February 16, 1995
Double Dutch rope-jumping, a sport that has evolved by leaps and bounds since the days when Dutch children first began simultaneously turning ropes clockwise and counterclockwise for jumpers on the streets of New Amsterdam, riveted the attention of numerous East Hampton High School athletes and spectators here Tuesday.
The high school athletes, including football players, soccer players, track competitors, and basketball players, could have had no better teachers.
The double Dutch demonstrators were members of the 1994 world champion team from Far Rockaway, Queens — Stan’s Pepper Steppers, coached by Stan Brown, who heads the New York City Parks and Recreation Department’s double Dutch program. Peter Goodson, a volunteer East Hampton football coach, brought them here.
. . . Goodson said he brought in the Pepper Steppers because he was convinced double-Dutching could vastly improve the footwork of “any athlete — football player, soccer player, track competitor — especially those who must maintain their balance while on one foot.”
. . . Living proof that double Dutch can be learned was furnished in East Hampton Tuesday by Mike Pellman, a junior varsity quarterback last season. According to Goodson, before beginning to jump rope at his instance two years ago, Pellman “used to trip over the grass. Now look at him,” the volunteer coach said.
Indeed, Pellman brought smiles to the faces of the Far Rockaway jumpers — Yattee Brown, Shawn Stainback, Xiomara Calzeta, Katisha Simpkins, Markeyta Baskerville, Vanessa Calzeta, and Tyesha Benton. They looked as if they might be saying to themselves, “Not bad for a boy.”
February 23, 1995
Paul Giardina, a thoroughbred-horse racer and breeder when he’s not running the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s radiation division, has a core of about 10 investors to whom he sells shares. Five of Cedar Meadow’s brood mares are stabled, with a breeding expert, in the Binghamton area, not far from where Go and Go, an Irish-bread that won the Belmont Stakes in 1990, is standing at stud. Giardina owns a share of Go And Go, whose first crop of foals will begin racing this year.
. . . “I bought Pacem in Kristie, a stakes-winner, for $7,000. He won $150,000 to $200,000 in his career, and I sold him for $200,000. That’s the kind of return that’s possible,” he said with a broad smile. “On the other hand, I’ve bought yearlings for $20,000 who have earned zero.”
. . . Giardina, whose eight-acre spread is south of Round Swamp Farm, would like to name more of his horses after East Hampton people and places. High on the list are the Snyders and Lesters of Round Swamp, Saverio Naclierio of the Villa Pork Store, Jimmy Demitrack of Kipling’s in Bridgehampton, and The East Hampton Star.