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Sports Briefs

■ Motor Racing
F1 to get new rules?
Formula One's governing body has proposed a raft of rule changes for 2008 to take the cutting-edge sport back to basics and make it more affordable for new teams and drivers. The details included ending the sport's tyre war between Bridgestone and Michelin by limiting supply to one brand, controlled by the FIA. Engine capacity would be reduced to 2.4 litre V8s from three litre V10s, with each unit having to last two races. Fully manual gearboxes and clutches would return with power steering banned along with the use of spare cars. The International Automobile Federation (FIA) issued preliminary proposals yesterday and summoned the 10 team bosses to a meeting in Monaco on May 4. FIA president Max Mosley outlined six main objectives in a letter to six of the team bosses, with the first on the list being "to improve the racing spectacle without introducing artificial rules." The others were the elimination of so-called electronic "driver aids" such as traction control to put a premium on talent, measures to reduce the costs of running a top team and "very substantially" cut the cost of operating a less competitive one. New teams were to be encouraged in to ensure a full grid of 24 cars, rather than 20 at present.

■ Soccer
Apology for racist remark
The British soccer commentator Ron Atkinson on Thursday night apologized for the racist outburst that led to his resignation as a football pundit on the UK's commercial ITV television channel, and yesterday saw his weekly column for the London-based Guardian newspaper terminated by mutual consent. Atkinson described Chelsea soccer club's black defender Marcel Desailly as "a nigger" after commentating on the London club's 3-1 defeat to Monaco on Tuesday night. He thought the microphones were switched off, but his comments were picked up by a microphone and broadcast to viewers in the Middle East. Speaking outside his home, Atkinson said his outburst had been uttered in anger and that he could not recall making it. "We didn't hear it until the following day. I was only talking to myself, into a monitor set," he said. "I had taken off the headphones and whatever. I was looking at some playbacks on the game. At that stage I was thinking more as a fan. At the end of the day, we all wanted to see them [Chelsea] go through to the final and thought they had a wonderful opportunity. "I apologize, I owe him [Desailly] and anyone else I have offended an apology. "It was not meant as a racist comment."

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