Sports round-up

Athletics: Every athlete competing at the World Championships in Daegu will face a blood test as part of an unprecedented anti-doping programme initiated by the IAAF. The samples from the competitors, who total almost 2,000, will mainly be collected at a purpose-built doping control station located in the athletes’ village starting from August 18. The samples will be tested on-site and then sent back to the Anti-Doping Laboratory in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Tennis: Caroline Wozniacki’s bid for a second-straight WTA Canada crown ended abruptly on Wednesday as the world number one was stunned in her opening match by unseeded Italian Roberta Vinci. Vinci defeated the top-seeded Dane 6-4, 7-5 to reach the third round. Wozniacki, playing her first tournament since Bastad in the first week of July, had enjoyed a first-round bye.

Horse racing: The Breeders’ Cup will return to Santa Anita in 2012, three years after Zenyatta’s thrilling victory in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at the south California track. The official announcement confirmed that the track in Arcadia, in suburban Los Angeles, beat out Churchill Downs in Kentucky and Belmont Park in New York to host the event November 2-3, 2012. Santa Anita has hosted thoroughbred racing’s richest event five times, most recently in 2008 and 2009.

Cycling: Belgian Philippe Gilbert, 29, is edging closer to signing for US team BMC, according to reports quoting the rider’s manager Vincent Wathelet. “It’s come down to Quick Step and BMC,” said Wathelet in a Het Laatste Nieuws report. Despite not being a three-week stage racer Gilbert, whose cycling specialities are hilly one-day classics, is currently one of the hottest properties on the market.