Just a quick one today, since I’ve been dealing with a migraine flare-up. Here’s three stories I’ve been keeping an eye on recently:

Headlines

Ski jumping suit scandal!

• Olympic gold medalists Marius Lindvik and Johann André Forfang, along with two coaches and a member of their service staff, have been formally charged with “equipment manipulation” as part of an investigation that has been ongoing since Nordic Worlds in March.

• According to BBC and Yahoo Sports, the team was caught on camera through a keyhole or a slit in a door restitching a groin seam of a suit with stiffer thread. This would increase stability to potentially allow the jumpers to fly farther. Unsubstantiated additional claims allege that their ski bindings may also have been altered.

• The Federal Ski Association (FIS) has many very strict regulations for ski jumping suits, which have been tightened even more since the March incident. In the first event of the 2025-26 season this last weekend, six jumpers were disqualified and three not allowed to start, all on account of suit violations.

Trump brings back the Presidential Physical Fitness Test and the President’s Council on Sport, Fitness and Nutrition.

• The council has a host of professional athletes on it, including New York Giants linebacker and registered sex offender Lawrence Taylor, who said about being on the council, “I don’t know why, I don’t know what we’re supposed to be doing, but I’m here to serve.” Eagles running back Saquon Barkley, on the other hand, was surprised to hear his name mentioned because he had turned down the gig months ago.

• Either way, the test and the council are unlikely to do much for kids’ health. As you can hear on Maintenance Phase, the test was originally based on misinterpreted and bad science, the data collected from it has literally never been used for anything, and so all it really did was traumatize kids in gym class.

• What do I think the council will actually do? In terms of policy actions, I think this sentence from the White House’s press release sums it up well: “The Council will also play an important role in restoring tradition to college athletics, including reforming the broken transfer portal and keeping men out of women’s sports.”

• All in all, this is mainly just PR for Trump because he wants to be a ‘sports president.’ The press release talks about the “American sports renaissance” he is bringing about, with the US hosting the Ryder Cup, President’s Cup, FIFA World Cup, and the Summer Olympics during his term. Of course, these were all planned well before his term and so he doesn’t actually have anything to do with making them happen.

The Dallas Stars have a monopoly on Texas youth hockey.

• A thorough investigation by USA Today traces how the NHL team has taken over the entire youth hockey ecosystem, getting new facilities built with public money, buying up independent rinks, and eventually owning every ice rink in the Dallas-Fortworth area. They use this power to consistently raise prices and silence any opposition by restricting access to ice hockey for anyone who speaks out, or for their kids.

• This ties back to my concerns in the last newsletter about private equity and for-profit companies beginning to dominate the youth sports space. Hockey is already an extremely expensive sport, especially in Texas where energy costs to maintain a rink are sky-high. The Dallas Stars here are a great example of how organizations can leverage an overwhelming market share to increase their margins while delivering a worse product for the kids and parents.