phelps

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Men's 25m Rapid Fire Pistol Gold: Lin Junmin Silver: Oliver Geis Bronze: Jorge Alvarez No second medal in the home world cup stage for Christian Reitz...he entered the final with the second qualification score (behind the Chinese LIn, eventual winner), but in the last act he had an awful 4th series and only managed to end up in 6th (last) place...

I just watched the Euro Hockey League final... and I must say that I really DO NOT LIKE this stupid new scoring system with the field goals giving 2 points and the goals coming off penalty corners giving just 1 point... c'mon, man! this is not basketball with free throws, 2-pointers and 3-pointers...this is Hockey...and a goal is a goal...STOP! p.s. however, HC Bloemendaal (NED) won the European Club title once again (today, they won 8-2 [4-1, with the "old", traditional scoring system] against HC Kampong, also from NED)...

they should keep the 1000m as the only "Olympic distance" (like 2000m is the olympic distance in Rowing) and have 12 Olympic races (K1, K2, K4, C1, C2, C4 for both men and women) over that length... but I'm not the IOC...

Chiccooooooo!!!!! Finally, Francesco Molinari wins a big tournament (the European PGA @ Wentworth) after a very long time, thanks to a bogey-free 3rd and final round (1st player to do it since Colin Montgomery in 1999)... but McIlroy got very close to turn things around at the last hole, when he missed an eagle shot which could have put enormous pressure on Molinari before his last par shot by just a couple of inches... Molinari is only the 3rd Italian player to win this historical European tournament after Costantino Rocca (1996) and Matteo Manassero (2013)...

well, in the women's lightest weights it's not the first time we have some very young talents (Ryoko Tamura came up when she was only 16, just to name one of the most famous of all times)...meanwhile in the heaviest categories normally people need more time to complete their physical growth and also to earn a bit more experience to succeed (that's why Akira Sone has more "good press" and she's seen more as a "phenomenon" than her lighter collegues with the same age)... on the other hand, I don't see Bilodid last that long in her current weight class...as a Caucasian woman, he's gonna grow up that much to force her to jump to a superior weight class (which would put her in the same category of Abe)... and I don't see those girls dominate for an age...maybe a couple of Olympic cycles, but not more than that... different situation, instead, is Akira Sone's...she's really a candidate to become eponymous of this age in the hevyweights (even if there's always a chance that a new younger star would eventually come up in the next few years and put her reign at risk)... however, at the moment I don't see anybody stopping her to win Tokyo's Gold medal...then...who knows?

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Women's 10m Air Pistol Gold: Olena Kostevych Silver: Wang Qian Bronze: Kim Min Jung and finally, Olena got her revenge over the Chinese shooters, who beat her in the 25m pistol 2 days ago... only 6th place for Anna Korakaki who entered the final with the best score by far in the qualification round...

3rd and last day @ the Chinese Grand Prix, as usual dedicated to the heaviest classes... and Japan renewed their lead in the medal table with 2 more Gold medals (both among the women, Ruika Sato in the -78kg and teenage wonder Akira Sone in the +78kg)... on the men's side, instead, it was mainly a Korean day, with 2 fully successful campaigns (Gwak Dong Han, -90kg and Cho Gu Ham, -100kg)... finally, the last of the men's event, the +100kg class, went to Mongolia (Tuvshinbayar Naidan, Olympic Gold medallist in the -100kg class in 2008 and Silver medallist in the same weight in 2012)... so, in this weekend Japan showed their supremacy once again with 7 Gold medals, then South Korea following with 3 and Canada, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and the Netherlands all ending up with "just" 1 Gold medal each...

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Women's 50m 3-Position Rifle Gold: Elaheh Ahmadi Silver: Chen Dongqi Bronze: Zhang Binbin great success for the Iranian woman, who entered the final as the last qualified shooter, but then changed gear and won the gold medal with some margin... meanwhile, disaster for Petra Zublasing (34th place, not even the best Italian), who's not having the early part of the season everybody would expect from her...

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Men's 10m Air Rifle Gold: Illia Charheika Silver: Vladimir Maslennikov Bronze: Lu Shao-Chuan

Day #2 @ the Chinese Grand Prix and Japan still on top of the medal table thanks to 2 more gold medals (Takeshi Sasaki, men's -81kg and Aimi Nouchi, women's -63kg)... the other gold medals from today's action went to South Korea (An Changrim, men's -73kg) and the Netherlands (Sanne Van Dijke, women's -70kg)... tomorrow the last 5 weight classes will be on stage...

yeah...it means that he's really a talented guy, not just a "machine"...

EPO = minor doping offence? really? p.s. that's the most they can be sanctioned with for this kind of infraction (based on the MLB Players Association CBA)... CBA = Collective Bargaining Agreement

just another Black Friday for Sport in general (and Cycling in particular)... and I'm not talking of Amazon-alike Black Fridays...but the Stock Exchange-alike ones...

I know that... however, she officially represents Canada...so, it's 3 gold for JPN and 1 for KAZ and CAN (and not 4 for JPN)...

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Men's 10m Air Pistol Gold: Oleh Omelchuk Silver: Christian Reitz Bronze: Pu Qifeng Women's 25m Pistol Gold: Xiong Yaxuan Silver: Yao Yushi Bronze: Olena Kostevych

Japan took 3 gold medals in day #1 of the Chinese Grand Prix, thanks to Ami Kondo (women's -48kg), Uta Abe (women's -52kg) and Joshiro Maruyama (men's -66kg)... the remaining titles from today's action went to Kazakhstan (Yeldos Smetov, men's -60kg) and Canada (Christa Deguchi, women's -57kg)... very disappointing performance by the few Italian judo players starting today (I'm especially upset about poor Elios Manzi's comeback after a long pause due to a bad knee injury)...

finally, a medal for Italy in a rifle/pistol discipline (after a fierce battle between De Nicolo and Stefanovic, SRB, who tried a late comeback but got just short in the final standing shots)... however, Yang and Kamenskiy were just a class apart... in general, not such an exciting final, except for the bronze medal race...

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Men's 50m 3-Position Rifle Gold: Yang Haoran Silver: Sergey Kamenskiy Bronze: Marco De Nicolo

470 Open European Championships 2018 (Bourgas, BUL) Men's 470 Gold: Anton Dahlberg & Fredrik Bergstroem (SWE), 39 Pts Silver: Panagiotis Mantis & Pavlos Kagialis (GRE), 72 Pts Bronze: Malte Winckel & Matti Cipra (GER), 91 Pts Regatta Overall Ranking 1st, Anton Dahlberg & Fredrik Bergstroem (SWE), 39 Pts 2nd, Stuart McNay & David Hughes (USA), 71 Pts 3rd, Panagiotis Mantis & Pavlos Kagialis (GRE), 72 Pts Women's 470 Gold: Tina Mrak & Veronika Macarol (SLO), 58 Pts Silver: Frederike Loewe & Anna Markfort (GER), 78 Pts Bronze: Nadine Boehm & Ann-Christin Goliass (GER), 82 Pts Regatta Overall Ranking 1st, Tina Mrak & Veronika Macarol (SLO), 58 Pts 2nd, Frederike Loewe & Anna Markfort (GER), 78 Pts 3rd, Nadine Boehm & Ann-Christin Goliass (GER), 82 Pts Full News and Results here: http://2018europeans.470.org/en/default/races/race

I'm so, so happy that the Caps won the Eastern Conference... and now, in the LA Kings' absence, I hope they can also make the last step and give Ovi the chance to win at least 1 Stanley Cup...go Caps! game #1 is scheduled for next Monday, May 28th @ 8 p.m. ET (2 a.m. CET in the night between Monday 28th and Tuesday 29th)... full Stanley Cup Finals schedule here: https://www.nhl.com/stanley-cup-playoffs

World Cup, Stage #4 (Munich, GER) Women's 10m Air Rifle Gold: Lin Ying-Shin Silver: Wu Mingyang Bronze: Rikke Maeng Ibsen to be noticed...the Italian girls who officially competed this morning have been an absolute disaster (as usual...and as expected), meanwhile our best shooter, the reigning World Champion in this discipline, Petra Zublasing, started only in the MQS Extra Series and had a score which would have allowed her to dominate the qualification round of the actual world cup event (2 points better than the Korean Jung, who won the early round, but finally ended up only in 7th place)... I just can't understand our coaches' choice...

baseball is already a big thing (actually, the National sport) in Japan (and also in Korea and Chinese Taipei)... and also for them, their own leagues and the North-American MLB are the most important thing, sometimes the only that really matters... and in the other Central-American Countries (where Baseball is the main sport) we have the same situation: the MLB has basically all the attention of the media... even here in Italy, we have quite a good number of games (drawing a reasonable attention) on our main pay-tv (Sky Italia) of the MLB, but no network following carefully our National league nor the National team games (normally we only have the final series of our league or the European Champs final, if we make it, on our tv networks)... so, in the end, I don't see any chance for Baseball to change things in the future...especially because the main protagonists themselves are not interested in doing it...

secondo me invece sui 200 c'è ampio margine (tra centisti stanchi e/o mezzi infortunati dopo la gara principale e assenze varie -che ci sono sempre) anche a livello Olimpico (ovviamente a patto di arrivare almeno sui tempi di Mennea anche su quella distanza)... sui 400m invece non c'è speranza...per andare a medaglia alle Olimpiadi, con gente come Van Niekerk, Gardiner e magari qualche nuovo fenomeno Giamaicano e/o Americano che sicuramente arriverà da qui al 2020, bisogna correre 3 volte in 44 netti, 43 e mezzo e 43 basso in 4 giorni... escludo che un "bianco" possa farlo senza doparsi e/o senza rischiare di infortunarsi dopo la prima stagione in cui ci prova... su Tamberi...beh, per me la questione è personale e va persino oltre la ragionevolezza...proprio non lo sopporto...mi disgusta come "omuncolo" prima ancora che non piacermi come atleta... quindi prendete con le molle ogni mio giudizio su di lui (fermo restando che per ora di medaglie mondiali outdoor e/o Olimpiche non ne ha effettivamente vinta alcuna)...

some interesting results earlier today in Italy... this afternoon, in Savona Filippo Tortu (19 years young) ran the 100m dash in 10.03 and Marcell Jacobs followed him in 10.07 (wind +0.7)... in the semifinals, Jacobs ran 10.04 (but with wind beyond limits @ +3.0), meanwhile Tortu had a "regular" 10.09 (wind +1.2)... those times are not extremely impressive at global level, but for sure they are very good at "our" continental level (and this year the main event are "only" the European Champs)...

i tempi di queste riunioni minori con cronometri e anemometri betabloccati (quando non anche piste più corte) non fanno testo (vedi i vari Collio, Boccarini etc.)... e non è neanche settimana prossima che deve correre forte (anche se farlo in un meeting di DL saebbe già un buon segnale)... fino a quando non porterà a casa medaglie mondiali (quelli "veri", all'aperto, non la buffonata indoor) e Olimpiche, rimarrà sempre una "speranza" (e se da ora in poi arriveranno un paio di fallimenti nei "grandi eventi", pure una speranza mal riposta...come un certo pagliaccio ben noto dell'atletica Azzurra attuale, che gli infortuni hanno solo salvato da figuracce epiche )... p.s. e, prima di esaltarci troppo, ricordiamoci che un tempo sopra i 10 secondi a livello internazionale non vale quasi nulla...le medaglie stanno a 9.80 (e anche meno)...