ATHLETICS
Kenyan wins London race
Eliud Kipchoge won the London Marathon on Sunday, leading home a Kenyan top four ahead of defending champion Wilson Kipsang. Kipchoge, a former world 5,000m champion, completed the 42.2km route in 2 hours, 4 minutes, 42 seconds in overcast conditions in the British capital. “It was a tough race,” said the 30-year-old, who won the Chicago and Rotterdam marathons last year. “My training paid off and it went to plan. The crowd were wonderful and lifted me for my sprint finish.” Tigist Tufa became only the second Ethiopian woman to win in London, emulating Derartu Tulu’s triumph in 2001. The 28-year-old Tufa won her first major marathon in 2 hours, 23 minutes, 22 seconds, with two-time winner Mary Keitany of Kenya 18 seconds adrift. “The weather was very difficult for me, and I found it a very slow race until the end and I was pushed,” Tufa said. “I was unwell at the end, but I am very happy that I am OK now. I’ve always dreamed about winning the London Marathon.”
BADMINTON
Lee banned for doping
Malaysian shuttler Lee Chong-wei was yesterday handed a backdated eight-month ban for doping by the Badminton World Federation (BWF), keeping alive the former world No. 1’s dream of winning gold at the Rio Olympics next year. The 32-year-old Malaysian, twice an Olympic silver medalist, had been under a provisional suspension since November last year after testing positive for anti-inflammatory drug dexamethasone during the world championships three months earlier. Lee, the winner of 55 titles around the world, had his case heard by a three-member panel in Amsterdam on April 11 and faced a two-year ban, which would have all but ended his career, but the Kuala Lumpur-based BWF opted for a softer sentence. Lee will be eligible to compete again on Friday. “The panel is convinced this is not a case of doping with intent to cheat,” the world governing body said in a statement.
ICE HOCKEY
Crosby makes Canada squad
The Pittsburgh Penguins’ center Sidney Crosby was added to Canada’s world hockey championship squad on Sunday after his team was eliminated from the NHL playoffs. Crosby, who won the Hart Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable player in 2007 and last year, became available when the Penguins were ousted by the New York Rangers after five games of their first-round series. The 27-year-old center has previously represented Canada six times during his illustrious career, most significantly at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, where he scored the game-winning goal against the US in the gold medal final. Crosby joins a strong Canadian roster that includes fellow forwards Claude Giroux (the Philadelphia Flyers), Taylor Hall (the Edmonton Oilers) and Tyler Seguin (the Dallas Stars).
MOTOR RACING
Schumacher Jr wins F4 race
Michael Schumacher’s 16-year-old son, Mick, on Sunday sprayed the winner’s champagne after capping an impressive debut weekend in German Formula Four with the first victory of his motor-racing career. Competing for the Dutch-based Van Amersfoort Racing team, the German lined up second on the grid for the last of three races at Oschersleben and made a quick getaway to lead from the start. Schumacher, who leads the rookie standings and is fifth overall in the championship, ended the 30-minute race behind the safety car with Australian teammate Joey Mawson second and fellow rookie Thomas Preining third.
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