CYCLING
KOM ranked in top 10
With a grueling 105km route that takes cyclists through mountains, including an 87km continual ascent, the Taiwan KOM (King of the Mountain) Challenge has earned its place on a list of the world’s 10 toughest by French magazine Le Cycle. The annual uphill bike race through the mountain ranges of central Taiwan is the only one outside of Europe to make the list put out by the major French publication. Featuring the event in its January issue, Le Cycle called the KOM Challenge the only one in Asia comparable to classic routes through Europe’s Alps and the Pyrenees mountain ranges. The race starts from the Qixingtan scenic area in Hualien followed by a 87km climb via the breathtaking Toroko Gorge to Wuling, a peak of Hehuanshan, which rises to an elevation of 3,275m. Johnson Wang, director of the Taipei Tourism Office in Germany, said the KOM Challenge is an extreme event that all cycling enthusiasts around the world should experience. He expressed hope that the recognition from Le Cycle would raise awareness of the difficult race among challenge-seeking professional cyclists. The arduous event was also featured in German weekly Die Zeit in December.
TENNIS
Olympics ‘too far’: Li Na
China’s No. 1 Li Na will probably not play at the Olympics in 2016, the 31-year-old said at the Australian Open yesterday. Li, who narrowly missed out on a medal at the Beijing Games in 2008 when she lost the bronze decider to Russia’s Vera Zvonareva, crashed out in the first round at the 2012 London Games. “I think it’s time for younger players to have a chance at the Olympics,” world No. 4 Li told reporters in Mandarin at Melbourne Park. “I don’t think I’ll be playing at the Olympics. As far as I’m concerned, the Olympics are too far away.” The 2011 French Open winner has been a reluctant standard-bearer for Chinese tennis in the past and reacted furiously in 2012 when her country’s tennis administration entered her to play Olympic doubles with Zhang Shuai at London without consulting her.
BASKETBALL
Kings to accept bitcoin
The Sacramento Kings said on Thursday they would begin accepting bitcoin, the first professional sports team to accept the virtual currency. Fans would be able to use bitcoin for tickets and team merchandise from March 1, using the cryptocurrency’s payment processor BitPay. The Kings said the move was part of majority team owner Vivek Ranadive’s “NBA 3.0” philosophy, aimed at tapping technology to boost the team. “With BitPay, we are able to implement a technology that allows our fans to make Kings-related purchases without physically reaching into their wallets,” Ranadive said in a statement. Based in Sacramento, California, the Kings have done poorly since last appearing in the post-season playoffs in 2006.
MOTOR RACING
McLaren CEO returns
Ron Dennis regained control of McLaren’s Formula One team on Thursday, returning as chief executive in a bid to revive the team’s flagging fortunes. Dennis stepped aside from his involvement with the F1 side of the business in 2009 after 27 years as team principal amid the fallout from a lying scandal. Dennis was left with responsibility for building commercial sports cars for McLaren. Dennis is back as CEO in charge of the team he led to 10 drivers’ championships, the last produced by Lewis Hamilton in 2008, and seven constructors’ championships.
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