Federer’s Serve Would Result in a Swiss Miss

Just call it “Ben’s Excellent European Vacation.”

Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger of the Super Bowl-winning Pittsburgh Steelers has been pictured with his family in recent days doing the tourist thing in Switzerland. But it’s more than that.

Roethlisberger has been exploring his heritage, visiting the farming village of Lauperswil, which was once the home of his great-great grandfather.

Behind his visit is Swiss Roots, an organization geared to helping Americans of Swiss descent explore their ancestral roots.

In Roethlisberger’s case, it seems to be working. He told reporters that he is starting to feel “more Swiss.”

In a pre-trip interview with the website swissroots.org, he was asked about playing tennis against top-ranked Roger Federer of Switzerland.

“I’d have to brush up on my tennis skills if I’m going to play Roger,” Roethlisberger said. “I’d like to try and just see one of his serves!”

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Game for anything: During his trip, Roethlisberger tried his hand at hornussen -- a Swiss sport somewhere between golf and baseball.

And Sunday afternoon, he watched a football game between the Bern Grizzlies and the Bienne Jets.

“It wasn’t quite the NFL,” Roethlisberger said. “But hopefully American football will continue to grow over here.”

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Trivia time: Where did Rusty Wallace finish in his first Winston Cup race?

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Soccer fever: Actor Kuno Becker took a beating, and then some, in his training for the movie “Goal! The Dream Begins.”

He plays a Mexican American, Santiago Munez, who is discovered playing soccer in Los Angeles and is taken to England for a tryout with Newcastle United.

“I wanted to make it believable,” Becker told the British website www.filmfocus.co.uk. “We have a lot of football scenes. It’s about the story, but if you don’t have believable football scenes, it’s going to take the audience out of the story and they’re not going to buy it.

“It was important to train and I did train. I put a lot of months, a lot of hours a day of training. I broke my ankles, I broke my nose, a lot of muscle injuries, it was crazy.”

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Medal alert: Dan Daly of the Washington Times, on a seemingly omnipresent escape artist who has been in the news of late:

“So I’m reading about attention-seeker David Blaine spending a week in a water-filled sphere, and I’m thinking: ‘By the 2012 Olympics, this’ll probably be a demonstration sport.’ ”

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Haute couture: Reason No. 3 of 10 reasons to still love baseball, from Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel columnist David Whitley: “What other form of entertainment allows ancient warriors such as Don Zimmer to dress like 19-year-old shortstops?”

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Trivia answer: Second, in the 1980 Atlanta 500.

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And finally: Golfer Jim Furyk, to reporters, taking stock after his PGA Tour victory at Charlotte, N.C., on Sunday: “I think a lot of people see the goofy swing and just assume I must be tough and gritty to have any success.”