Tyler Clark can guess what some wrestling fans might be thinking.

They?re probably thinking he?s bitter about the way his career is winding down. That he regrets his decision to transfer to Iowa, where he would likely be the fifth-ranked 133-pounder in the country if he wasn?t the second-best 133-pounder on his own team. That he wishes he never left Iowa State, where he was a two-time NCAA qualifier who could fit nicely at a weight where the Cyclones have yet to win a match this season in a dual.

Well, Clark isn?t bitter. He doesn?t like his role as a backup to fourth-ranked Tony Ramos, but he doesn?t regret transferring to Iowa, either.

?I?m happy with the decision I made when I came here,? Clark said Sunday. ?I knew what I was getting into and I don?t think I?d be the wrestler I am now if I hadn?t come here.?

Clark is 17-3 this season. Two of his losses came against Ramos. Another was against No. 5 B.J. Futrell of Illinois. He also notched victories against wrestlers currently ranked sixth, 10th and 11th at 133.

But there?s no room for him in a lineup that features NCAA champion Matt McDonough at 125, Ramos at 133 and two-time all-American Montell Marion at 141.

?Here, it?s a whole different level than anywhere I?ve seen,? Clark said. ?The coaches here know how to make you push past barriers and build your toughness and strength. (Iowa coach Tom Brands) talks about that on the mat and that correlates to life battles.?

Clark?s relationship with Brands hasn?t always been a smooth one. Both admitted they butted heads in 2009 after Clark transferred to Iowa in the wake of Iowa State coach Cael Sanderson?s departure for Penn State.

?My first year here, I wasn?t used to it ? the direct, head-on battles, the direct conversation ? and I think it clashed with me at first because I was used to more of a passive, laid-back style,? Clark said. ?We clashed there, and I came in thinking I knew everything ? a lot of people do. That?s the big thing I?ve learned ? I don?t know everything and I?m never going to. (Realizing that) gives you an opportunity to learn something new every day.?

Brands said Clark is the type who ?will do whatever you ask? now. The senior from Bettendorf will leave Iowa with a degree in finance and accounting. He hopes to one day start his own youth wrestling club.

But for now, his focus is continuing to prep McDonough, Ramos and Marion for individual title runs and remain prepared in case he?s needed in an emergency.

?The thing I tell Tyler Clark all the time is, ?You?re going to be successful in life, no matter what you do,? ? Brands said. ?He?s very smart, he?s very capable, he?s a people person, people like him.

?I don?t think it?s been easy on him, but I think he?s been a very good role player in a role he does not embrace because I know that he believes he can win.?

CHANGING LEVELS

Ross Larson, Ankeny

Prior to the CIML finals, Ross Larson?s wrestling season lasted roughly as long as a sitcom.

Ankeny?s top-ranked 195-pounder went the distance for the first time in 34 matches Friday when he won an 11-1 major decision against second-ranked Bud Smith of Southeast Polk. Larson wrestled a grand total of 31 minutes, 52 seconds during his first 33 bouts of the season, none of which went into the second period.

?You?d like to pin everyone, and I don?t know if it?s ever been done,? Larson said. ?That would?ve been a lot of fun, but I?m satisfied with going all three periods.?

ON DECK

HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICTS: The postseason begins on Saturday for teams in Class 3-A and continues for 1-A and 2-A squads with the top two wrestlers at each weight class advancing to next week?s state meet.

MAT MAYHEM: Six teams, including Iowa, Iowa State and Northern Iowa will wrestle Sunday in Ames for the right to advance to the final four of the National Duals.

BACKPOINTS

1 -- Davenport Assumption, ranked third in Class 2-A, turned in the most impressive sectional performance last weekend. All 14 Knights advanced to the district meet, including 11 sectional champions. Charles City, Creston/Orient-Macksburg and West Delaware advanced 11 wrestlers to districts in 2-A, while Clarion-Goldfield topped the 1-A field with a dozen district qualifiers.

2 -- Former Iowa State NCAA champ Trent Paulson and Iowa three-time all-American Phil Keddy claimed silver last week at the Dave Schultz Memorial International tournament in Colorado Springs. Paulson dropped a 1-0, 6-0 decision against reigning World champ Jordan Burroughs in the finals at 163 pounds. Raymond Jordan defeated Keddy 1-0, 5-2 at 185 pounds.

3 -- The NWCA announced Tuesday that Oklahoma State, Missouri and Minnesota submitted bids to host the Mat Mayhem finals if their programs reach the final four of the National Duals. Northern Iowa also has offered to host the finals. Cornell, Iowa, Minnesota and Oklahoma State earned No. 1 seeds for their respective regions. Iowa State is a No. 3 seed, Northern Iowa is No. 5.

MAT CHAT

?I have been watching college wrestling for 50 years and the call in the 174-pound bout for UM vs OSU is probably the worst I have ever seen.?

Wrestling historian Jay Hammond?s tweet after Ohio State?s Nick Heflin defeated Michigan?s Justin Zeerip by virtue of a 22-second advantage in riding time. Zeerip scored an escape and takedown in the tiebreaker, but referee Cody Olson awarded him only one point. See the match at facebook.com/insidetrip

Going for dinner with a friend with a big appetite? A new study suggests pacing your food intake after researchers found that people tend to mimic each other's eating behavior, bite for bite.

After observing the eating patterns of 70 pairs of young women, a team of Dutch researchers found that the participants tended to mimic each other's behavior, defined as taking a bite within five seconds of the other's dining companion.

The study was published February 1 on PLoS One.

Over the 20-minute eating period, researchers recorded almost 4,000 bites between the women. Bites separated by more than a five-second lapse were defined as non-mimicry.

Mirroring bites was found to be more common at the beginning of the meal, a trend researchers suggest attributed to a desire to connect socially with their new partner.

GET RID OF YOUR SPARE TIRE

But as the meal progressed, the pattern began to decline, the study notes, suggesting that participants became more comfortable with each other.

The latest Dutch study builds on a body of previous research which found that friends could make each other fat. For instance, a US study out of Arizona last year found that factors like eating and exercising together may play a large role in causing friends to gain and lose weight together.

A 2007 study published in The New England Journal of Medicine also found that both obesity and thinness were socially contagious and influenced the social network's body weight: if one person is obese, odds that his or her friends will also become obese increases by 50 percent, the study found.

Read more and watch videos from the card at the Sports Desk blog

ALBANY ? At 11:30 Saturday night, cast and crew from the movie "The Challenger" took over the ring at Times Union Center. They were filming fight scenes from the upcoming movie, which may or may not make it to the big screen.

If IBA heavyweight champion Joe Hanks had any say in the matter, he would have inserted his Saturday night opponent, Rafael Pedro, into the make-believe film.

That's because Pedro, just 48 seconds into the scheduled 10-round bout, called things off, when he was slumped against the ropes with what he called a dislocated shoulder.

And that was the end of the hyped fight between the 6-foot-4, 250-pound Hanks, who left the Capital Region disgusted with his foe.

"I am really frustrated for the fans," Hanks said after running his record to 19-0 with 13 knockouts. "They deserved more. I think he was looking for a way out of this fight."

The first boxing event at the arena in 15 years drew 3,527.

After Hanks rocked the 6-foot-7, 279-pound Pedro with a shot to the right arm, the challenger went down on one knee, looking to be in pain. He grasped his shoulder and then the fight was over.

Later, Pedro said that he had dislocated his right shoulder before, and added that he had it popped back into place. He also said that Hanks would have been in trouble had the incident not happened.

"I would have knocked him out, I have no doubt about that," Pedro said after getting in a verbal confrontation with members of Hanks' entourage in the hallway of the locker room area. "He hasn't fought anyone. I want to fight him again."

That probably won't happen. Joe DeGuardia, the president of Star Boxing, which promoted the card, was not receptive to the idea.

Hanks, nicknamed "The Future," was visibly angry when the fight was called. He waved his hands at Pedro more than once. He said he could not repeat what he said to him.

"It hurts any sport when you don't come out and give it your all," Hanks said. "Or maybe (Pedro) is smarter than we give him credit for."

Hanks says he wants to come back here and fight again, and that could be soon. DeGuardia announced after the fight that Star Boxing will be back at the arena on April 28 for a show. Hanks could again be the headliner, something he said he wants to do.

Bob Belber, the general manger of the TU Center, said he was happy with the crowd for the show (capacity was 8,000). He also said while sitting ringside, he did see Pedro's arm pop out of its socket.

The first fight of the night didn't last long as Albany light heayweight Mike Seitz knocked out Karim Richardson of Brooklyn at two minutes of the first round. Seitz, making his pro debut, connected with a body shot that stunned Richardson, and the fight was stopped shortly after Seitz, 23, hit him again in the head.

Schenectady's Bryan Abraham was up next, and his junior welterweight fight didn't last long either. He knocked out Darnell Jiles of Rochester at 2:59 of the first round. His record is now 6-10-2, all the wins coming by knockout.

Catskill's Kevin Rooney Jr. ran his junior middleweight record to 3-1 with a four-round unanimous decision over Stanley Harvey of Norfolk, Va. All three judges scored the bout 40-36.

The co-feature, for the WBO Intercontinental bantamweight title, went to Sahib Usarrov, who won a 10-round unanimous decision over Yan Barthelemy, who lives in Orlando, Fla. Two judges scored the fight 96-93, the other had it 98-91.

Also on the undercard, Jason Escalera of Union City, N.J., stayed undefeated (13-0) with his 12th knockout. It came at 1:09 of the fourth round when he dropped Marcus Brooks of Atlanta.

twilkin@timesunion.com ? 518 454-5415 ? @tjwilkin

Feb. 3, 2012

Weekly Notes

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - The Purdue wrestling team will close out it's Big Ten dual schedule this Sunday, traveling to Indiana University for the 98th meeting between the intrastate archrivals in series history. Sunday's dual is set for 2 p.m. (ET) as the Boilermakers look to improve upon their 7-9 (2-5 Big Ten) record, while the Hoosiers enter the weekend 6-6 (0-6) Big Ten and travel to Southern Illinois-Edwardsville on Friday before hosting Purdue.

The Hoosiers lead the all-time series, 62-32-3, including a 29-15-2 advantage in Bloomington, dating to the inaugural matchup on Feb. 24, 1914. Purdue hasn't won on Indiana's home turf since 2003, but the two schools have split the last four meetings with the Boilermakers winning in 2008 (18-16) and 2011 (21-12), and the Hoosiers taking the victory in 2009 (21-12) and 2010 (22-17).

While Indiana is in search of its first conference victory this season, the Boilermakers look to finish the conference dual schedule at 3-5 for the second straight season with a win on Sunday. It would pull the Old Gold and Black within one win of a .500 record as Purdue looks for its sixth straight season with a .500-dual mark or better. In addition, the winner earns a point in the Crimson and Gold Cup standings; the annual all-sports trophy between the Boilermakers and Hoosiers. Indiana currently leads this year's race, 4.0-to-3.5, and there will be a half-point at stake in Saturday's men's basketball meeting at Mackey Arena.

"There's a lot on the line Sunday," said Purdue head coach Scott Hinkel. "We always want to beat our rival school and earn that point for Purdue, but this is also our last conference dual and we want to end on a high note."

Despite a narrow loss to 18th-ranked Northwestern last Sunday, the Boilermakers had a lot of positives come out of the weekend. Senior Roger Vukobratovich led the group with his 3-1 upset victory over 13th-ranked freshman Mike McMullan, earning his first career national ranking from InterMat as he grabbed the No. 20 spot at heavyweight. Fellow senior A.J. Kissel, junior Ivan Lopouchanski and freshman Braden Atwood were victorious as well as the Boilermakers were just three points shy of topping the Wildcats. Atwood moved into a three-way tie for the team pin lead with fellow rookie Brandon Nelsen and senior Matt Fields with his eighth of the season. Yielding the starting nod to Fields at 133 pounds on Sunday, ninth-ranked sophomore Cashé Quiroga competed in the Ashland University Simonson Open on Saturday, winning the tournament title with a fall, a technical fall and a pair of major decisions.

Indiana will wrestle in a pair of duals at Southern Illinois-Edwardsville on Friday before hosting the Boilermakers Sunday in University Gymnasium. The Hoosiers are led by their pair of nationally ranked grapplers in third-ranked 197-pound senior Matt Powless and 18th-ranked 149-pound freshman Taylor Walsh. Powless is an impressive 24-3 on the season, including an 11-0 dual record, eight major decisions and four falls, while Walsh is 22-7 overall with an 11-1 dual mark and 10 falls. Other noteworthy individuals in the lineup include senior 141-pounder Matt Ortega, sophomore 174-pounder Ryan LeBlanc and sophomore heavyweight Adam Chalfant. Ortega is 20-10 overall, including a 4-3 victory over Nelsen at the Eastern Michigan Open in November, LeBlanc is 21-9 and Chalfant is 15-8, joining the Hoosier roster at the semester after transferring from Harper College.

Updates from Sunday's dual will be available via TrackWrestling.com and the @PurdueWrestling Twitter Page, in addition to a live blog courtesy of IUHoosiers.com.

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. ?  When federal investigators decided to look into whether Google Inc. was letting rogue pharmacies from overseas target American consumers with advertising, they turned to a convicted con artist with experience pushing pills on the Internet.

That man, David Whitaker, says he became a pill peddler to support his life on the lam ? hawking placebos and tiny water vials online that became a hit with bodybuilders searching the Internet for steroids and other drugs. Now serving a prison sentence for fraud, Whitaker says he spends a lot of time thinking about "the people hurt by the pill problem in America."

In an interview with The Associated Press at a private prison in Central Falls, Whitaker, 37, described for the first time how he took up the online pharmacy business while hiding in Guadalajara, Mexico, from a federal indictment for a multimillion dollar fraud case in Rhode Island.

His experience helped federal investigators orchestrate a 2009 undercover sting that resulted in Google forfeiting $500 million last year. The forfeiture allowed Google to avoid criminal prosecution for allegations that it improperly profited from ads promoting Canadian pharmacies that illegally imported drugs into the United States. U.S. Food and Drug Administration investigators found employees helped create advertising on Google's AdWords system for products they were told were manufactured overseas and did not require customers to have a valid prescription, authorities have said.

"It really changed my life working with the agents with the FDA," said Whitaker, wearing beige, prison-issued clothing.

Businesses using AdWords select keywords for advertising. When people search on Google using a business's keyword, that ad may appear next to the search results.

Shipping prescription drugs into the U.S. is illegal, investigators have said. When the forfeiture was announced, Rhode Island U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha said had the case gone to trial prosecutors would have had to prove that Google helped pharmacies violate federal law.

The Internet search engine has said it banned the advertising of prescription drugs in the U.S. by Canadian pharmacies and that it should have never allowed the ads. In 2010, Google announced new restrictions for online pharmacies seeking to advertise with AdWords. A company spokeswoman declined to comment on Whitaker's account of the investigation.

Whitaker has posted a written account of the Google probe online and shares details about his jet-setting past, criminal history and bipolar disorder on a website that is maintained by his lawyer.

He also says he saw the Google representatives he was tasked with snaring as "good people," but the operation convinced him Google was creating an "urgent danger."

One Google representative in Mexico, he said, didn't bat an eye after hearing plans about advertising the prescription abortion pill RU-486. Whitaker said he thought the venture would end the investigation.

"I was actually nervous and afraid. My voice would get shaky talking to him," Whitaker said.

He was wrong. Authorities placed an ad for RU-486 including the language "no prescription needed."

Whitaker fled to Mexico in 2006 while being investigated for allegations he defrauded customers of an electronics business, according to an affidavit filed in federal court.

Even though he was accused of being involved in a multimillion dollar-fraud, Whitaker said he still needed cash while on the run.

He said he got the idea to sells drugs online while visiting a farm supply store. The store had a ceramic horse and cow out front and sold steroids inside, Whitaker said.

Whitaker launched a modest enterprise working a few days a week.

Eventually, he said he expanded by hiring a lawyer and doctors. At its peak, the business was grossing $1 million in monthly revenues, said defense attorney Joseph Balliro Jr.

Whitaker credits AdWords with helping the business take off. He recalls talking with a Google representative in Buenos Aires, Argentina, about the anti-aging, bodybuilding and weight-loss products the site was selling.

"She did not hesitate at all and wanted to start advertising it right away," said Whitaker, reading from a written account of his time in Mexico. He said he deposited $30,000 to start.

"Once they know you had the money to spend, they let you advertise," Whitaker said.

As calls came in from bodybuilders wanting muscle-growing drugs, Whitaker said he consulted with doctors working for him and made a major change, developing a placebo targeting bodybuilders. In a more brazen move, Whitaker said he started selling $1,000 millimeter vials of what he marketed as an injectable sterile liquid purporting to offer multiple health benefits, but was actually water.

Whitaker recalled being surprised by the rave reviews from customers.

"I was expecting people to say, 'This stuff doesn't work,'" he said.

Whitaker said he stopped advertising on AdWords after a few months because he didn't want the additional exposure while on the lam. But the experience became invaluable after he was arrested in 2008 and learned he was facing up to 65 years in prison for the fraud case.

Whitaker recalled getting a tepid response when he described his online pharmacy to federal agents, who were aware of his pill shop.

"Agents don't tend to give you reaction," he said. But by early 2009, he was using undercover websites to see whether Google would allow ads for illicit drugs from abroad.

Whitaker said the first site looked like the handiwork of a Mexican drug lord trading in HGH and steroids. But after a few rejections by Google and some advice from a U.S.-based representative on what revisions to make, Whitaker said the ads went live.

"You have to take the drugs off the site," Whitaker quoted the U.S. representative as saying. "We were fine with it because that meant she knew we were selling drugs."

He said investigators spent about $200,000 on Google ads. Aside from ad spending, Whitaker said Google representatives in the U.S. and Mexico were enticed by his claim that he represented a Mexican hotel chain that wanted to advertise.

In total, Whitaker put in about 1,100 hours working over four months on the sting. He was sentenced in December to nearly six years for the fraud charges and faces a Massachusetts case that hasn't been settled, Balliro said.

Whitaker said he thinks the Google representatives did what they did because of greed.

"I believe these are good people. I think that good people often do get caught up in greed and greed causes them to do things they don't mean to do," he said.

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Bodybuilder Nicola gets extra help from St Crispin's gym

The researchers say that decrease, although seemingly small, is sufficient to potentially reduce the risk of several forms of heart disease.

It is the first study to check the effects of eating potatoes on blood pressure in humans.

Purple-skinned potatoes, a boutique variety increasingly available in food stores, are noted for having high levels of healthful antioxidant compounds. And in Korea, purple potatoes are renowned in folk medicine as a way to lose weight.

Joe Vinson and colleagues thus decided to investigate the effects of eating 6-8 small microwaved purple potatoes twice a day on 18 volunteers, most of whom were overweight with high blood pressure.

The volunteers ate potatoes or no potatoes for four weeks, and then switched to the opposite regimen for another four weeks while researchers monitored systolic and diastolic blood pressure (the higher and lower numbers in a blood pressure reading like 120/80), body weight and other health indicators.

Average diastolic blood pressure dropped by 4.3 percent and systolic pressure decreased by 3.5 percent. The majority of subjects took anti-hypertensive drugs and still had a reduction in blood pressure.

None of the study participants gained weight. Vinson said that other studies have identified substances in potatoes with effects in the body similar to those of the well-known ACE-inhibitor medications, a mainstay for treating high blood pressure.

But he suspects that the effects may be due to other substances in potatoes. The scientists do not know yet whether ordinary white potatoes have the same beneficial effects.

The finding was reported in the ACS' Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

There may be more to love about massage than just the "ahhhhh." A new study shows that kneading muscles after hard exercise decreases inflammation and helps your muscles recover.

The study hints that massage after exercise may help relieve soreness, and may also help muscles become fitter faster -- two benefits that have thus far been mutually exclusive in the "no pain, no gain" world of athletics.

For the study, researchers put 11 men through a hard bout of exercise. It was the kind of session that was tough to finish and would normally have made an athlete stiff and sore for a few days afterward.

Following their workouts, each man got a 10-minute, Swedish-style massage, but only on one leg. The other leg was rested and used for comparison. Researchers repeatedly sampled muscle tissue from both legs before and after exercise.

They used gene-profiling techniques to look for chemical changes in muscle cells. They saw two main differences between the legs that were massaged and those that were rested.

First, massage switched on genes that decrease inflammation. Many painkilling medications also work by blocking inflammation. Second, massage activated genes that promote the creation of mitochondria, structures that are the energy factories inside cells. The fitter a muscle cell is, the more mitochondria it tends to have.

Could Massage Boost Muscle Fitness?

"If someone starts an endurance exercise training program, after two or four months of training, depending on the intensity, you essentially double the volume of mitochondria in muscle," says researcher Mark A. Tarnopolsky, MD, PhD, a professor of pediatrics and head of Neuromuscular and Neurometabolic Disease at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

Mitochondria, he says, help the cell to take up and use oxygen: "The muscles' ability to extract oxygen is proportional to the amount of mitochondria that are there."

"Exercise plus massage seems to enhance that pathway," Tarnopolsky says.

If further research can duplicate and expand on these findings, Tarnopolsky says that would mean that massage may be uniquely beneficial to muscle recovery and muscle growth.

In recent years, a number of studies have shown that remedies for muscle soreness that work by turning down inflammation -- things like ice baths or anti-inflammatory medications -- may also have a downside. They may also block muscle repair and growth, which depends on inflammation.

"People were starting to feel it was a one-to-one link: You suppress inflammation, you [lessen] adaptation," says Tarnopolsky. "But this appears to be an intervention that suppresses the inflammatory response but still allows, and actually enhances, the [recovery] response." The study is published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

Massage May Be Serious Medicine

Experts who reviewed the study for WebMD say it is one of the first to document how human muscle cells respond to massage, a popular therapy that has struggled to gain respect as serious medicine.

And it echoes a 2008 study in rabbits, which found that rubbed muscle tissue recovered more strength after exercise than muscle tissue that was simply rested, with less swelling and inflammation.

As encouraging as these findings are, however, there's still a lot the study isn't able to say.

Priscilla Clarkson, PhD, who studies post-exercise muscle soreness, cautions that the study didn't look at whether massage actually improved pain.

"If a massage gives you temporary respite from the pain, by all means, try it. However, these molecular changes may have no effect -- or may need to be elicited many times to have a lasting effect," Clarkson, who is distinguished professor of kinesiology at University of Massachusetts at Amherst, says in an email.

What's also not known is whether massage may still be helpful if a person gets a rubdown hours or days after a hard workout instead of just minutes.

Still, scientists who say they were once wary that massage had any real benefits, beyond relaxation, say they are starting to come around.

"I went into all of this truly skeptical," says Mark H. Rapaport, MD, chair of the department of psychiatry and behavioral services at Emory University in Atlanta.

"I've changed. I think there is something there. We saw profound biological changes associated with it," says Rapaport, referring to a 2010 study published in The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, which found that Swedish massage boosted immune function and decreased stress hormones compared to a placebo.

"There's a real consistency between their results and our results," Rapaport says. "I was amazed at how positive their results were based on a really brief intervention."

WASHINGTON ? Mitt Romney?s resounding win in Tuesday?s Florida GOP primary is a warning shot to any Democrats who think the former Massachusetts governor will be a soft target.

Romney and his advisers showed dexterity, smarts and toughness in retooling his campaign within hours of his stinging loss in South Carolina on Jan. 21. Romney followed the revised road map to a T.

He shredded Newt Gingrich in Florida?s two debates, leaving the former House speaker fuming and flailing in the campaign?s closing days. He summoned a host of prominent Republicans to denounce Gingrich. And he regained his image as the person best positioned to take on President Barack Obama this fall.

Democrats ?like to comfort themselves with the thought that a competitive campaign will leave us divided and weak,? a buoyant Romney told the crowd celebrating his victory Tuesday night. ?But I?ve got news for them: A competitive primary does not divide us. It prepares us. And we will win!?

Returns from 79 percent of Florida?s precincts showed Romney with 47 percent of the vote, to 32 percent for Gingrich. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum had 13 percent, and Texas Rep. Ron Paul 7 percent. Neither mounted a substantial effort in the state.

Lots of time left

There is still plenty of time for things to go wrong for Romney. Gingrich might resuscitate his campaign, as he did after his Iowa collapse, although GOP insiders say the odds are not good.

If Romney does become the nominee, his highly negative campaign tactics may hurt him among independent voters. And Obama might do a much better job of hitting Romney?s record at Bain Capital and his switches on key policies over the years.

But the smug comments by some Democrats who said Romney is soft, untested and unable to take a punch have been obliterated.

?It feels like Mitt Romney?s campaign has passed a crucial test and become the kind of campaign we?re going to need to defeat Barack Obama in the fall,? said longtime Republican strategist Terry Holt.

The most impressive thing about Romney?s Florida win is how quickly his team shifted gears after his embarrassing 12 percentage point loss to Gingrich in South Carolina. Romney?s team hatched a new strategy hours before the loss was official: Romney would get meaner to make Gingrich madder.

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Romney immediately agreed to focus his main attacks on Gingrich, not Obama. He would highlight touchy subjects such as Gingrich?s well-paid consulting work for Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage lender that some Floridians blame for their state?s housing crisis.

The new, tougher Romney made a dramatic debut Jan. 23 at a debate in Tampa. He ripped into Gingrich from the opening bell, saying the former speaker ?had to resign in disgrace? in 1998, only to become ?an influence-peddler in Washington.?

Gingrich, who had re-energized his campaign with two fiery debates in South Carolina, seemed taken aback and unsure how to respond.

Self-assurance

Romney was even more sure-footed in Thursday?s debate in Jacksonville. He seemed better prepared, more focused and more aggressive than Gingrich at nearly every turn.

Romney?s research staff had handed him a crucial bit of information shortly before the forum. Earlier that day, Gingrich had rebuked Romney for owning shares of Freddie Mac. Romney?s staff quickly found similar holdings in Gingrich?s financial disclosures. When Romney confronted his rival with the fact on the debate stage, Gingrich was left speechless.

Romney?s team of advisers, including Stuart Stevens and new debate coach Brett O?Donnell, showed the type of flexibility, solid research and fast, incisive thinking that helped Obama beat the highly regarded campaign of Hillary Rodham Clinton four years ago.

No campaign strategy is better than its candidate, of course. For 10 days in Florida, at least, Romney displayed a level of discipline and confidence that could worry Obama fans.

To be sure, Romney had advantages in Florida he?s unlikely to enjoy in the fall, if he?s nominated. Gingrich inexplicably dropped the feisty debate style that helped him win South Carolina. And Romney?s team overwhelmed Gingrich in spending, flooding Florida?s airwaves with attack ads.

Romney?s win ?was fueled by a 4.5-to-1 spending edge that he?ll never have as the nominee,? said Obama campaign adviser Robert Gibbs.

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Gibbs also said Romney has damaged his image among independent and Hispanic voters by using ?a harsh and negative tone? and taking hard-right positions on issues such as immigration.

An NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll gives some credence to that view. It found that Romney?s negative ratings with independents have climbed 13 percentage points since December.

Some Democrats say those independent voters, crucial in all general elections, will be more receptive to criticisms of Romney?s record at Bain Capital. The corporate reorganization firm has a history of both creating and eliminating jobs.

Gingrich?s criticisms of Bain fell so flat with GOP voters that he abandoned them in South Carolina. Romney has weathered other assaults from his rivals as well, including taunts about his changed positions on abortion, gun control and gay rights, and his push for mandatory health insurance in Massachusetts.

Detractors say Romney?s answers are often evasive or illogical. Maybe so, but that didn?t hurt him much in Florida. He now goes to Nevada, Michigan and other states as a battle-tested candidate.

Two weeks ago, researchers from the University of Texas claimed that diet soda may promote weight gain, and research released Tuesday suggested that there may be a link between diet soda consumption and increased vascular events (heart attacks and strokes). Such claims about the sugar-free beverages have the potential change the way Americans look at dieting and weight loss. 

There's one problem, however: they're not true. There is very little evidence to support the assertion that diet soda is responsible for weight gain or poor cardiovascular health.

Whenever scientists postulate that a certain product or behavior can harm your health, remember that they can't demonstrate it by conducting observational studies, which prove very little about the subjects they investigate. In this case, both studies simply found that people who consume diet soda may also gain weight or experience heart attacks or strokes, not that drinking diet soda causes the latter two. At first glance the association does seem to suggest a causal link, but there are any number of variables that can explain observations of this nature. 

Consider a hypothetical study in which scientists discover that girls who quit high school are more likely to become pregnant than girls who graduate. One conclusion the researchers could draw is that dropping out of school causes pregnancy. Most observers wouldn't accept that conclusion because they recognize that dropping out doesn't literally lead to pregnancy; there's some other factor that better explains the situation, such as basic biology.

The same is true of the two real studies cited above. Diet soda doesn't cause weight gain or vascular events; people who consume it tend to suffer from these health problems in spite of the fact that they're forgoing sugary beverages. This is a better explanation of the data for two reasons. First, neither study found a mechanism by which the artificial sweeteners in diet soda can cause weight gain or vascular events. Several theories have been proposed over the years, but none have held up.

A recent review of the primary sweetener used in diet soda, Aspartame, found that "The weight of existing evidence is that aspartame is safe at current levels of consumption as a nonnutritive sweetener." The federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA), certainly no friend to the beverage industry, agrees. "Aspartame was first approved in the United States in 1981 and is one of the most widely used artificial sweeteners. When metabolized by the body, aspartame is broken down into two common amino acids, aspartic acid and phenylalanine, and a third substance, methanol. These three substances are available in similar or greater amounts from eating common foods." 

More importantly, however, sugar unquestionably causes weight gain and damages the cardiovascular system, and the average American's diet is loaded with it. Unlike the studies linking diet soda to negative health outcomes, numerous clinical trials, which are far more reliable than observational studies, have demonstrated that avoiding sugar is one of the best ways to prevent obesity and most of its related health effects. For those reasons, sugar is the much more likely culprit than the sweeteners in diet soda.

To be fair, none of the researchers involed in either study said their results are conclusive. But given the above facts, the associations they found don't stand up to scrutiny. As JunkScience.com's Steve Milloy summarized it, "Weak correlation + poor-quality exposure data + unaccounted-for confounding risk factors + ?unclear? biologic mechanisms = Junk science."

The media also deserve a lashing for their coverage of these studies. While the researchers themselves were slightly more cautious about their conclusions, the media took the possible links between diet soda and poor health and ran with them. CBS's coverage of study on weight gain was titled "Diet Soda Can Lead To Weight Gain," and the network's health expert told viewers that she recommends her patients avoid the "chemicals" in diet soda and drink regular beverages sweetened with sugar. The Daily Mail told readers that "Just one can of diet fizzy drink can increase risk of heart attack or stroke." These are certainly possible conclusions, but they're not the best ones based on all the evidence.

We should always be open to the possibility that the accepted wisdom about proper nutrition is flawed. In fact, it often is. But in the case of diet soda, we don't have good enough evidence to throw out the standard advice. And no amount of shrill news coverage or unsound science will serve as a proper replacement.

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