Oleksandr Usyk v Joseph Parker: Undisputed world heavyweight champion ordered to fight Kiwi
The Ukrainian was crowned undisputed world heavyweight champion on Saturday after beating Daniel Dubois in a fifth-round stoppage at Wembley Stadium.
The victory, sealed when he left the Briton on
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Otago Daily Times
2 days ago
- Otago Daily Times
Lawson 10th in Belgian GP sprint, one better in qualifying
Formula One champion Max Verstappen won a "cat and mouse" Belgian Grand Prix sprint in Red Bull's first race under the leadership of Laurent Mekies following Christian Horner's dismissal, while New Zealand's Liam Lawson posted a 10th-placed finish. McLaren's championship leader Oscar Piastri finished second, after taking a dominant pole position for the 100km race, with the Australian increasing his advantage over teammate Lando Norris to nine points. Norris ended up where he started, in third place on a bright afternoon at the longest and second fastest track on the calendar. New Zealand driver Lawson produced a solid drive in the middle of the field, in a race that offered few opportunities. With only the top eight finishers picking up points for their team, Lawson added nothing for Racing Bulls but his team-mate Isack Hadjar managed an eighth-placed finish. Charles Leclerc was fourth for Ferrari with Haas's Esteban Ocon fifth and Carlos Sainz sixth for Williams. "Well done Max. Very, very impressive defence, very well controlled. You didn't leave anything on the table there," Mekies told Verstappen over the team radio after the Dutch driver took the chequered flag. Verstappen, starting second, used straightline speed to slipstream into the lead at les Combes on lap one and held off Piastri for the remaining 14, with the Australian 0.753 seconds behind at the flag. The win was Verstappen's first, in either a sprint or grand prix, since Imola in May and it was knife-edge all the way. "I knew of course it was going to be very tough to keep them behind. So it's just playing like cat and mouse, DRS, battery usage," he said as the large contingent of Dutch fans celebrated. "The whole race was within seven tenths, so I couldn't afford to make big mistakes. I had one tiny lockup in the last corner, but apart from that it was, for us, a great result to keep them behind. "You have to drive over the limit of what's possible. Tyre management goes out of the window. I did 15 qualifying laps to keep them behind on a track where tyre management is important." Main race qualifying Norris edged out title rival Oscar Piastri to take pole position for what could be a wet and chaotic main race at Spa-Francorchamps. The Briton blasted around the long circuit in a best time of one minute 40.562 seconds on Saturday, with Piastri 0.085 slower, to secure his fourth pole in 13 races and 13th of his career. Norris will be chasing his third win in a row to cut the Australian's nine-point lead. "The car has been flying all weekend, Oscar's been doing a good job all weekend so we're pushing each other a lot," said Norris, who was third in the earlier sprint race with Piastri second. "It's tough because you kind of see where your strengths and weaknesses are. And you learn from each other quickly. It's a good but tough battle that we have at the minute." Norris said he was expecting rain and drizzle on Sunday and possibly a chaotic race. Lawson was ninth-quickest, one spot behind Hadjar. "It was a good session for the team having both cars reach Q3, but it's tough when you see P5 was so close," Lawson said. "The speed was building and we were learning throughout the session, but a moment at the end of the lap meant we lost some time, so with such close margins it's frustrating. "Regardless of the conditions tomorrow, we need to try and have a clean race while extracting everything out of the car." Leclerc will start third and Verstappen fourth. - Additional reporting RNZ
NZ Herald
2 days ago
- NZ Herald
Black Caps v South Africa: Live updates as New Zealand meet Proteas in Twenty20 Tri-series final
All the action as the Black Caps meet South Africa in the final of the Twenty20 Tri-series Seifert and Sodhi shine as Black Caps thrash Zimbabwe Tim Seifert hit a second successive half-century and Ish Sodhi took four wickets as New Zealand beat Zimbabwe by 60 runs in their T20 tri-series match in Harare today. New Zealand won all four matches in the round robin phase of the tournament. They will play South Africa in the final at the same venue on Saturday. Seifert hit 75 in a New Zealand total of 190 for six - the highest of the tournament – and Sodhi took a career-best four for 12 as Zimbabwe were bowled out for 130. Seifert and Rachin Ravindra (63) put on 108 for the second wicket to set up New Zealand for the highest total in the six round robin matches. Zimbabwe scored 21 off the first two overs in reply before leg-spinner Sodhi came on to bowl in the third over. He struck with his second ball and took three wickets for five runs in two overs in the powerplay. Sodhi came back later to claim a fourth wicket and become the third player to take 150 wickets in T20 internationals on a list headed by fellow New Zealander Tim Southee with 164. It was his fifth and least expensive four-wicket haul in the format. 'It was nice to contribute in a slightly new role for me. I haven't bowled a lot in powerplays in my career,' said Sodhi after being named player of the match. 'It was nice to put a score on the board batting first,' said New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner who chose to bat on a pitch which has favoured teams batting second. He said the number of players who had 'put their hands up at different times' gave New Zealand a selection headache ahead of the final.
Newsroom
3 days ago
- Newsroom
Champion Fairweather goes for a medal three-peat
Erika Fairweather will be the first New Zealander to defend a swimming world title at the World Aquatics championships in Singapore starting on Sunday. Should she place on the podium in the 400m freestyle on July 27, she, at just 21, will become the first Aquablack to win a medal at three different World Aquatics long course championships after her efforts in 2023 and 2024. She may have to be on top form even to be just outside the medals as she was at Paris. But it is the podium that Fairweather and her new coach Graham Hill will be aiming for. Just one other female -Lauren Boyle – has stood on any level of a world championship swimming podium for New Zealand. But she was six foot and aged 25 when she got her first medal in 2013. Fairweather was a teenager when she won her first. Now she is off to her sixth world championships. Her first was as a 15-year-old when she won the 200m freestyle at the 2019 World Junior championships. Fairweather switched to Hill in Auckland from Otago earlier this year after her previous coach Lars Humer retired from international coaching. Hill, whose swimmers have won six Olympic medals across four Olympic Games, arrived from South Africa where he was the head coach of the South African swim team. As Swimming New Zealand's head Olympic coach, he wants medals from Aquablacks now. Hill likes winning medals. Australian Ariarne Titmus, unbeaten in the 400m freestyle since 2018, is taking a break from competitive swimming. This may not even make a podium placing easier for Fairweather as competition this year is faster than any Olympic year. Without Titmus at Paris, Fairweather would have been New Zealand's first female Olympic swimming medallist since 1952. It's rare for a Kiwi to come away from a long course world swimming championship with a medal. Since Danyon Loader won three medals at Rome in 1994, only three have. Indeed, it is rare for a Kiwi to compete in an individual final; just four have since 2015. While New Zealand got its first 4x200m women's freestyle relay in an Olympic final at Paris, there will not be a Singapore repeat; New Zealand is not entering one, preferring to focus on Fairweather's 800m event the following day. At last year's worlds, Fairweather won an 800m bronze medal and her relay the day before was placed fourth. Fairweather deserves to rub shoulders with her main rivals, former world record holder Katie Ledecky of the US and the hot favourite and current world record holder, 18-year-old Canadian Summer McIntosh, the world's best athlete in a swim cap. At the 2023 world championships, in beating McIntosh, Fairweather shared a podium with Ledecky and Titmus when she became the world's fifth woman to ever break four minutes in the 400m freestyle. In less than a year, things have changed. At Paris last year, Fairweather was competing against the best 400m freestyle swimmers of all time. But they have just got faster as they use this year as a launching pad for the 2028 Olympics. Ledecky currently holds four world records. McIntosh holds six, three of which were set in one competition last month, the first swimmer to do that since Michael Phelps in 2008. Australian Lani Pallister and Tokyo Olympic medallist Li Bingjie from China added their names to that exclusive sub four-minute group, with US teenage swimmer Claire Weinstein just 0.05 seconds shy. Pallister is ranked second this year in the 25m pool. Fairweather looks for her time at the Swimming NZ Champs. Photo: David Rowland/ and Swimming NZ Before Paris, it was Fairweather who was setting lifetime bests when others were not, so she will be looking for a competitive time again this month. Her last lifetime best across her top events (3:59.44 seconds) was at trials for Paris, but her best this season is 4:03.06 seconds. Hill will be hoping Fairweather hits her straps for a big season best to touch the wall ahead of some of the top four seeds in Singapore. It's unlikely she will successfully defend her title unless she improves on her season best by at least eight seconds. But if she clocks a lifetime best, as she has done at each of the past two world championships, she could be on the podium with Ledecky and McIntosh unless Pallister shuts her out. Ledecky was just 0.26 seconds (or about 40 centimetres) ahead of Fairweather at Paris. It's not much. Fairweather has indicated she wants to compete at her third Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028, where she will still only be 24. As times get quicker and a couple more like Weinstein join the sub-four club, it may take a sub four-minute swim to make a 400m freestyle Olympic final, with Ledecky at her home Olympics and Titmus back for her final Olympics, to attempt a three-peat.
