phelps

do you think game #2 was crazy and exciting? well, just give a look at game #5... this was one of the most unbelievable baseball games I've ever seen...5 and a half hours of big plays, big mistakes, changes of lead in the scoreline... for sure, something that people with their hearts not perfectly fit (nor the Dodgers fans) shouldn't watch... in game #1, Keuchel vs Kershaw was an amazing duel, which came up as one of the shortest WS games ever because of the total domination by the 2 pitchers... yesterday night, insted, both starters were beaten heavily since the beginning, this resulting in their shortest outing in the PO and in a bullpen battle where the team giving up the less home runs eventually got the win...and that team were the Houston Astros... the key of the game was, once again, a capital mistake by LA's manager Roberts, who at a certain point didn't respect his own pre-game decisions and put relief pitcher Morrow on...the outcome of this move was that Houston scored 4 points on just 6 pitches from a gassed out Morrow and took a 3-run lead, which LA could only tie but not fully overcome in the 9th inning... finally, in the 10th inning the Dodgers closer Jansen, too tired because of the clearly wrong managing of the pitching staff by mr. Roberts, gave up the winning run to Houston, putting LA in a very deep hole, since on Tuesday in game #6 the Astros will have their superstar pitcher Verlander on the mound and for LA it will be very hard to face him and try to take the WS to the 7th and final game...

Florian Gruber had a bad injury to his shoulder...probably he will need an operation and will be out for the season, meaning that the young emerging Italian Duo Gruber/Kainzwalder will miss the world cup 2017/2018 and, above all, the Pyeongchang Olympics... all of our hopes in the Doubles competition are now on the shoulder of the veteran duo Oberstolz/Gruber and of the disappointing (so far) duo Rieder/Rastner... as 3rd sled, in fact, we're going to start a junior couple (Malleier/Nagler)...

and finally, it's the LA Dodgers who score a big inning in the top of the 9th and get the win in game #4... the series is now tied 2-2... the first 8 innings were dominated by the pitchers, with LA collecting just 4 hits (for 1 run) and Houston doing even worse, getting their only run until that moment with just one hit (Springer's HR) off a very effective Alex Wood... but in the 9th the Astros manager Hinch took the decision he should have never taken, giving the ball to his designated closer, Giles, who's totally out of mental shape...and he and his collegue Musgrove were just destroyed by the LA bats, despite being totally out of sync in the last 2 games... tonight (8 p.m. NY time, 1 a.m. of Monday CET) the pivotal game #5 is scheduled once again in Houston... for the Dodgers it's Clayton Kershaw's turn, for Houston Dallas Keuchel will start on the mound...it's the same duel we already saw in game #1 (and it was a classy one)... with Verlander ready to start game #6 for the Astros, there's no need to say that LA desperately need a great game from their ace if they want to keep the hope of winning their first World Series title after 29 long and painful years alive... on the other hand, for the Astros this is their best chance to complete their masterpiece and try to win their first World Series title ever... I'm not saying: "it's all or nothing", but I think we're really close to something like that... by the way, let's go Dodgers! now and forever!

Men's Team Epee (Bern, SUI) Gold: South Korea Silver: Russia Bronze: Japan Semifinals Results: South Korea b. Japan 27-26 Russia b. Italy 35-31 Bronze Medal Match Result: Japan b. Italy 18-15 Gold Medal Match Result: South Korea b. Russia 45-39 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/559/results/rank

Women's Team Sabre (Orleans, FRA) Gold: Russia Silver: France Bronze: South Korea Semifinals Results: France b. South Korea 45-39 Russia b. Italy 45-41 Bronze Medal Match Result: South Korea b. Italy 45-43 Gold Medal Match Result: Russia b. France 45-32 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/825/results/rank

Women's Individual Sabre (Orleans, FRA) Final Results: Gold: Rossella Gregorio (ITA) Silver: Loreta Gulotta (ITA) Bronze: Manon Brunet (FRA) & Bianca Pascu (ROU) Semifinals: Gregorio b. Brunet 15-9 Gulotta b. Pascu 15-14 Gold Medal Match: Gregorio b. Gulotta 15-6 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Yesterday's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/467/results/rank

Men's Individual Epee (Bern, SUI) Final Results: Gold: Park Sang Young (KOR) Silver: Bogdan Nikishin (UKR) Bronze: Volodymyr Stankevych (UKR) & Igor Reizlin (UKR) Semifinals: Park b. Stankevych 15-11 Nikishin b. Reizlin 8-6 Gold Medal Match: Park b. Nikishin 15-8 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/385/results/rank

yeah, but they didn't get the same attention of the NBA and NFL players... actually, I think that nobody in the US does know what they did... by the way, this week it's time for the men's Epee and the women's Sabre to start their respective World Cup season campaign... in today's Individual events, we're in front of a Ukranian festival in Bern (men's Epee), with 3 of them reaching the semifinals (to be contested later this afternoon, at 5 p.m CET - live streaming available on Youtube...the link on the official site of the event: HERE)... in Orleans (women's Sabre) we are at the quarterfinal stage (at 6 p.m. CET - also in this case live streaming available through the official website of the competition: HERE) and we still have 3 Italians, 2 French women and 1 girl each from Romania, Poland and Hungary left... to be noticed, the Russian complete failure and Arianna Errigo's best result in a Sabre World Cup event so far (she went out in the round of last #16, losing only 14-15 against Manon Brunet of France)...

well, I also like her, too... but frankly she's always too much on the edge... now she's experienced enough to know that she should be able to find a reasonable balance between attacking at her best and avoiding excessive risks in the most dangerous corners of the course... as @dcro wrote, she already missed out on quite a few top results because of her "all or nothing" attitude... she has to realize that she's no longer a promising youngster...now she's one of the top racers in the world in at least 3 different disciplines, who's expected by fans, coaches and officials to capitalize on her talent and get some medals...

yeah, I know NOS Teletext has always all results... I was used to take advantage of that when I was able to see (don't ask me how ) the main Dutch TV channels on the satellite (I'm talking of the 2004-2007 period, the golden age of sat tv emulators, when almost all european networks were up for grabs for tv "pirates")...

p.s. thanks for the streaming link (even if today I don't have so much time to follow all the action carefully)...

more or less... but it's all on ORF director... he did everything he could to boiycott her first WC success...first he showed the graphics saying she's never won a WC race before and then when she was at the start he went on with another graphics saying she would have been the oldest WC winner if she was to succeed... and of course she only got third at the end of the day... however, new season but old attitude by Bassino and, above all, Goggia... their skiing IQ is really -2743...

this looks some good news... I really hope she's on her full recovery path... p.s. they also showed Marianne Timmer on the stands...nowadays she looks even more beautiful than in her racing times...

as expected, at home the Astros bats got hot and jumped all over Darvish early... so the game was basically over after just a couple of innings... McCullers had another excellent outing after the unbelievable relief appearance in game #7 of the ALCS, escaping a potential disaster in the 3rd (when he was affected by the long interval between his second and third effort, due to the long half inning with Houston at bat)... meanwhile LA offense did perform something too little and too late... now LA is at high risk to pay a very costly prize to Roberts' idiotic mistakes in game #2...they really need a 5-star outing from Alex Wood later tonight in game #4 (8 p.m. NY time, 2 a.m. on Sunday CET)... and it's all but sure they're gonna get it...

quite surprising results, I'd say... p.s. am I the only one who has some "unhortodox" thoughts about Verweij's "hidden" training "over there"?

here in Italy it doesn't work, unless we go with a VPN (even a free one, like Hola)...

I hope it's just a naive boutade of a joker inside the IOC... I don't really understand them anymore...they're just killing the world of Sport and the Olympic Games...

meanwhile I know very well who I cheer for...it's 29 years I'm waiting a week like this...go Dodgers! by the way, last night's game #2 was very tense, close and one of the craziest ever in the WS history... Verlander did his usual very good job, but it wouldn't have been enough if the LA relievers didn't waste the 2-run advantage they had in the late innings... until now, they have been the real strenght of the team, but yesterday Morrow and Jansen blew the lead and forced the game to go to the extra-innings, where all the overmanaging mistakes of mr.Roberts, the *** acting as the Dodgers' manager, came out all at the same time and let the LA mound empty when it shouldn't have happened and so the Dodgers conceded too many runs to the Astros bats and finally came up short on their desperate comeback attempt in the bottom of the 11th inning... to be noticed that in yesterday's game a record was broken...there have been something like 8 home runs, the highest number in a WS game history... next game is scheduled for Friday night (8 p.m. NY time, 2 a.m. of Saturday in Central Europe) in Houston... for the Dodgers it's already been announced that the starting pitcher will be the Japanese Yu Darvish, for Houston the choice should go to Morton or McCullers (the one who won't start in game #3, almost surely will be the game #4 starter)... on paper, this situation makes the Dodgers big favourite once again...but you know...this is the World Series...and in moments like this anything can happen, some of the most amazing "Cinderella stories" have been written in the MLB showdown... however, let's go Dodgers...now and forever!

Last night the 2017 World Series started in Los Angeles, where the Dodgers defeated the Houston Astros by a score of 3-1 in game #1... Kershaw on the mound and Taylor and Turner at the plate were the heroes of the local team, meanwhile Houston could find just a single run on a Bregman HR in the 4th inning... tonight is already time for game #2, with Hill as the starting pitcher for L.A. and Verlander (the ALCS MVP) for Houston... should the Dodgers win also tonight's game, I don't see how the Astros could even think about a comeback, going into the weaker part of the starting pitchers' rotation (and it doesn't matter if the 3rd, 4th and, if needed, 5th game will be played in Texas)...

decent results through the entire weekend for Italy...podium places in all the competitions and nice win by Mara Navarria in the women's individual epee (today's team silver in the women's epee is especially good and encouraging, since this is our worst discipline since many years and because finally we have a couple of new faces in our roster...even if I don't understand why they still chose Alice Clerici instead of the surely stronger Eleonora De Marchi among the youngsters) ... Fencing is always our best chance to shine in the world of sports...

Men's Team Foil in Cairo Gold: United States Silver: Russia Bronze: Italy Semifinals Results: Russia b. France 44-43 United States b. Italy 45-42 Bronze Medal Match Result: Italy b. France 45-41 Gold Medal Match Result: United States b. Russia 45-26 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/205/results/rank

Women's Team Epee in Tallinn Gold: France Silver: Italy Bronze: China Semifinals Results: Italy b. China 44-43 France b. Germany 45-43 Bronze Medal Match Result: China b. Germany 32-31 Gold Medal Match Result: France b. Italy 43-39 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/751/results/rank

Men's Recurve Team World Title number #3 in their history for Italy... France guys (in particular Chirault) did really feel the pressure and were never close to catch our team... after last year's epic fail at the Rio Olympics, this is very much a rejuvenating success for our archery...shame that the girls (who won the Junior Team World Title just a few weeks ago) did so bad in the ranking round and didn't even make it to the direct elimination table draw (they were only 17th at the end)... in the individual events we didn't have the same expectattions, but frankly at least Nespoli (3rd overall in the ranking round) did waste an enormous chance to reach the top 4...he had a really "open" path to the semis and couldn't take advantage of such a gift... decent results came also in the Compound Team events, but the individual results were well below the expectations... so, it was a tournament with so many high and lows that makes a fair overall evaluation very difficult...let's say that at least we got the total number of medals we could expect before the Worlds started, even if sometimes we overperformed and in some other occasion we definitely underperformed...

Men's Individual Foil (Cairo, EGY) Final Results: Gold: Richard Kruse (GBR) Silver: Alessio Foconi (ITA) Bronze: Cheung Ka Long (HKG) & Race Imboden (USA) Semifinals: Foconi b. Imboden 15-11 Kruse b. Cheung 15-6 Gold Medal Match: Kruse b. Foconi 15-5 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Yesterday's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/135/results/rank

this weekend Women's Epee (in Tallinn, EST) and Men's Foil (Cairo, EGY) are on stage in the 2017/2018 Fencing World Cup... Foconi (ITA), who defeated Imboden (USA) by a score of 15-11 and Kruse (GBR), who defeated Cheung (HKG) 15-6 are the finalists in the Men's Individual Foil event... meanwhile the Women's Individual Epee is already over... here are the final results: Gold: Mara Navarria (ITA) Silver: Tatiana Gudkova (RUS) Bronze: Julia Beljajeva (EST) & Emese Szasz-Kovacs (HUN) Semifinals: Navarria b. Szasz-Kovacs 15-13 Gudkova b. Beljajeva 15-8 Gold Medal Match: Navarria b. Gudkova 15-12 Here is the Full Final Ranking (and Results) from Today's competition: http://fie.org/competitions/2018/80/results/rank