John Force on Saturday raced to his record 156th NHRA victory and first in two years, with the 74-year-old Funny Car great powering past Matt Hagan at Firebird Motorsports Park in the completion of the postponed Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals.
Force had a 4.033 second run at 512.16kph in his Chevrolet Camaro SS for his eighth victory in the drag racing event postponed two weeks ago at Pomona in California.
“I’m just facing the truth in life, that, you know, time’s running out and I’m trying to hang on,” Force said. “This morning, I was talking about: ‘You know, maybe this is it, maybe I should just walk out the gate and go to the casino,’ and then all of sudden you win and your weight and your personality just changes.”
Photo: AP
“Things went right and I got the win, so I’m excited,” he added.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
A goalkeeper with one of Iran’s top soccer clubs has been suspended after he embraced a female supporter during a championship match, sports daily Khabar Varzeshi reported on Monday. Hossein Hosseini, 31, who plays for Tehran team Esteghlal, was suspended after the incident on April 12. The Esteghlal fan rushed onto the pitch where stadium security attempted to detain her. Hosseini approached the woman while security staff were trying to hold her back and briefly took her into his arms. The newspaper said that the Football Federation Islamic Republic of Iran fined the goalkeeper the equivalent of US$4,700 and gave him a one-match
A wine merchant who blind tasted a different glass of wine at each mile of the London Marathon on Sunday has said he feels “honored” his challenge went viral on social media, as he surpassed his fundraising target. Tom Gilbey, nicknamed “the wine guy,” sampled 25 glasses of wine during the race, stopping to guess the drink’s grape variety, country of origin and vintage at each mile. A video he posted on TikTok has amassed more than 3.2 million views. He had his first sip at about 9:30am, shortly after the race began. Gilbey said he aimed to raise £2,000 (US$2,487) for Sobell