■ FORMULA ONE
Ecclestone denies insult
Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone has denied insulting Africa after the sport’s governing body voted to allow Max Mosley to stay on as president despite a sado-masochistic sex scandal. Britain’s Daily Express newspaper quoted Ecclestone as saying after the June 3 vote in Paris that “just because he [Mosley] got a few more votes from Africa doesn’t mean the King of Spain will want to shake his hand.” The reported remarks triggered a written complaint from Kenyan Automobile Association general secretary David Njoroge, who is also a senior member of the International Automobile Federation (FIA). Njoroge, who is a trustee of the London-based FIA Foundation for the Automobile and Society, said the African members took “great exception in what is clearly derogatory, demeaning and uncalled for attacks on Africa.
■NASCAR
Loeb wins Turkish Rally
Sebastian Loeb beat Henning Solberg by 1 second Friday to lead the first day of the Turkish Rally. The Citroen driver and defending champion took an early lead, winning the first stage on a dry gravel course. Loeb fell back in subsequent stages before winning the 7th leg. Jari Matti Latvala of Finland finished third overall. Loeb, who won the Turkish Rally in 2004 and 2005, is looking to widen his one-point lead in the 2008 title race against Ford driver Mikko Hirvonen of Finland. Hirvonen finished fifth on Friday.
■BOXING
Boxers arrested for heroin
Two Tanzanian boxers and four officials were arrested in Mauritius after they were found with 5kg of heroin, police said on Friday. The team, which was in the Indian Ocean island for the African Boxing championships, a pre-Olympic qualification for this year’s summer Games in Beijing, was arrested on Wednesday. Police first nabbed two members of the team as they placed the drugs, said to be worth US$1.8 million, next to their hotel’s perimetre wall to await collection and later picked up the rest. A Kenyan woman who came to collect the heroin was also arrested. The team consisted of two boxers, a coach, his assistant, a manager and a doctor.
■CYCLING
Russian takes alpine victory
Former mountain bike specialist Youry Trofimov of the Bouyges Telecom team claimed a prestigious alpine victory on the fifth stage of the Dauphine Libere stage race on Friday. Trofimov, of Russia, hoisted himself up the general classification after breaking free of an earlier breakaway to bring victory home after a tough, second day of racing in the Alps. “I’m still having trouble getting my head around it,” said Trofimov. “It’s a surprise. At the start of the breakaway I wasn’t thinking about victory. “But the downhill was an advantage for me, someone who has come from mountain biking,” the Russian said.
■BASKETBALL
Women make Olympic cut
Spain, the Czech Republic, Latvia and Belarus earned berths in the women’s basketball tournament at the Beijing Olympics on Friday, winning their quarter-final games at a FIBA qualifying tournament on Friday. Spain beat Cuba 82-68, the Czechs downed Japan 76-64, Latvia cruised to a 84-26 victory over Angola, while Belarus prevailed over Brazil 86-79 in overtime. Elisa Aguilar led Spain with 28 points and had four assists, while Eva Viteckova had six-three pointers in her game-high 26 for the Czechs, who rallied after trailing 21-16 at the end of the first quarter. Latvia didn’t allow Angola to score more than nine points in any quarter.
South Korean giants T1, led by “Faker,” won their fifth League of Legends (LoL) world championship crown in London on Saturday, beating China’s Bilibili Gaming (BLG) in a thrilling final. The teams were locked at 2-2 at a packed O2 arena, but T1 clinched game five to make it back-to-back titles after nearly four hours of tense action. China’s BLG started strongly, taking the first game before T1 struck back to level. The Chinese team pulled ahead again at 2-1 only for their opponents to hit back again and go on to take the decider. Faker, who won the Most
Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Belgian partner Elise Mertens on Monday notched up their first win in the doubles group stage of the WTA Finals in Riyadh to keep their semi-final hopes alive, while Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russian partner Veronika Kudermetova were aiming to record their first victory after press time last night. Third seeds Hsieh and Mertens came back from a disheartening opening-day loss to Australia’s Ellen Perez and Nicole Melichar-Martinez to defeat top seeds Ukraine’s Lyudmyla Kichenok and Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko, the women’s doubles world No. 3 and 4 respectively. The 6-1, 6-3 victory at King Saud University Indoor Arena
Amber Glenn overcame a fall and her own doubts to win a maiden Grand Prix figure skating title on Saturday at the Grand Prix de France. The American skater had the lead from Friday’s short program. That and the support of the crowd got her through a tough free skate in which she fell on a triple flip and put a hand onto the ice to steady herself on two other jumps. “I didn’t feel that great out there today, but I really tried, and the audience really got me through that last half when I was doubting myself,” Glenn
The Major League Baseball World Series trophy is headed to Los Angeles, but the party is extending all the way to Japan. People milled around local train stations yesterday morning in Tokyo as newspaper extras were ready to roll off the presses, proclaiming Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto as world champions along with their Dodgers teammates after a stirring Game 5 victory over the New York Yankees. The 30-year-old is a national hero in Japan whose face adorns billboards and TV adverts all over the country. Ohtani this year became the first player in history to hit 50 home runs and
RSS