Shane van Gisbergen wins Chicago Grant Park 165 for another Nascar victory
A day after taking victory in the Xfinity Series, the Kiwi took out the Grant Park 165 Nascar event from pole for his second Nascar victory of the
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1News
2 hours ago
- 1News
Former Warriors Kieran Foran makes call to retire after 16 years
Kieran Foran will close the curtain on one of rugby league's most-storied careers after confirming his plans to retire at the end of 2025. One of rugby league's great survivors, Foran is set to finish with close to 315 NRL games to his name when he plays his final match for Gold Coast in September. Foran's retirement comes as questions swirl around the future of coach Des Hasler at the club, with the Titans sitting last and looking unlikely to make finals. A premiership-winner at Manly in 2011, Foran also played 31 Tests for New Zealand and is the last player in the NRL to have debuted during the 2000s decade. But beyond all that, Foran will finish as one of the toughest halves to play the game in the NRL era, after a career that experienced more highs and lows than most. ADVERTISEMENT The Kiwi, who turns 35 on Sunday, debuted under Hasler at Manly in 2009 as a hard-running five-eighth, regularly putting his body through the ringer when taking the line on or putting on hits in defence. He won a premiership as a 21-year-old, partnering with Daly Cherry-Evans as one of the youngest combinations in the game's history to take a team to the title. But when the five-eighth was lured to Parramatta in 2016 on a mega four-year deal, the playmaker's path changed significantly. He experienced highly publicised personal issues and has since revealed the mental demons he fought through that period. Foran ended up leaving the Eels for the Warriors after one season, but admitted then it was the toll he put on his body that began to catch up with him. He played just 57 games across four seasons at the Warriors and then Canterbury, at one stage prompting fears of a medical retirement due to a shoulder injury. Foran persisted though, earned a lifeline under Hasler at Manly in 2021 before helping take them back to preliminary final in his first season back at Brookvale. ADVERTISEMENT The No.6 was eventually squeezed out at the end of 2022, but had done enough to extend his career on the Gold Coast. It was there Hasler ultimately joined him in 2024, after making a shock return to coaching at the Titans. Foran reached the 300-game milestone last year, perhaps the most unlikely member of the 55-man group given the fact his career looked over six years ago. "That's something I am so grateful for and proud of," Foran told AAP on reaching the milestone last year. "It's just staying in the fight. If this could be an example or message to anyone out there, it's that good things can come if you stay in the fight. "I'd got to 26 or 27 or 28 and my body just fell apart. Just through sheer wear and tear and not looking after it the way I should have in the early stages of my career. "I would say to the missus: 'Is it worth me keeping going if I'm not playing the footy I want to play? Is my body going to get back to where I need it to?'"
Otago Daily Times
15 hours ago
- Otago Daily Times
Winter driving often more demanding
EDITORIAL Driving mishaps seem to have been the stock-in-trade of the Otago Daily Times ' editorial and online pages in recent weeks, a phenomenon that I have noticed is invariably associated with the onset of true winter weather. Or perhaps to be more accurate, associated with the failure of ever so many Otago drivers to adjust to winter weather which, while unpredictable for sure, is still a mild version of what is experienced in some other parts of the world. I make this observation having witnessed some pretty poor driving so far this month, additional to my perennial bugbears of inattentive, distracted and discourteous driving. My particular winter gripes so far have been motorists failing to adjust their speed to slippery conditions, and far too many following far too close when conditions are wet and visibility is low. Some useful rules of thumb to keep in mind are that compared with a dry road, stopping distances are up to twice as long in the wet, and up to four times as long in the snow. As for ice, well, think in terms of five to 10 times longer, and with the attendant possibility that you are quite likely to stop only by hitting something. It might do us all good to remember that we are not engaged in a grand prix motor race, and even if racing is not your thing, perhaps take five minutes to watch the highlights of last weekend's British Grand Prix,which shows how even the most talented of drivers struggle in the wet, and how quickly and dramatically things can go wrong when a road is slippery and visibility is poor. This year's British Grand Prix was a disappointing one for New Zealand's Liam Lawson, though he was blameless in his first-lap exit from the race: rather, he was the victim of being in the wrong place at the wrong time as Yuki Tsunoda put the squeeze on Esteban Ocon, who in turn rammed Lawson off the rack and into a very early retirement. While that left Kiwi race fans with little to cheer about in F1 last weekend, there was every reason to be both proud and cheerful after big wins for both Scott Dixon and Shane van Gisbergen in the United States. That van Gisbergen was in with a good shot of winning the Nascar Cup race at Chicago's Street Circuit was something I predicted in Drivesouth last weekend; no special second sight was involved in that call, just an appreciation that SVG has won there before, in both the premier Nascar Cup category, and the second-tier Xfinity category. He contested both categories and won them both last weekend, which was a great result. Much more surprising was Scott Dixon's IndyCar win at mid-Ohio. Heading to the race, Dixon had his truly remarkable tally of 58 career wins in IndyCar, including at least one win in each of the past 20 seasons. But in recent races, the old Dixon sparkle appeared to be missing, to the extent that it seemed to me he might never win in IndyCars again. Then up the old master popped, running a two-stop strategy when three stops was easily the favoured option, and pouncing late in the race when his team-mate and series leader Alex Palou ran wide exiting a bend. In winning for the first time this season, Dixon became only the third driver to win in IndyCar this season, the previous nine races having been won by either Palou (six wins) or Kyle Kirkwood (three wins). So now it's 59 Indycar wins for Dixon (second only on the all-time list to the great AJ Foyt) including wins across 21 consecutive seasons. Once again, I am reminded that Dixon's a driver whose achievements place him up there with 1967 F1 world champion Denny Hulme and the legendary Bruce McLaren as one of the three greatest race drivers New Zealand has produced.
Otago Daily Times
16 hours ago
- Otago Daily Times
Queenstown player still right on cue
Simon Singleton with his recent South Island singles title-winning trophy. PHOTO: SUPPLIED Queenstown's Simon Singleton continues to prove he's New Zealand's best pool player. Last weekend, playing Australia's biggest 8-ball tournament for prize money, the Slate Pro Championship in Geelong, Melbourne, he finished equal third in a top-class field of 64. He won five matches and only dropped two — his first of two lives and his semifinal — to arguably Oceania's best pool player, Aussie Jake McCartney. In his last-16 game he potted a vital 'Z' shot and in his quarterfinal he won 11-9 after being 6-0 down. His performance was even more meritorious in front of a hostile crowd — "that was pretty tough, not something I've experienced before". On other hand, he says "the messages of support from all around NZ were unbelievable". Recently, Singleton, who's 42, through a feat of logistics managed to win the North Island and South Island 8-ball singles titles even though they were being competed for at the same time. "They tried to overlap the events so people couldn't play both." Singleton, who's ranked no.1 in NZ in Kiwi rules pool, also holds the NZ title which he'll defend in October — "I'm the first person in NZ to hold all three titles". Meanwhile, he'll be representing NZ for the second year running at the World Eightball Pool Federation champs in Ennis, Ireland, next month.
