commission and what amounts to a $35-per-order mailing fee, will be distributing only 43,004 tickets to the U.S., according to the release. About 55 percent of fans will receive some requested tickets, but few if any will receive all they asked for. Only about 25 percent of total ticket requests were fulfilled through a lottery system.

The agency, which chose ticket recipients to most events through a random lottery process after fans submitted electronic wish lists late last year, cited unprecedented ticket demand. And CoSport noted that the original total U.S. allocation was only 33,500 tickets. (That's about half of B.C. Place for a single opening or closing ceremony). Co-Sport's sister company, Jet Set Sports, which books travel packages for the Olympics, contributed an extra 15,000 tickets to the pool to bring the U.S. ticket total to about 48,000, the agency said.

Still, given the population base, tremendous fan interest, and large U.S. athlete delegation -- all factors supposedly considered in Vancouver organizers' decision on how many tickets to allot to foreign nations -- that's a surprisingly low number. The total U.S. allotment is about 3 percent of the Vancouver Games' total 1.6 million tickets sold. Demand, naturally, was very high for that small pool of tickets, mirroring the experience with Canadian sales. There, even with a fraction of the U.S. population base and a vastly larger ticket pool, some 120 of 170 total events required lottery processes to determine ticket winners. Canadian fans have been grousing about the process for weeks.

(For comparison purposes, we also know that CoSport received an allotment of 2,629 tickets for Australia, receiving 339 orders for a total of 4,142 tickets, so even fans Down Under went through a lottery process.)

The top 5 most-requested sports in the U.S.:

1. Ice Hockey
2. Figure Skating
3. Snowboard
4. Short Track Speed Skating
5. Alpine Skiing

And the top 5 most-requested individual event sessions:

1. Snowboard -- Men's Half pipe (17th February) -- Category B tickets
2. Snowboard -- Men's Half pipe (17th February) -- Category A tickets
3. Figure Skating -- Ladies Free Skate (25th February) -- Category B tickets
4. Opening Ceremony (12th February) -- Category C tickets
5. Snowboard -- Men's Snowboard Cross Qualification/Final (15th February) -- Category B tickets

A small number of remaining tickets will go on sale to the public on CoSport's Web site next month.

(Thanks to poster "Go Ducks" who noticed the news release in a very non-obvious spot on Co-Sport's site. We shall officially refrain from any Duck jokes for at least one day in his honor.)

-- Thirty-eight-year-old Roberto Carcelen, a runner and surfer from Peru, is training as a cross-country skier at Hyak, hoping to claim a spot in the Vancouver 2010 Games, The New York Times reports here. He's one of a growing number of athletes from warm-climate nations taking up winter sports in the hope of appearing in winter sport's marquee event.

-- The list of other athletes from unlikely places doing the same includes Kenya's Philip Boit, part of that memorable Nike publicity stunt to place runners from a desert climate in the 1998 Winter Games in Nagano, Japan. Boit competed there, but much to everyone's surprise, stuck with the sport after Nike stopped writing checks. He competed in the Salt Lake and Turin Games, finishing 92nd in the 15K -- ahead of five competitors -- in the latter. And he has vowed to cap his career by competing in the Vancouver Games. To help prepare, he's used the great trail network in Washington's Methow Valley as a training course.

He might not be alone for long. Word from a couple different sources is that the U.S. Cross-Country Ski Team, which has medal hopes higher than they've been in a decade, also is looking at the Methow as a possible pre-Olympic training venue. More on this to come.

We heard from a half-dozen folks this afternoon, from all around the country, saying they've received their Co-Sport judgments. More are expected throughout this week.

On average, most of those who've reported in said they requested three or four events, and received tickets for one or two. A couple of them noted -- and this is worth passing on -- that the confirmation email, at first glance, can be confusing. It actually lists all of the events you requested, but only those for which you'll receive tickets have real dollar amounts ( as opposed to "$0.00) next to them.

So far, we've yet to hear from a single soul who's received a thumbs-up for tickets to figure skating, speed skating (short or long), or any form of alpine skiing. First one to report such a score wins ... well, the scorn and derision of all the rest of us.

We've yet to receive our own personal ticket request e-mail, but based on the fact we requested only a couple very popular events, our hopes are not high.

So, watch your inbox, check your spam file, and keep your eyes peeled. And start saving up now to pay off that Visa if you truly struck it rich.

Meantime, let us know here what you got, what you asked for, and how you feel about the process. Aside from cutting down on the huge fees and markups, any suggestions for improving the process?

Vancouver organizers say financial commitments from some sponsors now on shaky grounds -- General Motors is one example -- remain solid. And though they've eliminated some unnecessary expenses, budget goals are still being met. Details here from Reuters.

But things aren't going exactly as planned, notes the Vancouver Sun's Jeff Lee, who reports that the Vancouver organizing committee recently asked for, and received, what amounts to a $76 million advance payment on some $600 million pledged to the 2010 Games by the International Olympic Committee to help fill out the overall $1.6 billion budget. That's money from TV royalties, advertising and other sources.

Tens of thousands of Canadians began receiving word this week of what tickets they got for the 2010 Games. From the ones who have contacted us here -- many of them stateside Canadian citizens using relatives addresses in Canada to buy from the general Vancouver Organizing Committee allotment -- results have been mixed. Most people got tickets to something, but not everything, requested.

In the states, Oly fans have been sitting on pins and needles waiting for their own notifications from CoSport, the sole U.S. ticket distributor, which was undertaking a similar lottery process for popular events, with results expected next week.

Big, fat new wrinkle: CoSport has received an extra allotment of tickets from VANOC. The company issued an email to potential customers this morning saying that because of a new influx of tickets, customer notification will be delayed until the first week of January. This might actually come as good news to customers -- we've heard from quite a few folks who ordered thousands of dollars worth of tickets -- because if ticket orders are fully filled, that's a pretty hefty credit-card charge right before the holidays.

And it SHOULD increase the overall odds of U.S. fans receiving tickets. But we wonder how the news is going to go over in B.C., where many folks already are ticked off at stories in the Vancouver papers this week declaring the main events for the 2010 Games already sold out, well over a year in advance.

Just how many tickets did CoSport get in its original allotment, and how many more in the new one? Only God, CoSport, VANOC and the IOC know, and none of them is particularly loose-lipped. Aside from brief introductory remarks directing potential customers how and when to give them cash, CoSport has never responded to our queries about ticket numbers. VANOC at least speaks, but somewhat guardedly.

In a recent interview, Caley Denton, VANOC's ticket manager, declined to give up CoSport's allotment for America, saying "we don't release specific numbers."

But he described the original U.S. allotment as "by far the biggest allocation of any country" outside Canada, adding that it was at least three times as big as the next biggest nation requesting tickets.

That's no suprise. The committee uses a formula based on numbers of attending athletes from a nation, and its proximity to the host nation, both factors favoring American sales. Even in times of recession -- perhaps particularly in such times, if Canada is affected -- VANOC is keenly aware of the massive fan, sponsorship, viewership and dollar base just across the border.

But the committee is between a rock and a hard place due to what's being described as unprecedented demand. Canadian residents alone put in requests for $345 million (Canadian) worth of tickets. Advance domestic orders for tickets to the Salt Lake 2002 Games, by comparison, were $74 million. And those Games turned out to be a success, attendance-wise.

Canadian demand was so high that two-thirds of events wound up requiring lotteries to distribute tickets. People who got shut out are being notified that they'll be first in line to pick from what's left -- mostly tickets to preliminary rounds of less-popular events -- in coming weeks.

"CoSport has a really big demand in the U.S., as well," Denton said, again declining to release numbers.

Overall, ticket demand has been "way beyond our most-aggressive target," he said.

No surprise, then, that the moment ticket notifications created crowds of unhappy Canadian fans this week, "resale" sites have begun to spring up on the Internet. One of them, showtimetickets.com, already is advertising gold-medal-event tickets for between $4,000 and $6,000. Ticketsnow.com, (a Ticketmaster resale site), Craigslist and e-Bay also were reported to be offering fresh ticket sales.

It's not illegal to re-sell tickets in B.C., and the secondary market is likely to be hot. But Olympic officials caution fans to be leery; no tickets will actually be printed until about a year from now, making it difficult to impossible to tell if ticket "promises" are actually going to lead to legitimate tickets. Caveat emptor.

U.S. fans, meanwhile, probably are best served by just waiting until the CoSport announcement next month.

The company's notice this morning noted that "As the number of additional tickets we were allocated yesterday (by VANOC) is material and would have a positive impact on the number of tickets distributed, CoSport has decided to run the lottery process with the increased ticket inventory we now have available.

"As this process will take several more weeks, CoSport will therefore confirm ticket allocations from the 5th January 2009 to 9th January 2009 and not next week as originally planned. We understand that many of you were hoping to receive notification next week, however, this small delay provides a higher chance of you receiving the tickets that you requested."

Stay tuned.

Dear Sir / Madame,

Thank you for participating in the CoSport Ticket Request phase for the
Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. CoSport has received a record
number of requests during the 5-week period. CoSport will finalize the
lottery and allocation process next week and commence sending the email
confirmations to each Account Holder during the week of 15th December
2008. As we have entered into the final allocation process, we can no
longer accept any cancellation of ticket requests. If your credit card
on file needs to be changed, please contact CoSport immediately as this
information is required before Thursday 11th December - 5pm US EST, in
order to confirm your ticket allocation. Your credit card will be
charged for the allocated tickets at the time confirmation emails are
sent to you.

Prior to the ticket allocation confirmations being finalized, we are
giving everyone the opportunity to update their shipping details
currently on file for each request. You may add or remove shipping for
each request and update the 'Ship To' address by logging into your
account at www.cosport.com. Note that CoSport will not be able to ship
tickets to a PO Box and therefore you will need to provide an
alternative address if this is currently indicated on your ticket
request as the shipping address. The shipping feature will be available
for your use until Friday 12th December, 2008, 5pm US EST.

Once logged in to your account, please click, 'My Account.' Under the
'Active Orders' tab, you will see a list of your Request Numbers. Click
'View' to display the entire contents of a single order. You will be
able to add shipping by clicking the box at the top to display a check,
or remove shipping by clicking the box to display an empty box. Your
request summary will indicate the revised totals with or without the
shipping fee. If you do select shipping, please review the 'Ship To'
information and update any necessary fields at this time. Please make
sure to click 'Update' to save the information and any changes made. It
is important to note, you must complete these steps for each Request you
have with CoSport.

Also note that the CoSport US office has recently moved. The new
contact details are as follows:

Telephone (from within the US or Canada) - Toll Free: 1-877-45 RINGS
(+1-877-457-4647)
From outside the US: +1-908-326-2660. Fax: +1 908-234-0270. Hours:
Monday
to Friday - 9:00am to 6:00pm EST

The other office locations remain the same.

Europe
Telephone: +43 (1) 713-3534. Hours: Monday to Friday - 9:00am to
5:00pm
(Austria time)

Australia
Telephone: +61 (0) 2 9241-5500. Hours: Monday to Friday - 9:00am to
5:00pm (Sydney time)

Regards,

CoSport Team

No word on similar ticket notifications for the completely separate U.S. process, through CoSport, although that ticket agency up until now has been attempting to match the dates of the Canadian process. So watch your inbox. We've received no word yet on the tickets we requested. Nor do we know what the total ticket request was for America, in dollar terms, because the agency seems unwilling or unable to speak.

Speaking of CoSport: There seems to be some confusion out there, still, as to how the process works. If you filled out an online ticket request and saw that the CoSport site indicated tickets "available" for your requested event, it doesn't mean you have tickets. It means the agency has some tickets for that event, and if demand outstrips supply, your name will be entered in a random lottery to get them.

How will you know for SURE you're getting tickets? When that big, bloated charge shows up on your charge card statement. Remember, just take deep breaths and keep repeating: "It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity." (Although, you might want to keep in mind that they said that the first time around in Lake Placid, and then the Olympics came back.)

So: Let us know if you hear about your ticket requests. We're dying to know how many people get in as opposed to shut out. And, frankly, we'd love to know what y'all are buying tickets to see. We just might see you there.

With the primary skating season winding up, America has no female entrant in the Grand Prix Final, Hersh notes, adding that he hopes promises of a comeback next year by Sasha Cohen, 24, are true. Follow his reasoning here.

First thing to greet you on the Web site (the cable network itself is unavailable in Seattle; Universal "simulcasts" its coverage of many events online) was a countdown clock announcing that ski coverage as coming -- in three hours. Not what was promised on Universal's own schedule, which indicated ski coverage would be piped in at 1:30 p.m. ET. In my world, that means 10:30 a.m. PT. No dice.

About five minutes later, however, the feed magically appeared, and off we went.

This was the first World Cup downhill of the year, and likely one of the first Universal -- the Olympic-sports broadcast arm of NBC -- has done. So some slack is in order. But still...

From time to time, Universal's production work was simply embarrassing. On more than one occasion, skiers would take the course, sail through the first five or six gates -- then simply disappear, as Universal threw up a graphic asking you to go to their Web site and take a poll: "Which Winter Olympic sport would you most like to try?" Sadly, not making this up.

Another time, newbie commentator Phil McNichol, the former U.S. men's alpine coach, was happily analyzing the run of one skier, only to be informed some time later that he was, in fact, watching a taped replay of an early skier. Still other times, the screen just went inexplicably to black, with no fade out, no explanation.

It became sort of comical at some point -- sort of a Wayne's World Does Skiing vibe. You halfway expected to see footage of Ingemar Stenmark appearing mysteriously in the mix, ubneknownst to the broadcast team. But later on, Universal's approach proved to seriously compromise its own coverage.

Today's World Cup was one of those odd races where the first dozen skiers got favorable conditions -- better light, and a lack of a headwind, as it turned out. The fast skiers -- Bode Miller, Didier Cuche and the like -- skiing in the middle of the pack, were posting times significantly slower than the earlier skiers. That typically indicates a major change in course conditions, with the track becoming slower later on.

Universal picked up on this -- but couldn't pinpoint why. Probable reason: Universal's commentators (McNichol and Steve Schlanger) aren't at the course. They're nowhere near it, in fact, laying audio over a ski-course pooled video feed from a remote location (L.A., I think). This works fine for some sports, and in fact proved to be a very successful technique for NBC at the Beijing Olympics. But it clearly presents challenges for ski coverage. It explains some of the production glitches, such as broadcasters not knowing who is on the course, and when. But it can have even more serious repercussions, as today's broadcast showed.

Because they're not there, Universals commentators lacked the ability to just walk outside the booth, feel the temperature and wind, see the light, etc. They also lacked a reporter at the finish line who could debrief skiers as they finished and ask The One Pertinent Question: Why did the course slow so badly for the middle and late racers?

It was a glaring omission -- one that made you wonder why, since they were broadcasting live, Universal couldn't at least have a reporter with a cell phone calling in conditions and racers's comments from the finish area. (For a small fee, I'll volunteer to tag along and do just that for the rest of the World Cup circuit.) It's not rocket science, folks.

And the lack of any real-time, on-course observations -- coupled with the network's unwillingness to admit they are not on-site -- just makes the people in the booth look stupid, with McNichol (who is decidedly not stupid about skiing) left to speculate as to the source of the course slowdown. (McNichol kept saying things like, "Good light. A little flat, I was told." Or, describing the course, saying "It was bumpy, I was told.")

Later on, we watched the same race, tape delayed on CBC, and the broadcasters, actually on the scene, were quick to pick up on the race conditions -- changing light and stiffening winds, that dramatically slowed later skiers.

So, not a good start for Universal. In fact: sloppy, sloppy, sloppy. We're glad they're doing skiing. But we hope they learned something from today's fiasco.

Speaking of annoying TV coverage: Someone at CBC needs to tell Kerrin-Lee Gartner it's OK to take a breath every 8 or 10 minutes. Really. It's not necessary to fill every fractional second of air time with commentary. It's TV, not radio. A little dead air is a good thing. Trust us.

Thanksgiving weekend marks the kicking-into-gear of many Winter Olympic sports, and NBC's Universal Sports venture is making it easier than ever before for Americans to track the action.

Alas, the cable network, in some 30 million U.S. homes, is not available in the Seattle area (something might be brewing; stay tuned). But some action will make its way to parent network NBC, and online simulcasts at Universalsports.com will bring skiing action to Northwest winter sports fans.

Universal's FIS World Cup alpine ski coverage kicks off with live online and cable broadcast of the men's downhill and Super-G Saturday and Sunday from Lake Louise, Alberta. See the Web site for broadcast times.

NBC's TV skiing coverage kicks off with the Aspen Winternational women's giant slalom at 11 a.m. PT Sunday, and the Beaver Creek men's downhill at 11 a.m. PT on Dec. 7.

At the NBC microphone is host Tim Ryan, former Canadian Ski Team member Todd Brooker and former U.S. Ski Team members Steve Porino and Kristina Koznick. Former men's head coach (and Bode Miller handler)Phil McNichol joins Porino and Steve Schlanger for Universal Sports' cable and online coverage.

All of this should be a natural for NBC and Universal. One winter out from the Vancouver 2010 Games, the U.S. alpine team is perhaps at its all-time strongest, with Miller, Ted Ligety, Lindsey Vonn, Julia Mancuso and other stars looming as constant medal threats. Miller and Vonn won the coveted World Cup all-around titles last year, the first U.S. sweep since Phil Mahre and Tamara McKinney 25 years ago. And the full slate of races will give U.S. fans a rare chance to follow skiers through a full World Cup season.

Here's the near-term schedule. See Universal Sports for broadcast times:

UPCOMING ALPINE WORLD CUP SKIING ON UNIVERSAL SPORTS:

Nov. 29 - 30 Women - Aspen, Colorado
Nov. 29 - 30 Men - Lake Louise, Alberta
Dec. 4 - 7 Men - Beaver Creek, Colorado
Dec. 5 - 7 Women - Lake Louise, Alberta
Dec. 13 - 14 Women - La Molina, Spain
Dec. 13 - 14 Men - Val d'Isere, France
Dec. 19 - 20 Women - St. Moritz, Switzerland
Dec. 19 - 20 Men - Val Gardena, Italy
Dec. 28 - 29 Women - Semmering, Austria
Dec. 28 - 29 Men - Bormio, Italy

Both NBC and Universal also will broadcast the 2009 Alpine World Championships February 2-15 from Val d'Isere, France.

--------------------

Other winter sports this weekend, courtesy of the USOC:

Figure Skating: A delegation of U.S. figure skaters, including Johnny Weir (Quarryville, Pa.) and Mirai Nagasu (Arcadia, Calif.), will compete in the NHK Trophy Grand Prix competition in Tokyo, Japan, Thursay through Sunday.

Luge: The team travels to Igls, Austria, for the World Cup #1 event Saturday and Sunday. See broadcast update, below.

Speedskating: Short track skaters, including Seattle's Apolo Anton Ohno, will compete in the World Cup #3 event in Beijing, China, Friday through Sunday.

Bobsled: 22 U.S. skelton and bobsled sliders kick off their World Cup tour Friday through Sunday at Winterberg, Germany. See broadcast update, below.
----------------------

Broadcast update, 2:15 p.m.: Universal reports that it also will provide coverage of the luge and bobsled/skeleton World Cup events listed above.

Bobsled/skeleton coverage will be same-day, on-demand at universalsports.com, with daily recap shows on the Universal Sports broadcast cable channel.

Luge coverage of the World Cup opener from Igls, Austria will be some live and on-demand video, free of charge, with one-hour highlight shows on the broadcast network. See the Web site for scheduling.

Upcoming World Cup Bobsled/Skeleton coverage on Universal Sports:

Nov. 28 - 30: World Cup, Winterberg, Germany
Dec. 5 - 7: World Cup, Altenburg, Germany
Dec. 12 - 14: World Cup, Igls, Austria
Dec. 19 - 21: World Cup, Cesana, Italy
Jan. 9 - 11: World Cup, Koenigssee, Germany
Jan. 16 - 18: World Cup & European Championship, St. Moritz, Switzerland
Feb. 5 - 7: World Cup, Whistler, Canada
Feb. 12 - 14: World Cup, Park City, Utah
Feb. 20 - Mar. 1: World Championship, Lake Placid, NY

Upcoming World Cup Luge coverage on Universal Sports:

Nov. 29 - 30 World Cup #1 Igls, Austria
Dec. 6 - 7 World Cup #2 Sigulda, Latvia
Dec. 13 - 14 World Cup #3 Winterberg, Germany
Jan. 3 - 4 World Cup #4 Koenigssee, Germany
Jan. 10 - 11 World Cup #5 Cesana Pariol, Italy
Jan. 23 - 25 World Cup #6 Oberhof, Germany
Jan. 24 - 25 World Cup #7 Altenberg, Germany
Feb. 6 - 8 World Championship Lake Placid, NY
Feb. 13 - 14 World Cup #8 Calgary, Alberta
Feb. 20 - 21 Olympic Test/World Cup #9 Whistler, B.C.

And there's more: Universal says it also will offer coverage this winter of freestyle skiing, ski jumping, nordic combined, biathlon, cross country, short and long track speed skating and ice hockey.