■ Sailing
Skandia maintains lead
The two leading yachts in the Sydney to Hobart yacht race entered Bass Strait on Saturday with Australian supermaxi Skandia holding a two-nautical-mile edge over New Zealand's Zana. Grundig AAPT, the surprise overnight leader, was in third place, about 10 nautical miles behind the leaders. Both Skandia and Zana, the pre-race favorites for line honors, are 30m supermaxis. All 56 yachts reported their positions early Saturday with no retirements since the 628-nautical mile race started in Sydney harbor on Friday. The race ends at Hobart on the island state of Tasmania, separated from Australia's mainland by Bass Strait. The race leaders had covered more than half the race distance by early Saturday evening. Crew aboard Skandia predicted a finish at Constitution Dock in Hobart on late Sunday night or early Monday.
■ Tennis
Matches made in heaven
It begins with Lleyton Hewitt facing his new fiancee, Belgium's Kim Clijsters, in a mixed doubles tournament at the Hopman Cup and continues for two weeks across six time zones. There are nine tennis tournaments scheduled in Australia and New Zealand early in the new year as players attempt to shake off the holiday break and prepare for the Australian Open, the first Grand Slam of 2004 that starts in Melbourne on Jan. 19. Hewitt, who asked Clijsters, his girlfriend of four years, to marry him during a harbor cruise in Sydney before Christmas, will partner Australia's Alicia Molik in the Jan. 3-10 tournament at Perth that also features the defending champion Americans with James Blake and Lindsay Davenport. Davenport replaces Serena Williams, who has delayed her scheduled return to competitive tennis to concentrate on preparations for the Australian Open. Williams has not played a tournament since winning Wimbledon in July. She had knee surgery on Aug. 1. At Perth, Belgium will feature Clijsters and Xavier Malisse while other countries include Marat Safin and Anastasia Myskina for Russia and Daniela Hantuchova and Karol Kucera for Slovakia.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
Taiwanese badminton superstar Lee Yang broke down in tears after publicly retiring from the sport on Sunday. The two-time Olympic gold medalist held a retirement ceremony at the Taipei Arena after the final matches of the Taipei Open. Accompanied by friends, family and former badminton partners, Lee burst into tears while watching a video celebrating key moments in his professional sporting career that also featured messages from international players such as Malaysia’s Teo Ee Yi, Hong Kong’s Tang Chun-man, and Indonesia’s Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan. “I hope that in the future when the world thinks about me, they will
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later
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