Yardbarker: Damon Hill

Bahrain GP on despite protests

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 13:41:00 -0400

Formula One returns this week to Bahrain, casting the spotlight on an event that has defied criticism while a bloody political crisis has engulfed one of the West's most important allies in the region. The Bahrain Grand Prix has drawn less attention than a year ago when F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone in the final hours decided to go ahead with the race despite calls by some rights groups for a boycott. But criticism has intensified in the past week after explosions sparked security concerns and a Human Rights Watch report alleged that authorities rounded up activists living around the track in a bid to ''silence'' dissent ahead of the race on Sunday. ''The race is going ahead and our position is quite simply to call it out for what it is. It is a political event which will serve to gloss over serious rights violations,'' said Nicholas McGeehan, a Gulf researcher for Human Rights Watch. Similar to last year, team officials have mostly dodged the question of racing in Bahrain.

Bahrain GP on despite anti-government protests

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 10:59:06 -0400

Formula One returns this week to Bahrain, casting the spotlight on an event that has defied criticism while a bloody political crisis has engulfed one of the West's most important allies in the region. The Bahrain Grand Prix has drawn less attention than a year ago when F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone in the final hours decided to go ahead with the race despite calls by some rights groups for a boycott. But criticism has intensified in the past week, after explosions sparked security concerns and a Human Rights Watch report alleged that authorities rounded up activists living around the track in a bid to ''silence'' dissent ahead of the race on Sunday. ''The race is going ahead and our position is quite simply to call it out for what it is. It is a political event which will serve to gloss over serious rights violations,'' said Nicholas McGeehan, a Gulf researcher for Human Rights Watch. Similar to last year, team officials have mostly dodged the question of racing in Bahrain

Column: Not-So-Great Britain learning to win again

Wed, 12 Sep 2012 16:26:04 -0400

Learning to lose used to be as British as warm beer and milky tea. Growing up in Not-So-Great Britain post-1966, when England football fans last had something to really shout about, meant living with rain and the cold, hard fact that the country which invented a host of modern sports more often than not seemed to have become pretty rubbish at them. Wimbledon, home of the world's oldest tennis tournament, became the place where Britons munched on overpriced strawberries while abdicating the business of winning to overseas players - champions from the United States, Switzerland and elsewhere who served up victory, not heroic failures. Rugby was a town in the middle of England that lent its name to the game that New Zealand's All Blacks subsequently used to rub English noses, actually everyone's noses, in the dirt. Cricket, which spread with the British Empire, became a favored Australian method of getting payback on the English who once used their land as a penal colony. Revenge, it turned out, w

Britain leads in team dressage

Fri, 03 Aug 2012 17:05:00 -0400

Charlotte Dujardin's record score riding Valegro helped Britain take a slender lead over Germany on Friday after the two-day first round of the Olympic dressage competition. Dujardin and Britain's two other team riders have an average score of 79.407 percent. Germany, which has dominated the sport for much of the past 50 years, is a close second at 78.845 percent. The Netherlands is in third place with 76.809 percent, followed by Denmark in fourth and the United States fifth. The riders will return to ride the Grand Prix Special on Tuesday to complete the team event. The 18 highest-placed competitors from the team competition will perform a freestyle ride on Thursday for individual medals. Germany's Kristina Sprehe on Desperados broke the former Olympic record for a Grand Prix test by nearly a full percentage point earlier in the day with a 79.119, but Dujardin improved on that with her 83.663 to take first in the individual standings and also to put Britain into the team lead. ''I wa

Britain leads Germany in team dressage

Fri, 03 Aug 2012 13:17:11 -0400

Nico Rosberg claimed his first F1 victory in China

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 08:38:33 -0400

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