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Showing posts with label Le Tour de France. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Le Tour de France. Show all posts
We haven't really addressed the other sports news going on in the world and this weekend still packs a lot of action around the world.
Tour de France Concludes This Weekend I don't remember another Tour de France race where the winners were still somewhat uncertain coming into the penultimate stage. Today's time trial virtually decided this year's champion with Cadel Evans and Carlos Sastre fighting against the clock for the top spots in the overall standings. Coming into today's time trial, Sastre was wearing the yellow jersey with Evans behind by 94 seconds.
Evans was predicted to perform stronger in today's stage, which was won by Stefan Schumacher of Germany. But Evans wasn't strong enough as Sastre was able to retain the yellow jersey after finishing his time trial only 29 seconds slower than Evans. Sastre still has a 65 second lead over Evans in the overall standings.
Tomorrow's final stage to the finish in Paris will largely be a ceremonial ride since riders traditionally do not challenge the man in the yellow jersey. Thus, Sastre, barring any unexpected crashes or obstacles, will enjoy a victory ride to the Champs-Elysses.
Game 1 of Red Sox-Yanks becomes a pitchers' duel It was a low scoring game in yesterday's first of three games to be played this weekend by the AL East rivals. New York Yankee Joba Chamberlain outperformed Red Sox pitcher Josh Beckett and Jason Giambi hit a single to allow Bobby Abreu to score the only run of the game.
The 1-0 win put the Yankees only two games behind Boston for the American League wild card lead. This was also the Yankees' seventh consecutive win. Today, it will be a battle of veterans on the mound as Yankee pitcher Andy Pettite will take on Tim Wakefield.
Australia Defeats New Zealand To Extend Lead in Tri-Nations Standings
The Telstra Stadium in Sydney was the site of today's tri-nations rugby test match between Australia and New Zealand in a battle for the Bledisloe Cup. Australia scored an impressive four tries in their leap to the top of the standings over the All Blacks and world champions South Africa Springboks.
Twenty20 Cup Finals Day From the Rose Bowl It may not be the Rose Bowl you're accustomed to, but in England the focus is on the Twenty20 Cup finals in cricket. For those not familiar with Twenty20 cricket, or cricket in general, Twenty20 is a faster and shorter form of the traditional one-day international style of this bat-and-ball sport. Tonight, it will be Kent vs. Middlesex in the finals after the semifinals took place earlier today.
FIVB World League Finals It will be Serbia, Brazil, Russia and the United States facing off against each other today in the World League Semifinals.
Late word is that the United States has upset Brazil in straight sets for a spot in the championship match tomorrow. The Americans will face the winner of Serbia vs. Russia, which is already underway.
FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup Brazil secured a spot in the finals earlier today after a thrilling 5-4 win over Portugal. The winner takes on either Italy or Spain, with that semifinal already underway.
Supposedly yesterday was one of the slowest sports news days of the year. True for some, but for me, the world of sports kept on going. Yesterday, the Tour de France continued amid a second doping scandal and the second round of group matches occured in the Superliga. Also, important news emerged from the world of women's soccer which we'll look into a bit later. And today is the start of The Open Championships in golf, the third grand slam event of the year and the first without Tiger Woods.
Olympic Baseball Roster Announced; Softball Team Looks For Complete Dominance in Beijing We'll go backwards this time and start with our Countdown to Beijing. Yesterday, we looked at the announcers for NBC and today we go back to the stars on the field. The roster for the Olympic baseball team was announced yesterday, with no major leaguers named to the team. We discussed on Tuesday that major leaguers will not be on the team, and that's for a variety of reason. Olympic baseball coincides with the Major League Baseball season and the run up to the postseason and MLB officials and managers do not want to take the risk of injuring players before the hunt for October begins. Olympic organizers suggested that instead of an All-Star break, MLB could take several days off for the Olympics instead.
Instead, we'll see several minor leaguers represent the United States in their bid for the last baseball gold medal to be given out before it disappears from the Olympic program. There are several standout names here that may be able to match up with the teams from Cuba and Japan. Matt LaPorta is one of them. He is currently an outfielder, but played very well at first base in the Futures Game last Sunday at Yankee Stadium.
Dexter Fowler has dominated the Double-A division of the minor league and has been referred to as a switch-hitter that "has superstar written all over him." One of their best pitching elements is seen in San Diego State's Stephen Strasburg, a pitcher that can throw strikes and throw in the high 90s.
For the complete roster, click here. For the comments about the roster made during the press conference, click here.
And keeping with the subject of bat-and-ball sports, we take a look at the Olympic Softball Tournament, where again Team USA is the favorite heading into Beijing. Since the sport was introduced at the Atlanta 1996 games, the United States has won every gold medal and faced little competition.
Like the baseball competition, eight teams will compete in a single pool and will play a round robin format. The top 4 teams with the best records from pool play will advance to the semifinals and compete in a knockout format. The winners advance to the gold medal game while the losers will compete for the bronze medal.
The United States had their best performance in Athens, finishing undefeated and scoring 51 runs while only allowing one, which occured in the gold medal game against Australia. The best news going for the United States is that the core group of players that won gold in Athens will remain with the team in Beijing, including Crystl Bustos and Jennie Finch.
If anyone can slow down the United States, it may be either Japan, who boasts a pitcher that threw the first perfect game in Olympic history, or Australia, the silver medalists in Athens who also has an intimidating veteran pitcher in 36-year-old Tanya Harding.
USA Women's Soccer Loses Wambach To A Leg Injury Hopes for a gold medal in Beijing were significantly lowered yesterday when veteran and star-forward Abby Wambach broke her leg after a collision with Brazilian defender Andreia Rosa in an exhibition match held yesterday against Brazil in San Diego. She will be out for three months and will miss next month's Olympic Games. (Click here for story.)
Wambach, who leads the team in goal scoring, still thinks that the United States has the potential to win the gold medal. And that may be true physically. But yesterday's injury lowered expectations and the confidence of many of the younger players on the team who look up to Wambach as a guide and leader. It will be tough for the United States as they will have to learn how to play without Wambach.
They did win the exhibition match by a score of 1-0. However, three of Brazil's top goal scorers, including Marta, did not play in yesterday's exhibition, though they are expected to play with Brazil in the Olympics. The task to defend the gold medal that USA won in Athens will be much tougher to accomplish without Wambach, though they are still expected to get out of the preliminary round with matches against Norway, New Zealand and Japan in the first round. We won't find out until their first match how much Wambach's injury has affect the team. But the outlook isn't very good.
Superliga: New England Revolution and Guadalajara Remain Undefeated The New England Revolution were able to get away with their second win of the tournament yesterday after being granted a penalty kick in the final moments of their match against Pachuca.
Pachuca is still alive with one win and one loss. Chivas USA is also alive after it's 1-0 win over Santos Laguna, whose second straight loss eliminated them from advancing further in the tournament. On Tuesday, Guadalajara stayed strong with its second win of the tournament over the Houston Dynamo, who stands with one win and one loss after two games. Also in contention is Atlante, who pulled out a 3-2 win over DC United.
As far as the tournament itself, it has been entertaining to watch and hopefully we'll see more people in the stands as we get into the knockout stages. We'll have to see. But I missed soccer since Euro 2008 ended, and this has been a nice fix for my football separation anxiety, especially with the Spanish commentators.
Tour de France update: Britain Has Its Moments While Doping Steals Spotlight Doping has hit the tour again and has resulted in an entire team from withdrawing from the tour. It's sad that cyclists haven't learned yet that the sport is going nowhere because of idiots that don't seem to care about anything but winning. What we need to do though is commend the Tour for uncovering these scandals and taking the necessary steps to fix the situation. While the consequences are certainly not positive, there is a reason why cyclists are tested after every stage. It may taint the image of the Tour, but the fact that action is being taken immediately is better than doing nothing at all.
What needs to be done in the future is prevent these incidents from happening, as each scandal that emerges just further ruins the credibility of the race. But I am comforted with the fact that organizers are doing all it can to rid the sport of drug offenders.
Doping has also stolen the spotlight of Britain's Mark Cavendish, who has made history by becoming the first British rider to win three stages of the same tour. The tour has had its moments with views of spectacular mountain climbs and electric sprints to the finish. Despite the recent drug scandals, I'll keep watching the tour. There are still some good guys out there.
The Open Championship: Truly an Open Field The veterans are struggling while Rocco Mediate has taken the lead in the early round of golf's third major of the year. Mediate was the player who nearly took down Tiger Woods at last month's U.S. Open championship. This time, he doesn't have to fend off Tiger Woods, who is out the rest of the year healing a knee injury that recently underwent surgery.
Mediate is currently -1 after the first round and will be an interesting storyline in a golf tournament that is still new to a world without Tiger Woods. The weather and the course itself could be supporting storylines as the setting has proved to be challenging during today's first round.
For the latest updates and news, visit the offical Open championship website: www.opengolf.com
So now you're up to date on the world in sports. Glad I was able to help. This weekend, we'll talk more golf and also take a look at some of the marquee sports in out countdown to Beijing.
Sorry this post is late, busy day in the life of a blogger...
anyway, today we continue with the countdown to Beijing series with a look at NBC's plan to broadcast the Olympics. But first, the tour de France has been going on for several days now, and since my job is to cover world sports, its only fair to give the world's biggest annual cycling event its share of attention.
Why the Tour just isn't buzzing this year (and why it should)... Since Lance Armstrong left for retirement, the Tour just isn't the same. Especially for us here in the United States, there hasn't been a "Tiger Woods"-like character for us to turn to Versus every morning and pay attention to the tour. It's hard for us to really invest our time and interest to a number of international cyclists who we've never heard of. Granted there are 22 days of the race for us to get to know these cyclists, but I guess the question should be: why would I want to get to know them in the first place?
I'll answer that question later, meanwhile there are other reasons why the tour isn't receiving much attention. Doping scandals from the past two years have played a huge role. A year after Armstrong retired following the 2005 race, Floyd Landis looked like our next American star in cycling after his come from behind win in 2006. But Landis was found guilty for taking synthetic testosterone and though he plead his innocence, he was stripped of the title. This result had several impacts on the sport. Cycling fans and general sports fans like me came to distrust American cycling and found no reason to view the Tour as a fair event.
This point was further proved in 2007 when the Tour was marked by several doping controversies. Three cyclists and two teams left the race due to various doping scandals, including pre-race favorite Alexandre Vinokurov and his Astana team after Vinokurov was found guilty of blood doping. Michael Rasmussen, while still in the yellow jersey after winning Stage 16, was forced to leave the tour after he missed several blood tests and lied about his whereabouts during those scheduled blood tests.
The 2007 tour can be considered one of the lowest points of the history of the race. It led to many withdrawals by primary tour sponsors and certainly must have decreased the number of fans that were loyal to the sport.
But in my eyes, the Tour de France continues to be the one prize that most road cyclists strive for. Not even the World Championships or even the Olympic Games can compare to a Tour de France win. And it's this kind of pressure that may have caused many cyclists to turn to doping. But the international governing body of cycling, UCI, has made it its duty to enforce progress and remove doping from the tainted sport.
The Astana team that was heavily involved in last year's doping scandals have been barred from competing in this year's tour. Last year's green jersey winner, Tom Boonen, has also been barred from this year's race after failing a doping test earlier this year. Clearly there is some progress being made in making this year's tour a clean event. I have yet to hear of any immediate doping scandals concerning this year's Tour.
Which is why it is a good idea to give this year's tour a chance. Though what is normally one of the summer's biggest sporting events will be overshadowed by the upcoming Olympic Games, the Tour de France is the U.S.'s only chance to see the world's top cyclists perform on one of the most challenging stages in sports. And though the United States is not at the top of the cycling world like Lance Armstrong was several years ago, there are still plenty of young cyclists to admire. Several cyclists, including today's winner, Mark Cavendish of Britain, are relishing tour victories. Even the French have had their day in the sun after winning both Stage 3 and the yellow jersey on the same day.
It's something that I appreciate about the Tour, that individual riders can have their shining moments while trying to capture the overall title. The tour always has its share of stories as it rides around through the streets and mountains of France. And given that the Tour has its worst doping scandals behind them, its a sporting event that we need to start trusting again to give us what us sports fans love, great and fair competition.
And all of what NBC said in that article is true and surely a positive for all Olympic fans across the country. But beware, it turns out that NBC's Olympic plan can be too good to be true. This are the flaws that I have heard from other blogs and articles:
Sure, NBCOlympics.com will stream 2200 hours of coverage. But none of that live coverage will be of the marquee events like gymnastics and track and field. In an AP Report from last week, the Web will still be taking a backseat to TV.
No other website or news organization (or blog including this one) is allowed to post videos of events prior to their broadcast on NBC. Actually, we can't post videos from the games at all.
NBCOlympics.com will not stream any events that are scheduled to air on TV. So for us hoping to watch the Men's 100 meter final, we'll have to wait until it airs on NBC 12 hours after the event is completed.
So what's the impact of these restrictions? Viewers and internet users (and bloggers like me) may be flocking to illegal P2P video sharing sites to see other broadcasters feeds. (I won't mention where, you'll have to find it yourself). NBC needs to understand that the Web should be working with TV, not behind TV especially concerning top notch events. But consider the progress they've made from Sydney 2000 when they just had a couple of articles and pictures on the NBCOlympics website. I think this year's coverage of the Olympics is a big step up from then and certainly expected.
Many of the world's broadcasters are streaming big events on websites (look at BBC Sport). NBC looked like it was headed in this direction after it streamed the Men's Ice Hockey game live from the Torino Winter Olympics in 2006. I think we'll take what NBC is giving us now rather than taking less from them. Also, consider this: American broadcasters never pay attention to the marquee sports of the Olympics during non-Olympic years, so we can't expect them to broadcast it live (though they should). But they won't, because NBC paid wayyy tooo much money for these Olympics and they aren't going to gamble with advertisers by broadcasting marquee sports live in the morning (but they should, especially because the Today Show is doing so well in the ratings).
Overall, I'm happy with the coverage NBC is offering. I'm a crazy sports fan so if there's Olympic coverage every hour of the day, I'm down for it. And look at it this way, if you're a big Olympics freak like me, they'll be something on TV about the Olympics 24 hours a day that you'll forget to check who won that Men's 100 meter race by the time it airs on NBC.
As a special bonus to the readers, HERE IS THE ENTIRE NBC UNIVERSAL OLYMPIC SCHEDULE embedded below:
Thanks so much for reading! I hope I have informed and enlightened you with the opinion and information that I have given you. Come back tomorrow and we'll discuss some baseball and maybe even cricket (maybe...)
The Olympic trials are over here in the United States and over the next four weeks, the eyes of the world will slowly shift to Beijing. In exactly one month from now, the Chinese capital city of Beijing will host the world's best sporting event, the Olympic Games. So everyday until the opening ceremonies begin at 8:08PM local time on 8/8/08, NOW Sports Daily will preview every aspect of the games as possible, from the elusive matchups in each sport, to introducing you to several unknown sports like BMX racing, to how to watch the Olympics here in the United States.
Countdown to Beijing: 30 Days Left With less than 31 days left until the Games begin, what better way to start the countdown than introducing you to the host city of Beijing, China.
The International Olympic Committee elected Beijing to host the Games of the XXIX Olympiad on July 13, 2001, beating four other cities in the bid to host the games: Osaka, Paris, Toronto and Istanbul. For the past seven years, China has been rapidly preparing for these games, which should serve as a "coming-out" party for a nation that has made great economic progress and prosperity.
In the process, the Beijing Organizing Comittee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG) has built 12 new venues, renovated 11 and built 8 temporary structures for a total of 37 venues that will host 302 events in 28 sports. Approximately 10,500 athletes from over 200 nations will take part in the competition.
Two venues that stand out the most are the Olympic Water Cube (Beijing National Aquatics Centre) and the Bird's Nest (Beijing National Stadium). The two venues will host aquatic and athletic events respectively. I can't really describe why they stand out better than these two pictures.
I have never seen an exterior of a sports venue like those two, and they do truly make these Olympic Games unique, architecturally speaking.
Some basics regarding the games itself (just in case, I swear I'm not insulting your intelligence):
Beijing 2008 will be held over a period of 17 days starting with the opening ceremonies on Friday, August 8 and will end with the closing ceremonies on Sunday, August 24.
Competition will actually start two days before the opening ceremony on August 6, with preliminaries in the women's football (soccer) tournament.
Some football games will be held in cities outside of Beijing and the equestrian events will be held in Hong Kong due to quarantine concerns. This will be the second time two separate nations will host Olympic events. The equestrian events were held in Stockholm, Sweden in 1956 while Melbourne, Australia hosted the rest of the Games.
The modern Olympics began in Athens in 1896. The games during the VI, XII and XIII Olympiads have been cancelled three times to World Wars I and II.
This will be the first Olympic Games to be broadcast entirely in high definition and expected to reach over 4 billion viewers around the world.
The official slogan of the games is "One World, One Dream," the logo is entitled "Dancing Beijing" and there will be five mascots, each representing the five colors of the Olympic rings.
Those are just some basic facts that I throughout there. Each day leading up to the Games, I'll focus on one aspect of the upcoming Olympic Games. Tomorrow, for example, we'll look at NBC's coverage of the games as part of out "WHAT UP?! Media" weekly series.
All-Star Game Coming Up in One Week New York City and Yankee Stadium will be hosting the baseball world next week with the 2008 All-Star Game. It's quite fitting since this is the last year in the history of the old Yankee Stadium before they move into the new Yankee Stadium. This is the first time since 1977 that the game will be held in New York.
The All-Star roster was announced last Sunday and taking a look at the starters, I don't see many surprises. Lots of Yankees and Red Sox players playing together, including Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez, both playing in their 12th All-Star Game. I can say that with how well the Rays are doing, its a little disappointing to see a lack of Tampa Bay players, though I guess the public hasn't gotten to know them yet.
The National League is a little more mixed with the Cubs having several more players in the game than other NL teams. The topic of choice right now seems to be about the Final Vote, where there is one spot left for each team, and five players in contention to capture that final spot, including Jason Giambi who is using his mustache as a campaign slogan to capture the final vote.
We'll talk more about the game as it gets closer to the first pitch. Meanwhile, if you're in New York check out these upcoming events:
DHL All-Star Fan Fest, starting from Friday, July 11 until Tuesday, July 15 at the Jacob Javitz Center
Taco Bell All-Star Sunday including the XM All-Star Futures Game and the Taco Bell Celebrities and Legends Softball Game
State Farm Home Run Derby on Monday July 14
All-Star Game on Tuesday, July 15.
Go to this link for more on the 2008 All-Star Game:
And finally, imagine having to play a playoff game only to find out that one of the players is ineligible to play. That was the case in Britain where the Cricket Twenty20 quarterfinal was postponed:
Felipe Trueba/European Pressphoto Agency Rafael Nadal posing for photographers after his victory over Roger Federer in the men's final at Wimbledon on Sunday.
That's all for now, thanks for reading and come back tomorrow, we'll discuss NBC's Olympic Coverage and hopefully I can cram in something about the Tour de France.
Former Senior Sports Editor of the Spectator of Stuyvesant High School. Been covering high school sports for three years, now its time to move on to the real world.
Felipe Trueba/European Pressphoto Agency
