CYCLING
Evans consolidates lead
Cadel Evans weathered a late storm to consolidate his Tirreno-Adriatico lead with an impressive victory in Monday’s sixth stage of the Italian race. The 34-year-old went into the penultimate stage with just a two second lead on Italy’s Ivan Basso and, riding without any teammates, found himself facing several attacks late in the 178km ride from Ussita to Macerata. The Australian, however, fought back every time a gap opened up and even had to deal with some elbowing in the final kilometer with former teammate Philippe Gilbert, before pulling away from a select group in the final few hundred meters. “It was quite something to take the overall leader’s blue jersey on Sunday,” said Evans. “But to win the stage and keep the jersey today is absolutely brilliant.” Basso dropped to third at 12 seconds behind his fellow Italian Michele Scarponi, second at 9 seconds behind, with Dutchman Robert Gesink in fourth at 15.
FOOTBALL
Suit to be heard in April
The antitrust suit filed by NFL players against the league will be heard on April 6 in a federal court in Minnesota, according to court documents released on Monday. The hearing is to be heard by Judge Susan Nelson with the players asking for an injunction against the lockout declared by the NFL on Saturday. Ten NFL players, including top quarterbacks Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees, filed a class suit against the league following the break down in talks on a new collective bargaining agreement on Friday. The players’ union officially dissolved itself on Friday and is now acting as a “professional trade association” rather than a formal union. The NFL is expected to argue that the unions move is a “sham” to avoid their responsibilities in bargaining for a new deal.
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