Italian sprint ace Alessandro Petacchi(C) of the Milram team celebrates as he wins the 101st edition of the Pro Tour Paris-Tours classic.

TOURS, France,
Oct. 15--Italian sprint ace Alessandro Petacchi of the Milram team won the 101st edition of the Pro Tour Paris-Tours classic over 256km from Paris to here on Sunday.
Led out by his German team-mate Eric Zabel, Petacchi edged compatriot Francesco Chicchi in the final sprint. Former three-time world champion Oscar Freire of Spain was third after being impeded in the sprint with Dutchman Steven De Jongh and Australians Allan Davis and Robbie McEwen finishing next.
According to AFP, Petacchi paid tribute to his German team-mate Zabel, who beat him into second in 2003 when they were on opposing teams.
“Erik did an incredible job in the final sprint. In the end, I’m basically glad he beat me in 2003,“ said Petacchi. “I made the mistake of setting off too early in the sprint and I seized up in the final 50m. I learnt my lesson and this time I set off at just the right time.
“To win in this way, with him (Zabel) leading me out, it’s as if I won twice. After Milan-Sanremo it’s my best victory.“
Petacchi also took time to reflect on a badly disrupted season in which he was cleared of doping despite returning a non-negative result for the Asthma drug Salbutamol.
He was later cleared of doping by the Italian Cycling Federation, who put the result down to human error, although the Italian Olympic Committee has appealed to the Court of Arbitration for sport.
“This season has been the most difficult of my career,“ said Petacchi. “It began badly with my broken knee last year.
“After the Giro (Tour of Italy in June) other problems started (the doping suspicion). I went through every stage of suffering, even though I won two stages at (September’s) Vuelta (Tour of Spain). Finally, without a doubt, it’s today that I’ve had my best day of the year.“
This, the penultimate Pro Tour race of the season, began at altitude for the first three hours of racing as the sprinters’ teams controlled the pace.
There were several breakaway attempts, the last of which, involving Belgian Philippe Gilbert, Karsten Kroon of the Netherlands and Italy’s Filippo Pozzato made the most of a slight climb to jump off the front 8km from the end and held a lead of 20sec inside the final 3km but they were hunted down in the final kilometer.
In claiming the final sprint, Petacchi won his second big classic after Milan-Sanremo in 2005. Italian Tour of Italy champion and former Pro Tour winner Danilo Di Luca still leads the Pro Tour standings from Australia’s Cadel Evans and Tour de France winner Alberto Contador.

TEHRAN, Oct. 15--Iran’s 2-man taekwondo team that will take part in the 2008 Olympic qualifying in Vietnam will be named on Wednesday almost six weeks before the event.
New head coach, Reza Mehmandoost, who took over last week, will pick the two best players from 10 eligible contestants.
Qualifications of the 2008 Olympic taekwondo for Asia will be held in Vietnam Nov. 29-Dec 2.
Iran’s taekwondo team failed to qualify for the 2008 Olympics in the first session three weeks ago in Manchester, England.

Ehsan Haddadi

TEHRAN, Oct. 15--Iran’s discus thrower Ehsan Haddadi is all set to start training for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
The 2004 World Junior Championship gold medalist, who had cut down on training due to the fasting month of Ramadan that ended on Saturday, is now prepared for extensive training, Mehr News Agency reported.
Haddadi, who is due to participate in a discus throwing championship in Russia by the end of the year, said “I will start training early next week to be ready for the Russian event. I have to move out from Tehran to the south of the country due to climatic conditions.
I will do my best to take the Olympic medal as the most important medal in the world.“
The prominent Iranian thrower will also test his power in some Big Prizes tournaments next year in Europe.
His best throw was 67.95 meters, registered on June 9 in Minsk.

Hamilton has shredded the F1 record books.

PARIS, Oct. 15--Intrigue in the fast lane, internecine warfare, and bitter personal rivalry between the leading actors set against the backdrop of a multimillion pound business where the line between fantasy and reality is often blurred.
According to Reuters, this could easily have been the script for the next Hollywood blockbuster from the pen of John Grisham but was in fact the recipe served up to motor racing fans in a season that few will forget in a hurry.
The 2007 campaign may have left McLaren boss Ron Dennis with a few less hairs but no one can deny that all the drama on and off the track has injected much needed life into a sport that can act as an antidote to even the most acute case of insomnia.
He could never have realized it at the time but when Ferrari’s sacked mechanic Nigel Stepney put the stamps on that infamous 780-page dossier and popped it in the post to his mate Mike Coughlan over at McLaren he did the sport a huge service.
At least for the impartial armchair observer for in that treasonable act Stepney set off a chain of events that has kept F1 fans gripped to their seats throughout this turbulent but fascinating season.
A season that draws to a close this Sunday in Interlagos where Lewis Hamilton is in a three-way fight to crown a remarkable debut year by clinching the drivers’ title.
The ’X’ factor is something the entertainment industry craves but it has been the ’H’ factor in the shape of the brilliant young Briton that has brought the sport a wave of new fans in 2007.
From his third place in his first ever grand prix back in Melbourne in March Hamilton has confounded convention and driven with the skill, verve and nerve of a Fangio or Schumacher. In so doing he’s shredded the F1 record books.
In Australia he produced the best finish by an Englishman in his debut race since 1966, in Spain he became the youngest driver to lead a championship and if everything goes his way in Interlagos he’ll become the first driver to win the championship in his rookie season.
The fact that he is also the first driver of Afro-Caribbean descent to race in Formula One let alone score any points or win four races is now a mere footnote on his CV.
Hamilton’s achievement is all the more noteworthy given he’s had to get on with the job of driving his car faster than his pitlane rivals with various storms swirling around his broad shoulders.
Spygate at one stage looked dangerously close to wreck his title bid when McLaren were found guilty of possessing data from Ferrari. In the end the sport’s governing body the FIA chose to strip McLaren of their constructors’ points and impose a record one million dollar fine rather than penalizing Hamilton and his teammate Fernando Alonso.
He’s also had to contend with the complete meltdown in his relationship with double world champion Alonso. Given the bitter rivalry that has developed between the two McLaren drivers it seems light years ago that Hamilton expressed his excitement at having Alonso for a teammate.
“I look at having Fernando Alonso as my team-mate as a positive. I can only learn from him,“ he said before the fireworks started.
Alonso, who along with Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen can still win the title in Brazil, has fallen out big time with McLaren and Hamilton over his treatment at the British team since switching from Renault.
As world champion he expected to be treated as number one and has become increasingly irritated at what he perceives to be McLaren’s favouritism towards Hamilton.
His persistent complaining has prompted the FIA to send one of their men to Interlagos this weekend to spy on McLaren’s team strategy to ensure their stated race equality program is all its cracked up to be.

Australia world champion Casey Stoner leads the pack in the 2007 MotoGP at Phillip Island, Australia on Sunday.

SYDNEY, Oct. 15--World champion Casey Stoner led from the first lap to claim a dominant victory in front of his home fans at the Australian MotoGP on Sunday.
The 21-year-old started third on the grid but surged into the lead to take his ninth victory of the season, Reuters wrote.
The Australian finished ahead of his Ducati team-mate Loris Capirossi with Yamaha’s Valentino Rossi in third. Stoner, who won his first world title in Japan, became the first home winner in Australia since Mick Doohan in 1998.
“To get the championship before this round I think was perfect for me,“ said Stoner. “I could really enjoy this race. The race worked out perfectly for us. We got a great start and I led it from start to finish--the bike was working beautifully so it was just a matter of bringing it home.
“Nicky (Hayden) was really good--I wasn’t able to pull away from him and I was trying reasonably hard, then he started to drop off and it increased my freedom a little bit more to increase the gap, and we just held them off from there.“
Rossi said he had felt capable of catching Stoner until tyre problems forced him to ease off. “I pushed very hard and after 10 laps I thought it was possible to stay close until we lost a lot of grip,“ he said.

LONDON, Oct. 15--Ernie Els claimed the World Match Play title for the seventh time with a 6&4 drubbing of Argentina’s Angel Cabrera in the final at Wentworth.
According to BBC, the South African’s victory earned him 1 million pounds in prize money and he is now top of the European Order of Merit.
Cabrera bogeyed the 1st hole and was quickly four down, but did birdie the 24th and 27th to cut the gap to two. Els then two-putted the 30th for another winning birdie and a par on the next put him five up with five to play.
Padraig Harrington and Justin Rose, now second and third in the Order of Merit, still have tournaments to come whereas Els does not.
Els led by three at the halfway stage, but there was a worrying period in the morning when he had problems with his back. He recovered and a 12-foot putt saved him his par at the 21st, while Cabrera failed to get up and down after pushing his approach.
The South American knew he had to step up his game--and did with four birdies in the next six holes. But Els promptly sank a 15-footer at the 28th and worked his magic again on the 30th, before Cabrera’s fate was sealed when he bogeyed the following hole. Cabrera picked up a sizeable runners-up cheque for 400,000 pounds.

Colorado Rockies' Yorvit Torrealba celebrates as he rounds the bases after hitting a three-run home run in the sixth inning off Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Livan Hernandez in Game 3 of the National League Championship baseball series in Denver, Monday.

DENVER, Oct. 15--The Colorado Rockies were one strike away from not even making the playoffs. Now, they’re one win away from their first World Series, wrote AP.
With a cold rain falling, Josh Fogg shut down Arizona’s bats in his first postseason start and Yorvit Torrealba hit a tiebreaking three-run homer to fuel the Rockies’ 4-1 victory Sunday night in Game 3 of the NL championship series.
MVP hopeful Matt Holliday also homered as the wild-card Rockies took a 3-0 lead with their 20th win in 21 games, a streak that has taken Colorado from afterthoughts to the buzz of baseball.
About two weeks ago, the Rockies had no control over whether they’d even make the playoffs. The San Diego Padres could’ve eliminated Colorado on the final Saturday of the regular season. But Milwaukee’s Tony Gwynn Jr. hit a tying, two-out, two-strike triple off San Diego’s Trevor Hoffman that gave the Rockies a chance.
The next day, Colorado caught the Padres. The night after that, the Rockies beat San Diego in a 13-inning, NL wild-card tiebreaker. Since then, the Rockies have been unbeatable.

BUENOS AIRES, Oct. 15--In a country that lives and breathes football, Argentines are suddenly waking up to a game played with an oval ball, as the Pumas prepare to take on South Africa in the World Cup semi-finals.
As the national team has powered through the World Cup rugby ranks in France to reach the semi-finals for the first time, Argentines have become increasingly aware that the Pumas stand on the verge of making history, wrote AFP.
“Anything could happen, because anyone could win and Argentina is currently achieving lots of things for the first time, such as reaching a semi-final,“ said former Pumas player Cristian Viel.
“We can beat them and I think the Pumas could win against any rival in this World Cup,“ added Alejandro Cubelli, an ex-Puma and a player with Club Belgrano.
“It’ll be close. But tactical. But that’s the formula for winning in this World Cup,“ added sports journalist Jorge Buscio, who has also written a book “Being a Puma.“