Race leader Gilberto Simoni finished second to fellow-Italian Dario Frigo on Thursday in a dramatic 18th stage in the Alps marred by rain, hail, cold and spills that might have decided the Giro d'Italia winner.
With three stages left, Simoni piled up a huge overall lead of 7:08 minutes over second place Stefano Garzelli, who, delayed by a fall, ended the stage more than five minutes behind the winner.
Frigo, of Fassa Bortolo team, edged Simoni by 10 seconds to score his second career victory in the Giro in an uphill finish at 1,815m of altitude in the northwestern Alps of Piedmont.
Frigo and Simoni left all opponents behind in the final kilometers as the road climbed to Valle Varaita.
During the ascent to the Colle di Sampeyre, the second pass of the day at more than 2,000m of altitude, the cyclists struggled with roads covered with hailstones.
In the slippery downhill section of Sampeyre, Garzelli and Marco Pantani fell at high speeds and suffered bruises.
Garzelli, of Vini Caldirola, was quicker to recover, while slipping out of contention for the Giro title.
Pantani took longer to resume and finished, battered and aching, 16 minutes behind the winner.
Taiwan’s men’s table tennis team won bronze on Saturday at this year’s International Table Tennis Federation World Team Table Tennis Championships in London, matching the country’s best-ever finish at the regular tournament. Consisting of Lin Yun-ju, Taiwan’s top-ranked player at world No. 7, Feng Yi-hsin, Kuo Guan-hong, Hong Jing-kai and Hsu Hsien-chia, the team won bronze after losing 0-3 to Japan in the semifinals. In the opening match, 24-year-old Lin played the first game against world No. 3 Tomokazu Harimoto 11-5, but ultimately lost the next three closely contested games 9-11, 10-12 and 10-12. Feng then faced world No. 8 Sora Matsushima in
Taiwanese fire dancer Yang Li-wei advanced to the final of Britain’s Got Talent this weekend after receiving a Golden Buzzer during her live semi-final performance. Yang, a member of Taiwan’s Coming True Fire Group, awed judges and audiences with a high-intensity fire performance featuring flaming umbrellas, fire swallowing and spinning metal structures balanced with her legs. Judge Simon Cowell praised Yang as a star, while guest judge KSI reacted with amazement before pressing the Golden Buzzer, sending her to the finals. The dance group wrote on social media that the Golden Buzzer was “the highest honor” on the talent show, adding: “Twenty-three years
As Super Rugby fast approaches its playoff season it finds itself racing toward a reckoning with many issues that threaten the southern hemisphere tournament. A group of stakeholders met in the New Zealand city of Christchurch late last month to address problems that are making the future of the 31-year-old competition increasingly tenuous. The discussion was made more urgent by the decision by the owners of Moana Pasifika to fold the Auckland-based club for financial reasons. That followed the closure of the Melbourne Rebels at the end of the 2024 season, likewise because of financial difficulties. Problems addressed included player retention as more
Memphis Grizzlies forward Brandon Clarke, 29, has died, the NBA team said in a statement on Tuesday, while the family of Jason Collins, the first openly gay man to play in a major US pro sports league, announced the former Grizzlies and Brooklyn Nets player had died after a battle with brain cancer. “We are heartbroken by the tragic loss of Brandon Clarke,” the Grizzlies said in a statement posted on social media. “Brandon was an outstanding teammate and an even better person whose impact on the organization and the greater Memphis community will not be forgotten.” The statement did not provide
RSS