■SOCCER
Grenoble, Rennes in semis
Grenoble qualified for the French Cup semi-finals for the first time in their history after a comfortable 2-0 home win over Monaco on Wednesday. Grenoble took a 13th-minute lead through 31-year-old striker Daniel Moreira. Another old hand, 34-year-old Nassim Akrour, killed off Monaco’s hopes with a goal in the ninth minute of the second half. Later on Wednesday, Rennes ended third-division Rodez’s hopes of progressing further as they ran out 2-0 winners over the side that eliminated Paris Saint-Germain in the previous round.
■GOLF
Wu leads by a shot
Wu Weihuang made the most of local knowledge yesterday to shoot a six-under 66 for a one-stroke lead in the first round of the Dell Championship in Xiamen, the opening event of the Omega China Tour’s fifth season. Kunming-based Chen Jian surprised even himself with a 67, while Asian Tour star Alex Wu Ashun posted a 69 to share third with Omega Championship winner Zhou Jun, Wang Xu and James Su Dong, 19, and South Korea’s Eom Jae-woong, 18. Taiwan’s Lu Wen-teh Lin and Lin Keng-chi, the latter making his Tour debut, both shot 70 to finish tied eighth with Kong Weihai and 23-year-old American C.J. Gatto.
■CYCLING
Armstrong has bad hair day
Lance Armstrong literally had a bad hair day. A French anti-doping inspector armed with a pair of scissors this week took six clumps of the former Tour de France champion’s hair that will now be tested for signs of drug use. Armstrong says his hair was so “butchered” by the test that he had to get a buzz-cut afterward to hide the mess. In France, hair tests are now being used to hunt down the use of banned substances in sports. When anti-doping authorities say they want the scalps of cheats, they mean it. The sample-collector “flew down from Paris, he was a French doctor, couldn’t have been nicer. He was a total gentleman,” Armstrong said by phone on Wednesday. But “he didn’t make my hair look very good, that’s why I cut it after that, after he butchered it,” Armstrong said.
■SLED DOG RACING
Mackey wins three in a row
Lance Mackey cruised to victory in the 1,774km Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race on Wednesday, winning Alaska’s most popular sporting event for the third consecutive year. Mackey crossed the finish line, an arch erected on Front Street in the Bering Sea town of Nome, just before noon with 15 dogs pulling his sled. He finished the race across Alaska’s wilderness in nine days, 21 hours, 38 minutes and 46 seconds. For his victory, Mackey gets US$69,000 in prize money and a new truck. He also claims a spot in Iditarod history, becoming the third musher after the late Susan Butcher and Montanan Doug Swingley to win three races in a row.
■BASKETBALL
NBA teams to play in Taipei
Two NBA teams will visit Taiwan and China in October to play warm-up games before the start of the NBA season, the Chinese-language Apple Daily reported yesterday. The Denver Nuggets and the Indiana Pacers will play a pre-season game on Oct. 8 at the Taipei Arena. Taiwan’s basketball association will announce details of the game next month, the newspaper quoted an unnamed sports official as saying. The two teams will send a total of 30 players, including Denver forward Carmelo Anthony and Indiana forward Danny Granger.
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
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
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