■CYCLING
Guderzo wins road race
Italy’s Tatiana Guderzo, bronze medalist at last year’s Olympic Games, won the women’s road race at the world cycling championships on Saturday. The 25-year-old broke away from the field on a climb with just over 12km remaining in the 124.2km race and sped away to win in three hours 33.25 minutes, 19 seconds ahead of her closest rival. Marianne Vos of the Netherlands, winner in 2006 at the age of 19, pipped Noemi Cantele and Kristin Armstrong in a sprint for second place. Guderzo’s compatriot Cantele was third and US rider Kristin Armstrong, winner of Wednesday’s time trial and set to retire after the race, missed out on the medals.
■CYCLING
Frenchman wins under-23
Romain Sicard became the first Frenchman to win the world under-23 road race championship when he stormed to victory on Saturday. The 21-year-old, also the first French rider to win an event at this year’s championships, finished nearly half a minute ahead of his nearest competitor. He completed the 179.4km course in 4 hours, 41.54 minutes after breaking clear with around 10km left. Colombia’s Carlos Alberto Betancur snatched the silver medal after overhauling Russia’s Egor Silin in the last few meters to also finish 27 seconds behind Sicard. Betancur was aiming to become the second successive Colombian to win the race after Fabio Duarte last year.
■BOXING
Diaz returns from furlough
Former lightweight champion David Diaz returned from a 15-month absence to earn a majority decision victory over Jesus Chavez on Saturday. The 33-year-old Diaz seemed to take control during the ninth and 10th rounds, likely sealing the victory. Judge Mike Fitzgerald scored the fight 95-95, but Mauro DiFiore and Scott Dexter gave Diaz the decision by scores of 97-93 and 96-94, respectively. “I was telegraphing my punches,” Diaz said about the first few rounds. Diaz, a Chicago native, hadn’t been in the ring since being knocked out by Manny Pacquiao on June 28 last year in Las Vegas. Despite his 15-month absence, Diaz (35-2-1) looked spry through all 10 grueling rounds against Chavez.
■BOXING
Thai knocks out Irishman
Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym of Thailand knocked out Bernard Dunne of Ireland in the third round to win the WBA super-bantamweight title on Saturday. The Thai landed a trio of powerful left hooks in the third round, each time sending Dunne to the mat. The referee stopped the fight after the third knockdown as blood flowed from the dazed Dubliner’s nose and left ear. The 28-year-old Poonsawat (39-1) had waited 18 months for his shot at the title. It was his first professional victory outside Thailand. Before the fight, he predicted he would knock out the hometown favorite within seven rounds.
■BADMINTON
Bao topples Hidayat
Bao Chunlai shocked Athens Olympic gold medalist Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia to make it a Chinese double at the Japan Open Sunday after Wang Yihan won the women’s crown. The unseeded Asian champion, who previously eliminated third seed Peter Gade of Denmark and Vietnam’s Tien Minh Nguyen, the eighth seed, powered his way to a 21-15, 21-12 win. Earlier, defending champion Wang Yihan chalked up a 21-8, 21-9 victory over Wang Xin in an all-Chinese final to retain the women’s singles title.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
Chen Yi-tung (陳奕通) secured a historic Olympic berth on Sunday by winning the senior men’s foil event at the 2024 Asia Oceania Zonal Olympic Fencing Qualifiers in United Arab Emirates. Chen defeated Samuel Elijah of Singapore 15-4 in the final in Dubai to secure the only wild card in the event, making him the first male Olympian fencer from Taiwan in 36 years and only the sixth Taiwanese fencer to ever qualify for the quadrennial event. The last appearance by a Taiwanese male fencer at the Olympics was in 1988, when Wang San-tsai (王三財) and Cheng Ming-hsiang (鄭明祥) competed in Seoul. The
A soccer jersey carrying a national map including disputed Western Sahara has become a hot commodity in Morocco after a diplomatic dispute with Algeria. Retailers said RS Berkane jerseys have been flying off the shelves after a Confederation of African Football (CAF) Cup match against Algerian club USM Alger was canceled last month over the jerseys. “We are overwhelmed by the influx of messages and requests,” said Brahim Rabii, representative of the official RS Berkane jersey distributor. Algeria broke off diplomatic relations with Morocco in 2021, partly over the issue of Western Sahara. The former Spanish colony is largely controlled by Morocco, but claimed