■Loeb wins Wales test
Loeb wins Wales test
World champion Sebastien Loeb overtook Jari-Matti Latvala on the final stage on Sunday to win the season-ending Wales Rally. Loeb, who clinched a record fifth world title in Japan last month, trailed Latvala by 4.9 seconds following a 10 second jump start penalty in the penultimate stage but surged ahead to win by 2.7 seconds. The French driver ended the 2008 championship with 11 wins from 15 races for the first time, taking his career tally to 48. His last-gasp victory also secured the manufacturers’ title for Citroen. Loeb’s teammate Dani Sordo finished third, 1 minute, 7.9 seconds behind Latvala.
■RUGBY LEAGUE
Ricky Stuart quits as coach
Ricky Stuart has quit as Australia’s rugby league coach in the wake of his “offensive” behavior toward World Cup officials following the Kangaroos’ shock defeat in last month’s final. Stuart was widely condemned for his outbursts at match referee Ashley Klein and British referees official Stuart Cummings after the Kangaroos’ 34-20 loss to New Zealand in the Brisbane final on Nov. 22. Australian Rugby League chairman Colin Love said Stuart had informed him at a meeting here Monday that he would not be applying for the national job for next year’s season. Stuart’s decision came with the announcement of a A$20,000 (US$13,000) fine imposed under World Cup disciplinary guidelines.
■CRICKET
Bradman bat up for sale
The cricket bat Australia’s Don Bradman used to make his highest first-class score is up for sale. The bat with which Bradman scored 452 not out for New South Wales against Queensland in 1930 will be auctioned in Melbourne next week. Bradman’s unbeaten 452 is the third highest individual first-class score of all time and stood as the world record for almost three decades. Pakistan’s Hanif Mohammad made 499 for Karachi in 1958-1959 and West Indian Brian Lara scored 501 not out for English county Warwickshire in 1994. Bradman, regarded as the greatest batsmen of all time, died in 2001 aged 92.
■SWIMMING
Bernard sets new record
Olympic champion Alain Bernard of France set a new world shortcourse record in winning the French 100m freestyle crown in a time of 45.69 seconds on Sunday. Bernard beat the former record of 45.83, set by Sweden’s Stefan Nystrand on Nov. 17, last year in Berlin. It is the first time Bernard, who won three Olympic medals in Beijing including gold in the 100m freestyle, has swam under the 46-sec mark. What was the Frenchman’s first world shortcourse record comes in the wake of him setting four world records, three over 100m and one over 50m, in the longer, 50m pool earlier this year.
■LUGE
Russian wins singles cup
Albert Demtschenko of Russia won a World Cup luge singles race on Sunday, edging two-time Olympic champion Armin Zoggeler of Italy by 0.146 seconds. Demtschenko, who crashed in the season-opener last month at Igls, Austria, had a two-run time of 1 minute, 39.265 seconds. “I had some problems at Igls, but now I’m very happy,” he said. “This was the best answer after the crash at Igls. The most important thing today was my head.” David Moeller of Germany was third. He and Zoggeler top the overall standings with 155 points. Demtschenko is sixth with 100.
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