■ Sumo
Kyokushuzan retires
Mongolian sumo wrestler Kyokushuzan has retired because of heart disease, a news report said yesterday. The 33-year-old wrestler has been suffering from heart disease for about a year and decided to retire after losing the first match of a tournament which kicked off on Sunday, Kyodo News agency reported. In 1992, he became one of the first Mongolians to participate in Japanese sumo wrestling, Kyodo said. Officials at the Japan Sumo Association could not immediately confirm the report. Kyokushuzan, who once reached komusubi, the fourth-highest position in sumo, was ranked the No.10 maegashira this month.
■ Basketball
Brezec's summer takes toll
Charlotte center Primoz Brezec said on Sunday that sitting out the Bobcats' first six games had taught him a lesson: He plays too much basketball. Brezec, worn down after a summer playing with the Slovenian national team, caught a virus at the start of training camp. He lost 7kg and was so weary doctors told him to sit out at least the first two weeks of the NBA season. Brezec said he won't play for the Slovenian national team in next year's European Championship. "That's what I do every summer, and obviously the last two years wore me down a little bit," Brezec said. "I'm going to have to consider not playing anymore for my national team."
■ Hockey
Russia wins Karjala Cup
Russia won the Karjala Cup after beating the Czech Republic 3-2 in a penalty shootout on Sunday, snapping Finland's streak of eight straight titles in the Euro Hockey Tour event. Petr Shastliviy, who scored the game-winning goal against the Finns, forced overtime when he tied the score at 2-2 with 1:56 left in regulation. Petr Caslava gave the Czechs a 1-0 lead early in the first period. Alexander Tiaritonov tied it with a power-play goal 27 seconds into the third period. Caslava then set up Ivan Huml midway through the period. Russia also won its first two games by one-goal margins. Finland played winless Olympic champion Sweden later on Sunday.
■ Soccer
Houston wins MLS Cup
Brian Ching scored the tying goal for Houston a little over a minute after New England's Taylor Twellman struck what appeared to be the game-winner in overtime, and the Dynamo prevailed 4-3 on penalty kicks on Sunday to win the MLS Cup in the US. Faced with needing to prevent a goal in the fifth and final set of penalty kicks, Houston goalkeeper Pat Onstad blocked Jay Heaps' drive to the left side of the net to give the Dynamo a championship in their first year in Houston. The loss was the third defeat in the league championship for the Revolution and coach Steve Nicol, who lost 1-0 in overtime to Los Angeles last year.
■ Speed Skating
Davis wins 1,000m
Olympic champion Shani Davis overcame a slow start on Sunday to win the 1,000m at the season-opening speed skating World Cup meet. The American, who also won the 1,000m at the Turin Games in February, was slow off the start line but sped up throughout the race to finish in 1 minute, 9.17 seconds. Lee Kyou-hyuk of South Korea was second in 1:09.26 and Denny Morrison of Canada was third in 1:09.35. Anni Friesinger of Germany won her third event of the meet on Sunday, adding another 1,000m title.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier