Women ALIVE Ministries

By Chris McKenna
BBC Sport

Franco di Santo (centre) celebrates his fourth goal of the season

Franco di Santos late strike moved Wigan off the bottom of the Premier League and heaped pressure on Sunderland manager Steve Bruce.

Wes Brown messed up a Keiren Westwood clearance in stoppage time and James McArthur nipped in before setting up Di Santo – who slotted into an empty goal.

Sunderland have only won once in 10 but they went ahead as Sebastian Larsson pounced on Ali Al Habsis error.

Jordi Gomez equalised with a penalty before Di Santo nicked the win late on.

It was Wigans first away win of the season – and only their second overall – but they are now within two points of Sunderland and escaping the relegation zone.

Wigan went into the game low on confidence with just one win from their previous 12 encounters and their spirits took a further hammering when they went behind after eight minutes.

South African Open: Steven OHara storms his way to top of leaderboard

Nov 25 2011
By Ted Tracey

STEVEN OHARA boosted his chances of retaining his Tour card by blasting a stunning seven-under 65 to take a share of the lead at the South African Open yesterday.

The Scot began the year with a fourth-place finish at the Africa Open and needs a similar result at the Jack Nicklaus-designed Serengeti course to keep himself on the top-tier circuit next season.

And the 31-year-old has put himself in pole position to achieve his aim after his glorious opening round left him joint leader with home hope Jbe Kruger.

OHara, who eagled the 576-yard eighth and had six birdies in his opening round, said: I hit a lot of great shots. I had it inside 10 feet pretty much every hole and felt I could have made more birdies.

The Scot is 134th on the Tour money list and has to climb to 118th to be exempt for next season. As things stand this is his last opportunity although a top five finish would give him a place in next weeks Hong Kong Open.

OHara had a golden chance at the Czech Open in August to make his immediate future secure, leading with a round to go before dropping to fifth with three closing bogeys.

Joint-leader Kruger has also recently thrown away a shot at glory. The 25-year-old led by four halfway through last weeks Alfred Dunhill Championship but finished only joint ninth after two closing rounds of 73.

The South African, though, is determined to hold his nerve this time.

He said: This is the SA Open, its the biggest event when you are growing up here. Just to take it one shot at a time is the important thing for me now.

But the leaders have some imposing figures breathing down their necks.

Two-time winner Retief Goosen is among those just one shot behind, while five-time champion Ernie Els began his title defence with a 69. Englands Simon Dyson – the highest-ranked player in the field at 32nd in the world – fired a two-under 70.

Goosen – the US Open winner in 2001 and 2004 – has been struggling with his game due to injury and, like former Open champion Els, has fallen out of the worlds top 50.

But the 42-year-old looked back to his best yesterday and reached seven under before carding back-to-back bogeys. However, Goosen finished in style by almost holing a 230-yard tee shot at his final hole before bagging a birdie.

The South African said: The whole years been a struggle but my back has been better in the last month.

Goosen shares third spot with fellow South Africans Merrick Bremner, David Hewan and Tyrone Mordt.

Scotlands Alastair Forsyth (70) is five shots off the pace but the Record Sport columnist needs to finish first or second to retain his Tour card for next year.

Leaderboard 65 – S OHARA, J Kruger (Rsa).

66 – Bremner (Rsa), T Mordt (Rsa), R Goosen (Rsa), D Hewan (Rsa).

67 – F Aguilar (Chi), G Mulroy (Rsa), J Hugo (Rsa), S Norris (Rsa).

68 – J-B Gonnet (Fra), J Huldahl (Den), T Aiken (Rsa), S Hansen (Den), P Price, J Harvey (Rsa), G Coetzee (Rsa), D Frost (Rsa), M Brown (Nzl), D DRYSDALE, M Brier (Aut), K Horne (Rsa), T Fisher Jnr (Rsa).

69 – A Velasco (Spa), F De Vries (Ned), O Wilson, B Grace (Rsa), J Van Zyl (Rsa), O Strydom (Rsa), T Norret (Den), L Rowe (Rsa), T Simon (Rsa), E Els (Rsa), B Wiesberger (Aut), G MURRAY, G Maybin, A Curlewis (Rsa), J Roos (Rsa), L SALTMAN, U Vandenberg (Rsa), L Moolman (R ), sa) r (Aut), s A Curlewis TMAN, Noolman (Rsa), E SALTMAN.

Other Scots: 70 – A Forsyth, P Whiteford. 71 – A McLean 72 – S Jamieson. 74 – M Stewart.

By Andrew Benson
BBC Sport in Sao Paulo

Barrichello is the most experienced driver in F1 history but wants to race on

He is doing his utmost to fight it, but Rubens Barrichellos illustrious career appears to be turning full circle this weekend.

The 39-year-old Brazilian veteran was born just down the road from the Interlagos circuit and raced here as a youngster, and now the track looks like being the stage for his final grand prix.

Barrichello, the most experienced F1 driver in history, does not see it that way. He is hopeful that he will find a drive to race on into an unprecedented 20th consecutive season in 2012. But the reality is that there appear to be no seats available for him.

His many friends in the paddock – Ferraris Felipe Massa and Red Bulls Mark Webber among them – are therefore urging Barrichello to treat this as a farewell race, so his home-town fans and F1 itself can give him the send-off he deserves, as the Australian puts it.

Music festivals are one of the most cut-throat aspects of the industry according to ARIA winning musician Kav Temperley.

Its a bit of a blood sport really. Theres so many people that start up festivals and maybe get into it a bit naively thinking theyll make a lot of money from it, the Eskimo Joe frontman said.

At the end of the day festivals can be the greatest situation for a band to be in but unfortunately they can also bomb dismally if theyre not put together properly.

INDIANAPOLIS — A week after her racecar broke during a practice run, hit a wall and flipped, catching fire and dousing her with fuel, Simona de Silvestro still had her burned hands swathed in white gauze. She smiled when she called them her “Mickey Mouse hands.”

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Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images

Simona de Silvestro starts 23rd, two spots ahead of Danica Patrick, above.

De Silvestro, 22, a native of Switzerland, plans to drive Sunday in her second Indianapolis 500, even though she will be in a backup car, nicknamed Pork Chop, with an eight-year-old chassis. She said Thursday she was lucky to be here. The crash could have been a lot worse.

Thursday was the first day she woke up with no pain, she said, and she seemed to be in good spirits. But she also said of the crash, “I was pretty freaked out after it.”

Later, she said that she told herself after the crash, “I don’t know if I really need this,” meaning racing cars for a living.

IndyCar drivers are brave, but they are not numb. She had been spooked, as drivers like to say, and it is not easy to get back into a car that goes 225 miles an hour.

“When you are driving and something breaks, in the back of your mind you are thinking, ‘What happened?’ and ‘Will it happen again?’ ” said Eddie Cheever, who won the 1998 Indianapolis 500 and is now a television analyst. “You have to put that monster to sleep, or otherwise you can’t get that out of your mind.”

De Silvestro said neither her team, HVM Racing, nor her corporate sponsors pressured her into getting back into the backup car to qualify last weekend. She contemplated her future, and decided what she really still wanted to do is to be a racecar driver.

“I think it was the hardest decision I took in my racing career,” she said. “Maybe in my life.”

Like most drivers here, she has raced since she was a child, beginning on go-kart tracks in Europe and moving to the United States five years ago to pursue an open-wheel driving career. A year ago, she finished 14th in her first Indy 500, earning rookie-of-the-year honors.

“She’s very positive about any situation she’s in,” said Brent Harvey, her race engineer at HVM Racing. “She deals with one thing in the moment and moves onto the next. She knew she had to get back in the car even though she didn’t really want to.”

De Silvestro will start 23rd in the 33-car grid, the best among the four women in the field. (Danica Patrick starts 25th, Pippa Mann 31st and Ana Beatriz 32nd). Harvey said he thought de Silvestro was capable of a top-10 finish.

Helio Castroneves, who has won the Indy 500 three times, said of de Silvestro’s successful qualifying attempt: “It doesn’t matter if you’re male or female. If you have a strong mind-set, you can do anything. It was very impressive.”

De Silvestro, who said she thought she had as much control of the car as she had before the crash, is not the only driver dealing with pain. Beatriz, 26, a native of Brazil, pointed to a pink scar on her right wrist Thursday. She broke her wrist March 27 in a race at St. Petersburg, Fla.

“It was in the fourth lap. I drove to the end,” Beatriz said of the race, which was on a 14-turn street course. “It was painful. I was crying during the race. I just wanted to get to the end.”

An oval like the Indianapolis Motor Speedway is easier to drive with injured hands, but Beatriz said, “When you have to get aggressive with the steering wheel, it still hurts.”

De Silvestro does not think she got any more attention — or sympathy — because she is a woman who climbed back into a racecar two days after a terrible crash. Fans were concerned, but she thinks they would have been concerned for any driver in such a situation.

Still, women are measured by different standards here, and they probably will be for a while. For now, the standard is the 29-year-old Patrick, who as a rookie in 2005 became the first woman to lead the Indy 500. Patrick has five top-10 finishes at the Indy 500.

“It’s clear that anyone who wins this race is a legend and is remembered for it,” Patrick said.

But Patrick is dabbling in stock-car driving, leading to speculation that Sunday’s race could be her final Indy 500. And de Silvestro is 11th in the IndyCar standings through four races, four spots better than Patrick.

The consensus before the accident was that de Silvestro, who finished fourth at St. Petersburg, had a better chance than Patrick, driving for the team owned by Michael Andretti, to become the first woman to win at Indianapolis.

Pork Chop seems to be good to go. So is its driver, a frightening setback notwithstanding.

“As soon as I got in the car, it felt like home,” de Silvestro said.

COLORADO SPRINGS — It was close to tip-off, and Bradley Walker, a towering former Marine sergeant, had a crucial basketball game against the Navy/Coast Guard team. He hustled to remove his prosthetic legs and strapped himself into a wheelchair for warm-ups.

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Stephen Nowland for The New York Times

Marcia Morris-Roberts learned to swim a few weeks ago.

More than four years ago, Walker was on a patrol in Haditha, Iraq, when his vehicle struck an improvised explosive device. The blast destroyed his lower legs. But his wounds did not stop him from participating in the second annual Warrior Games, an Olympic-style event for wounded, injured and ill service members, and veterans, that took place last week at the United States Olympic Training Center. Last Wednesday, Walker’s mind was nowhere but the basketball court.

“When I was at Bethesda, Marines would come visit me who were at different levels of their rehabilitation,” Walker, a 30-year-old from White Pine, Tenn., said. “You see other people and you think, I’m going to be there someday.”

Run by the United States Olympic Committee and the Department of Defense, the Warrior Games were born of the idea that sports play a critical role in helping disabled service members recover physically and psychologically.

To a civilian, the sight of these mostly young men and women willing their bodies around a pool or basketball court can be jarring, if not emotional. But this was a fiercely competitive, and collegial, sporting event.

As Charlie Huebner, the chief of Paralympics for the U.S.O.C., said: “A lot of the kids we serve, the first thing they worry about is being able to play with their children— whether it’s running or playing basketball or just doing what a mom or dad would do. Our whole movement is about the power of sport.”

This year, the Warrior Games drew 220 participants, up from 187 in their inaugural year, with teams from the Marines, the Army, the Navy/Coast Guard, the Air Force and Special Operations competing in individual and team events.

The event classifications were devised specifically for the Warrior Games, Huebner said. In swimming, for example, athletes are grouped by disability. Single-leg amputees compete against one another, as do athletes missing both legs.

Those with spinal-cord injuries are in a separate category, and soldiers with traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder have their own group.

Team sports are organized differently. Sitting volleyball, with the net a few feet off the ground, is open to all, as long as they remain seated. Wheelchair basketball is also open, although teams are required to have at least two players with lower-limb injuries on the floor at all times.

Blake McMinn, a former infantryman who lost his lower right leg when his tank was blown apart by a roadside bomb in Kirkuk, Iraq, in 2007, plays for the Army’s powerful wheelchair basketball team. Army handily defeated the Marines for the gold medal on Friday night.

McMinn, 23, of Arlington, Tex., recalled being approached on the Las Vegas strip by a man who invited him to shoot around with a local wheelchair team.

“It took me a month to talk myself into it,” McMinn said after a victory over Air Force, a gritty game in which wheelchairs went flying and players hit the floor. “Once I did, I fell in love with it.”

Not everyone at the Warrior Games has war injuries.

At the aquatic center, the Marine veteran Chuck Sketch, 43, of Wildomar, Calif., swung his torso into the pool for the start of the 50-meter freestyle race for double amputees. Halfway through Sketch’s enlistment in the early 1990s, he developed a malignant brain tumor that led to blood clots in his legs and cut off the blood supply to his optic nerve. His legs were amputated and he lost his sight.

In the years after his discharge, Sketch took up swimming by doing the doggie paddle with a life vest. After three months, he was swimming on his own.

“I only beat last year’s time by one second, from what I understand,” he said, grinning. “It’s a humongous recharge to every part of your body.”

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PHILIP REID at Wentworth

GOLF:NO CORONATION of a new Italian prince, just of a new English king; and a reaffirmation that at this point in time Luke Donald is king of this sport which involves getting a spherical ball into a tin cup in as few shots as humanly possible. Yesterday, in claiming the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth over the toughened West Course, the worlds number two became the worlds number one as he exhibited imperial qualities of his own.

On a dry and blustery day in the stockbroker outside London, Donald outdueled and dethroned his fellow Englishman Lee Westwood in an absorbing battle that went to a play-off.

In winning, Donald pocketed the 750,000 winners cheque and strengthened his position atop the Race to Dubai. Crude as it may be to suggest it, but the money was almost incidental.

Sounds pretty good, doesnt it? he said after being hailed as the new number one.

Hopefully there will be many more of these victories, but I will savour this its an amazing achievement, something I am very proud of.

This was a old-fashioned mano-o-mano battle between the two current top players on the planet, which went to the very last stroke. Sadly for Westwood, his reign as number one ended with an approach shot to the 18th green the first play-off hole that spun back off the green into the hazard. He became the latest, and most notable, victim of Elss redesigned hole.

While Matteo Manassero became a bit player in the drama, with more central casting undoubtedly ahead of him, the real theatre came in extra-time.

Westwood, who had shot a closing 68 for 278, six under, and Donald, who had finished with a 70 for the same mark, were forced back down the par-five 18th for sudden-death.

And the 539-yard dogleg hole lived up to its reputation of examining a players mental fortitude as much as his golfing skill.

With both players opting to lay-up, Donald first to go hit his approach to the back of the green and the ball spun back to 10 feet.

Knowing what he had to do, Westwoods approach never reached the flag and, then, he could only watch from the fairway as the ball spun viciously back towards and into the drain. In that moment, he knew that his quest was finished.

Westwood would run up a double-bogey seven, although that anti-climatic conclusion proved irrelevant.

The damage had been done, and Donald coolly and calmly rolled in his birdie putt to settle matters once and for all and gave him his second win on tour this season to go with his WGC-Accenture Matchplay win in February.

Donald kept his cool to eke out a win yesterday but, when he looks back on this victory, he will likely recall his fight-back in Saturdays third round as critical.

Then, he ran up two double bogeys in his first six holes, only to rejuvenate his quest for the title by coming home in 32 (with four birdies) to grab a share of the lead alongside Manassero heading into the final round. Manassero had a horrid final round, failing to find a single birdie as he signed for a 75 (for 283) which dropped him down to tied-seventh.

No, this was Donalds moment of triumph. Although the sideshow of the spat between Ian Poulter, highly critical of the courses re-design, and Ernie Els cast the slightest of shadows.

Its difficult not to take personally, especially if its coming out of left-field, said Els of Poulters comments, before adding: Well have a word when its suitable and when Ians calmed down a bit. His comments have done a lot of damage to the (European Tours) flagship event. But Im not going to take this craziness. It is uncalled for, said Els.

For Rory McIlroy, the anticipated final round charge failed to materialise. The 22-year-old Ulsterman finished with a 73 for 287, three-over, that left him in tied-24th position.

I didnt chase at all, conceded McIlroy, his attempted charge effectively stopped in its tracks with a double-bogey six at the third.

Rather than any rueful reflections, McIlroy was intent on looking ahead with the US Open looming. I feel really good. Im driving the ball good. Ive put my old three-wood back in the bag which is a hue advantage.

It goes a lot further than the other one did. I can hit it 285 (yards), 290, which is perfect for the US Open (at Congressional) coming up, he said.

Michael Hoeys closing 69 for 288 where he produced a birdie-birdie finish for tied-31st position marked a huge contrast to a year ago when he was forced to withdraw from this championship in the first round due to fatigue. A winner of the Madeira Island Open last Sunday, Hoey maintained the momentum in his push to rise up the world rankings.

I was quite pleased the way I played well this week, considering normally a win like that (in Madeira) would take a lot out of me, said Hoey. I thought the swing is a lot better and Im not using up as much energy I really appreciate being able to play because I was just worn out last year and had to rest for a couple of months. Its the nature of the lifestyle and travelling, it can wear you out.

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