Daily Sports News

Former European and Common wealth 400m champion Iwan Thomas said he is not bearing in mind a comeback. He added saying he trains for enjoyment under the clarified comment that suggested he was tempting to return to competition. Thomas said he still love training however not thinking about a comeback. He recalls about returning as a competitor was asked at a charity dinner that was blown a bit.

Thomas won Commonwealth and European titles in 1998 unfortunate fall in career in recent years was due to injury, which forced him to miss out the last Commonwealth Games in Melbourne in 2006. He remains as the 400m record holder setting this in 44.36 seconds in 1997 at Birmingham. Thomas mentions he would love to run quickly again and never know about the future however, he has other commitment, which is going on. Thomas added saying he would be happy to offer any assistance to the team as a squad for the 2010 Common wealth Games in Delhi. He was semi tempted glancing at the timetable charts and did planned to participate at the Common Wealth. Thomas was unable to defend the individual title in 2002. He also participated at the Great Britain for the Sydney Olympics in 2000. If he happened to be injury free then running seems to be his passion. Thomas said he never got a chance to say goodbye from his career. He never was retired went out from ground due to injury.

Australia reclaimed topped one day ranking after their 111 runs victory against England in Nottingham, Australia in lead of 6-0 in seven match series must win the final match to enter the Champion Trophy. The main contribution for sixth one-day match for Australia is from wicketkeeper Tim Paine.

Tim Paine made 111 runs out of 148 balls with the total score of 296-8 went ahead of current world leaders South Africa in ODI and returned to top world ranking. Miserable defeat of England just leaves one defeat away to 7-0 series somewhat that never happened in international series of cricket. Captain Strauss was hurt by his team poor performance and cannot defend his team when few days remained to begin ICC Champions Trophy in South Africa. He described his team batting as a horror show and a poor performance.

Michael Schumacher is all set to return to F1, he will be on track at the European Grand Prix in Valencia after a gap of two years and nine months. After taking retirement at the end of the season in 2006, Schumacher has been a consultant and a test driver for the Ferrari. He will take the place of a recuperating Felipe Massa who suffered head injuries at Hungaroring during qualifying. Schumacher will be replacing and racing for Massa and is expected to continue till Massa is fit to return.

It is said that Schumacher agreed to return to F1 due to his team loyalty and also his proximity to Massa, as he has been helping the Brazilian shape up his career from the time he was his co-driver in the last season of his retirement. Schumacher won five of his seven world titles with the Italian Team F1 team Ferrari.

This will be a great challenge for the German Ace to be ready to race in just three weeks. He would be only able to step in the 2009 car on 21st august practice as the new FIA rules don’t allow in-season testing. Schumacher had last stepped into a F1 car in April 2008. The much bigger challenge for Schumacher will be to overcome the injuries sustained in a bike race in Feb this year. Human body especially the neck region comes under high G-forces n a F1 race. But knowing Schumacher, its looks he will be ready for the European Grand Prix and he is such a fighter that elevated him to 91 career Grand Prix wins.

This news was revealed on the same day when BMW decided to quit Formula 1 racing at the current season, last season Honda had quit. The reason for BMW quitting could be the recession, but the company says that it wants to use the money on developing greener technologies.

Now the wait is on, as it will be the first time to see Schumacher taking Hamilton. Also the race is a city track and Schumacher like city circuits more then regular Grand Prix tracks.

The English dream came to an end on Friday when Roddick defeated Murray in the Wimbledon semifinals. Murray could have been the first man to reach the Wimbledon finals since 1938 but he lost to Roddick on a score 6-4, 4-6, 7-6, 7-6.

Roddick was seeded sixth and has been a grand slam winner himself (2003 US Open) showed all the aggression and temperament which took him to the World No.1 rank. Roddick took the first set easily by breaking Murray’s in the very first serving game and then followed it with his perfect serving.

Murry came back strongly in the second set and broke Roddick ‘s serve and leveled the score to one set each.  But his aggression did not last long as he could not convert the three break point of the first game in the third set. He also failed to convert the set point to his advantage in the tiebreak giving Roddick a 2-1 lead in the match. The last set also went into a tiebreak and was won by Roddick.

Roddick showed that he still had the powerful serve in his arsenal when he fired the fastest serve of the tournament at an astonishing 143 MPH. Roddick in a post match interview said that he played this best game and many people had ruled him out and had thus all the pressure was on his young opponent.

Roddick now faces the Five Times Wimbledon Champion, The Magician Federer. Roddick has a enormous task ahead of him as he has only won 2 matches against Federer and lost 18. In his last 3 encounter at Wimbledon, Roddic has lost to Federer thrice. But one this is there that this independence day for Roddick will surely be different.

On a day kissed by rain, Federer accomplished the unthinkable, he won the FRENCH OPEN. The mixed tears of joy and relief ran down Federer’s face as he won the coveted French open title, the only trophy missing in his gallery of impressive titles. The Swiss beat Soderling ,7-6 and 6-4 in less than two hours, on a day which could have been spoiled by rain. But all the elements were in Federer’s favor as Soderling hit the net on reply to Federer’s serve.

The match will be a true spectacle to many a Federer fan as he displayed his once exquisite form, hitting aces, dropshots, etc to thrash Soderling. The first set was won easily by Federer in less than 25 minutes as he took four break points and won the set 6-1. The only moment during the match when Fedex was unnerved was during the second set when a spectator ran onto the court with a Barcelona flag and tried to place a hat on Federer’s head. Truely a huge disappointment to the French authorities.

Federer lost three points in a row after this incident as Soderling leveled it 2-2. But Federer quickly recovered his composure to take the set 7-6 in the tie breaker by 6-1. This set lasted for 49 minutes as Federer produced four aces by service. In the third set, Federer won the break in the first game of the set, leading 1-0, then after that each player won their respective service games, and on the score of 5-4, Federer served for the match and won the third set and the match.

By winning the French open, Federer became only the sixth man in tennis history to win all the four slam titles, with Andre Agassi being the last man to do it in 1999, presenting him with the trophy. What an irony it was, to watch Agassi present Federer the trophy, to equal Agassi rival, Pete Sampras’s record of 14 grand slam titles.

“This was my greatest victory” said Federer although it was Soderling’s win over Nadal, the four time French Open champion, who was attempting to become the first man to win five in succession. Soderling, playing his first grand slam final, and watched by fellow Swede Bjorn Borg who has won this title six times said “You gave me a lesson how to play” and later said “To me you are the greatest player in history”.

Federer has finally achieved the French Open title can now and go on with the rest of his career without worrying about never winning the French Open……

Sebastian Vettel finished as the leader of the qualifying by taking has third career pole position. The most amazing thing about Sebastian Vettel was that he finished at the top in all the three qualifying session, which was a sign of his domination of the Turkish circuit. Red Bull had two cars finishing in the top 5 with Mark Webber qualifying fourth. The dream run for Brawn GP continued in Istanbul with Jenson Button who was a bit conservative but still managed to get the front row of the grid by qualifying second fastest behind Sebastian Vettel. Rubens Barrichello though managed to take the third position but had to encounter traffic and that could have been the reason for him loosing a fraction of a second.

Toyota’s Jarno Trulli drove an impressive fifth clearly showing his experience and driving skills in the tough Istanbul circuit. After a devastating start of the season, Ferrari are showing positive results to the changes adopted in the new car and their two cars qualified sixth and seventh. Kimi Räikkönen lines up in the third row of the grid while his Brazilian counterpart Felipe Massa will start the race in the fourth row along side Fernando Alonso of Renault.

Disaster for McLaren-Mercedes happened when Lewis Hamilton failed to even clear Q1, his car was not responding properly raising doubts about the current car. Now it’s very much clear that the defending champion won’t be able to defend his crown this season.It was also a good showing by Force India driver Adrian Sutil, who managed to clear Q1.

Some facts about the race, first its one of the few races that happens anti clock wise. As the circuit is not used for anything apart from F1 it also has its own impact on the tyres. The is a lot of wear and tear on the tyres and also the temperature and wind also make a lot of difference to the race.

2009 FORMULA 1 ING TURKISH GRAND PRIX QUALIFYING RESULTS

Not an ideal start what the reigning champion Rafael Nadal had expected on his fifth consecutive French Open title.World number one Rafael Nadal hobbled to second round with a victory over Brazilian Marcos Daniel in straight sets 7-5, 6-4, 6-3. It took Rafael Nadal two hours and twenty three minutes to beat the Brazilian. Rafael Nadal has a clean record at Roland Garros and has never lost a match since his debut in 2005. Wit the win Rafael Nadal also improved his record 29-0 at Roland Garros and equaled Christ Evert’s all-time record of consecutive match wins at the French Open. But Rafael Nadal showed that he is still human when we was down in the second set 1-3 but smartly managed to win the set 6-4.

During the course of the match Rafael Nadal broke Daniels serve seven times and hit 36 winners. Rafael Nadal had 32 unforced errors during the match.

In a post match interview Rafael Nadal said

“The first match is always difficult. I was a little nervous because this tournament is very special to me, but I feel good.”

On being asked about this choice of bright clothing, Rafael Nadal said “It’s the same reason why I wore white and yellow two weeks ago – because its better then dressing the same color every week.”

Rafael Nadal will now face either Teimuraz Gabashvili or Igor Kunitsyn of Russia in the second round of French Open.

Some other results for the day were:
Andy Roddick beat French wildcard Romain Jouan 6-2, 6-4, 6-2.
Dinara Safina demolished Britain’s Anne Keothavong  6-0, 6-0.
Russian Maria Sharapova beat Anastasiya Yakimova of Belarus 3-6, 6-1, 6-2.
Venus Williams beats fellow American Bethanie Mattek-Sands 6-1, 4-6, 6-2

Jesnson Button continued his good form and captured another pole position for Brawn, his fourth pole in six races. Everyone thought that Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen would take the pole in Monaco when he clocked 1m 14.927 but Button came from behind and made himself the star of the day by clocking the fastest lap at 1m 14.902s. This season Button and his team Brawn has impressed and shocked everyone giving sleepless nights to others like McLaren and Farrari. Button’s team mate and second in the driver standing for the season, Rubens Barrichello celebrated his 37th birthday by grabbing the third position with a lap timing of 1m 15.077s.

Defending World Champion Lewis Hamilton was considered as the pre-race favorite crashed out in the first qualifying session and could just manage 16th position. He would start the race on the 8th row of the grid on Sunday. Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel showed his driving skills and form to take the fourth place ahead of Ferrari driver Felipe Massa. Massa was lucky that he could still race after surviving the Q1 accident where he damaged the nose cone of his car in the swimming pool section of the race. Vettel Clocked 1m 15.271s and Massa clocked 1m 15.437s. Nico Rosberg and Heikki Kovalainen came sixth and seventh with a timing of 1m 15.455s and 1m 15.516s. Mark Webber drving the second Red Bull clocked 1m 15.653s taking him to the 8th spot. Alonso clocked 1m 16.009s and would share the fifth row on the grid with Williams’ Kazuki Nakajima who clocked 1m 17.344s.

The only accident in the Q2 happened with Nelson Piquet and finished 12th behind Toro Rosso driver Sebastien Buemi. Force Indian had a great qualifying with both the cars reaching Q2, Giancarlo Fisichella finished 13th while his German counterpart Adrian Sutil finished 15th. Sebastien Bourdais of the Toro Rosso team finished 14th and shares the grid with Fisichella. Sutil shares the grid with Hamilton who was out dude to Q1 accident. On the 9th row of the grid are the two drivers from BMW Sauber Team, Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica. The last row on the grid is shared by the two Toyota drivers Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock. The weather forecast for Sunday is clear and sunny and it is sure to be a great race day. Monaco is the most technical circuit and has a history of crashes and surprise winners. We just have to see who take the checkered flag at one of the most popular races of the Formula One season.

Jesnson Button

Kimi Raikkonen