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Winter Sport: Pop violinist Vanessa Mae (picture, right) has been awarded damages by the International Ski Federation (FIS) after it wrongly accused her of manipulating race results in order to qualify for the 2014 Winter Olympics. Mae, initially handed a four-year ban, took her case to the CAS which cleared her of fixing races. In a statement, FIS said it had settled a claim for defamation by British citizen Mae, who competed under her father’s name Vanakorn for his native Thailand in Sochi, finishing 67th and last in the giant slalom.
Tennis: French Open champion Stanislas Wawrinka will join Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal at this year’s pre-Wimbledon warm-up event at Queen’s Club, Aegon Championships organisers said yesterday. The Swiss, who also won the 2014 Australian Open, is a former semi-finalist at Queen’s where the world’s best have traditionally fine-tuned their grasscourt games. He reached the last eight at Wimbledon last year and in 2014, losing to Richard Gasquet and Roger Federer respectively. Murray won the title at Queen’s last year for the fourth time.
Cricket: Australia moved back to the top of the Test rankings after wrapping up a seven-wicket victory over New Zealand in the second Test at Christchurch, yesterday. Needing 131 at Hagley Oval with nine wickets in hand, the tourists encountered few problems before displacing India at the top of the ICC rankings. It gave Australia a 2-0 series success, following victory by an innings and 152 runs in the opener at Wellington last week.
Diving: Tall Jamaican diver Yona Knight-Wisdom hopes he has inspired others to break down barriers after becoming the first male diver from the Caribbean island to qualify for the Olympics. The university undergraduate stands 190cm tall and weighs 90kg, an uncharacteristically large frame for a sport dominated by diminutive athletes. “I think that it should inspire people to try new things. Don’t be limited to what is normal and what is safe. Don’t be afraid to go against the odds,” Knight-Wisdom said.
Olympics: Rio mayor Eduardo Paes has described Australia’s Olympic committee as a “source of aggressions” against Brazil after it banned the team’s athletes from visiting the city’s favelas during the Games in August. Australia’s team chef-de-mission Kitty Chiller told News Ltd media this week that their Olympians would be barred from going to the urban slums, even on official tours, in accordance with advice from a security expert. Paes said: “There is a certain dramatisation. And between us, the Australian committee has been a source of aggressions to Brazil.”
Tennis: Teenager Taylor Fritz will make his Top 100 debut in the ATP rankings after upsetting eighth seed Jeremy Chardy in the first round of the Abierto Mexicano Telcel. The 18-year-old American qualifier won 6-4 3-6 6-3 in Acapulco to set up a second round clash against a player 17 years his senior – Victor Estrella Burgos, a 6-4 6-2 conqueror of Lucas Gomez. In the women’s event, top seed Victoria Azarenka beat Polona Hercog 4-6 6-3 6-1, while Dominika Cibulkova did not drop a game in seeing off Lourdes Dominguez Lino.