By and large it was a day to forget for Taiwanese players at Wimbledon on Thursday. In the first round of the men’s doubles, Lu Yen-hsun and Bjorn Phau of Germany lost in straight sets to Russian pair Igor Andreev and Evgeny Korolev.
More disappointingly, No. 5 seeds Hsieh Su-wei and Peng Shuai of China lost in three sets to Sorana Cirstea and Caroline Wozniacki in the first round of the ladies’ doubles. The Romanian and Danish duo took the first set 6-4 before Peng and Hsieh fought back to win the second 6-2. But the French Open semi-finalists couldn’t keep the momentum going and Cirstea and Wozniacki claimed the deciding set 6-2.
Chuang Chia-jung was the only Taiwanese to make it through to the second round of the ladies’ competition after teaming up with India’s Sania Mirza to defeat US pair Jill Craybas and Carly Gullickson 6-4, 6-2. The No. 15 seeds play Alla Kudryatseva of Russia and Monica Niculescu of Romania in round two.
On Wednesday Chan Yung-jan and Agnes Szavay of Hungary lost in three sets to Vera Dushevina of Russia and Tatiana Perebiynis of Ukraine.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later