Olympic champion Cheek donates prize money to Darfur

Fresh from the Olympic's
here's a Positive Story.

TURIN, Italy - US speedskater Joey Cheek
credited his decision to donate any prize
money from a Winter Olympic gold medal
to a Sudanese relief project with helping him
capture the 500m title Monday.

Cheek will donate the 25,000 dollars he will
receive from the US Olympic Committee for
his victory to "Right to Play", an athlete-driven
charity organization, with the money earmarked
for the battle-ravaged Darfur region.

"I knew if I ever did something like this, I wanted
to be able to give something back," Cheek said. "The
best way I can say thanks is to donate my money
to help somebody else."

Cheek, who will ask each of his handful of sponsors
to donate money as well, skated the two best 500m
races of his career to win gold in a combined time of
1:09.76, beating runner-up Dmitry Dorofeyev
by .65 of a second.

The humanitarian crisis in Darfur has claimed
between180,000 and 300,000 lives, and displaced
more than two million people.

Cheek's role model is former Norwegian speedskater
Johan-Olaf Koss, who made a similar contribution in
1994 when the program was called Olympic Aid.

"The things he has done for other people have been
an inspiration for me," Cheek said. "It's my hope that
I can assist some people and walk in his large shoes."