European GP: Massa dominant in Valencia

From F1-Live.com

Felipe Massa took the chequered flag first at the end of the 57-lap European Grand Prix, but at the time the Brazilian and the Ferrari team were under investigation by the FIA and it was not until some time after the race it became clear exactly who the winner of the 12th round of the championship even was.

The moment in question – and for debate - came as Massa exited his pit box following his second pit stop on lap 38 as he was released into the path of Adrian Sutil who was already coming down the pit lane. It was a close situation and it was certainly unnecessary from Massa who had dominated the Grand Prix from the pole position and was under no real pressure from behind.

The FIA duly placed Massa under investigation and then announced that any penalty would be imposed after the race. That is most unusual as the normal practice is for a driver to receive a drive through penalty within a few minutes of the incident in question. Massa’s did not need to worry much though as he was later simply fined and there was no other penalty.

Regardless of this incident, Massa dominated the race from the pole position and at no time looked under any serious pressure from Lewis Hamilton who shadowed Massa across the line six seconds behind. Hamilton retains the championship lead with 70 points, while Massa moves second in the championship race with 64.


FINAL RESULTS:

1) Felipe Massa - Ferrari

2) Lewis Hamilton - McLaren -Mercedes

3) Robert Kubics - BMW

4) Heikki Kovalainen - McLaren - Mercedes

5) Jarno Trulli - Toyota

6) Sebastien Vettel - Scuderia Toro Rosso - Ferrari

7) Timo Glock - Toyota

8) Nico Rosberg - Williams - Toyota

NFL Preseason: Giants vs Lions

Preseason Opener Looms Several Giants talk about the start of the 2008 Preseason
By Michael Eisen, Giants.com

AUGUST 6, 2008

ALBANY, NY - The Giants will play their first game since Super Bowl XLII tomorrow night when they open their four-game preseason schedule against the Detroit Lions in Ford Field. Besides the fact that the Giants will be one of the two competing teams, little about tomorrow's game will resemble the Super Bowl. The latter, of course, was for the NFL championship and included the most exciting fourth quarter in Super Bowl history, one that will be remembered for as long as football is played. Tomorrow’s game will be played for much lower stakes, will be contested for the most part by backups and players who won’t be in uniform a month from now and the score will quickly recede from memory.

But to the Giants players and coaches, the game is important. Here is a sampling of what several of them had to say about the Giants’ first game of the 2008 preseason.

Head Coach Tom Coughlin:
“We are going to play a lot of people and see how they perform under game conditions, see how they do with the speed of the game, which I’m sure will be a surprise to a lot of these young guys. It’s a turf game, it’s an indoor game. See how they are under the pressure of having to execute assignments. How quickly they can react to what the opponent is doing. Be very conscious of who it is that is contributing on special teams and how they might be used going forward. (To) start on some of the objectives that were put forth in the offseason to our players in terms of our improvement. To assess, each and every time we play, but a big personnel-type of evaluation. I don’t think there will be any mystery about how we play. I’m not sure what Detroit will have in mind.”

Quarterback Eli Manning:
“Everybody is always looking forward to getting into a game situation. It’s good to kind of mix it up instead of going up against the same guys every day in practice. We’ve prepared for Detroit; we’ve watched a lot of film on them. I think everybody is looking forward to going over there and playing the game.

“I think you learn from every practice and every game that you play in. This game will help us get back into game speed and will help me get back to throwing under pressure, getting the ball off on time, and getting used to taking the hits. You know guys are coming after you and you’re going to get hit, knocked down, hopefully not too often, but it’s going to happen. It’s not a bad thing, because it will help you get back into form.”

Middle linebacker Antonio Pierce:
“We’re tired of hitting each other. I’m tired of seeing Brandon Jacobs, Derrick Ward, (Ahmad) Bradshaw and Eli. I want to hit someone else for once. You just want to get out there and compete and the only thing we’ve done at that kind of level was goal line and that’s not realistic. The offensive line has the ball at the two-yard line and they didn’t have to do any work for it. It will be good to go out there against another team. Detroit has a lot of weapons and we’re excited to go out there and play. We’ve got new faces on the defense, so it’ll be good to see the guys working well together in a game situation.”

Defensive end Justin Tuck, who will start his first game on the left side as the replacement for the recently-retired Michael Strahan:

“I don’t get bogged down with all that. It’s just a little asterisk next to your name that says you’re a starter now. Other than that, you continue to go out there and do what you did up until now. It’s still the same.

“Obviously we won’t play a whole game, but for the plays we are out there, we're going to take it like it’s the Super Bowl. We’re going to try and get our timing down and get a feeling for playing with one another again in a real live situation and work on the little things we didn’t do well last season.

http://www.giants.com/news/headlines/story.asp?story_id=27931

Yankees 5, Rangers 3

From MLB.com

ARLINGTON -- Lest the rest of the season speed on by them, the Yankees have no choice but to look ahead. There's no use in looking back at Joba Chamberlain, a pitcher who might not return to the team this season. No use in looking back at Chien-Ming Wang or Phil Hughes or Jorge Posada. Call it bad luck; call it baseball. The Yankees call it an excuse.

And they won't taint their season by relying on excuses.

So the Yankees made none on Wednesday, and wound up needing none. Their 5-3 win over the Rangers was complete and comprehensive, drawing from a patched-up rotation and a taxed bullpen and a cyclical offense. The Yankees showcased the finest traits of all three areas on Wednesday, and so they left Rangers Ballpark with a win.

They did not escape with a win, but they earned one instead.

"It was good to win," shortstop Derek Jeter said. "I don't really care who was pitching, to be honest with you."

But he knew it was Sidney Ponson, a former rotation stopgap who has bullied his way into a regular job with the Yankees. Despite allowing a two-run single to Chris Davis in the second inning Wednesday, and despite serving up a solo homer to Michael Young in the sixth, Ponson handled his former team as efficiently as the Yankees might have hoped.

His final line wasn't quite as sparkling as the one he produced against the Angels last week, but his process was perhaps even more impressive. Ponson recorded eight ground-ball outs and only five flyouts -- one-third the amount he had against the Angels. That's no small detail, considering how fly balls tend to rocket over walls in this Texas heat. Ponson knew that coming in, so he took extra care to throw a sharp sinker.

RECAP:
http://newyork.yankees.mlb.com/news/wrap.jsp?ymd=20080806&content_id=3266059&vkey=wrapup2005&fext=.jsp&team=away

Hungarian GP: Heartbreak for Massa Gives Kovalainen 1st GP Win!

From f1-Live.com

As a race, the 70-lap Hungarian Grand Prix is always somewhat processional and this year was no exception. However, the race was spiced up by some unexpected issues that took both Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa out of contention and handed Heikki Kovalainen the race win in the very final stages of the race.

Felipe Massa made an electric getaway from third position on the grid passing Kovalainen on the run to turn one and then braking late, passed Lewis Hamilton for the lead around the outside of turn one. It was a tremendous aggressive move and showing that his record breaking pace in the second round of qualifying yesterday was no fluke, the Brazilian was able to pull out a small advantage from Hamilton, a gap of four to five seconds he retained though the first round of pits stops.

Hamilton did not look to have an answer to Massa’s pace but the championship leader’s race took a further nose-dive as the front-left tyre failed on lap 42. Hamilton made his way slowly back to the pits and took the soft tyre for the remainder of the race.

Out front, Massa controlled the pace and allowed Kovalainen to slowly close the gap. It all looked to be perfectly under control until two laps from home when the Ferrari V8 failed in dramatic fashion handing the race win to Kovalainen and leaving Massa distraught.

It was certainly Kovalainen’s lucky day as he recorded his first Grand Prix victory. The Finn did not have the pace of McLaren Mercedes team-mate Hamilton nor Massa in the Ferrari. Still, it was an error free run which launches his championship tally to within striking distance of the BMW Sauber duo of Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica.

Timo Glock drove what is by far the strongest race of his career to finish second for Toyota, Starting from fifth position, Glock made the jump on Kubica and ran with Kovalainen for much of the race and while second position was perhaps a little fortunate, he was a contender throughout the race on pure pace and not a safety car intervention or an abstract fuel strategy.

Kimi Raikkonen finished in third position having followed Fernando Alonso for two-thirds of the race without making much of an impression. Some rapid pit work from the Ferrari crew gave him the track position and he was then able to close the gap to Glock before backing off in the latter stages following team-mate Massa’s engine failure. The result moves Raikkonen ahead of his unfortunate team-mate in the championship race.


FINAL RESULTS:

1) Heikki Kovalainen - McLaren - Mercedes

2) Timo Glock - Toyota

3) Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari

4) Fernando Alonso - Renault

5) Lewis Hamilton - McLaren - Mercedes

6) Nelson Piquet Jr - Renault

7) Jarono Trulli - Toyota

8) Robert Kubica - BMW

CHAMPIONSHIP LEADERS:

1) Lewis Hamilton - 62

2) Kimi Raikkonen - 57

3) Felipe Massa - 54