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Sevens rugby players are runners. They’re fit, hard, athletic sports people. Their bodies are fat-less and trim – strong thighs, cut calves. They’re not fit like competitive body-sculptors or cross-fit types. Sevens players are purpose-built to run. We’re watching the Australian women’s team train at the Sydney Academy of Sport and Recreation in Narrabeen. It’s a couple of days before the team flies out for Rio. And though they’ve been…

Photo credit: @keselowski WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Brad Keselowski escaped uninjured — “still upright,” in his words — after a scary crash Tuesday during an organizational test for NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams at Watkins Glen International. Keselowski had just turned a session-topping 124.572 mph on his 18th lap of the day, best of the 14 drivers participating on the freshly repaved 2.45-mile road course. But just after registering that…

Russian Alexander Dyachenko won gold in the kayak doubles sprint at the London Olympics in 2012 Nineteen more Russian rowers have been banned from competing at next month’s Olympics, taking the number of Russian athletes suspended this week to 37. Earlier on Tuesday, eight athletes across canoeing, modern pentathlon and sailing were banned, as seven swimmers and three rowers were on Monday. Governing bodies are making the rulings following the…

Dale Earnhardt Jr. warned Monday that his return to NASCAR could take longer than planned. NASCAR’s most popular driver is scheduled to miss his third consecutive race this Sunday with concussion-like symptoms. On his weekly podcast, he said he will have another evaluation soon to see “what kind of gains we’ve made and get in front of my doctors . and let them tell me where they think I’m at…

On the morning that Britain voted to leave the European Union, I was in Paris covering Euro 2016, and quite honestly football was the last thing on my mind. I walked the streets of Oberkampf and Le Marais listlessly and without purpose, trying and failing to organise my thoughts, engulfed in a quiet, private devastation. As the repercussions began to jolt into motion, as politicians sank without trace, as markets…

Archery Has a decision been reached? Yes All three Russian athletes selected for Rio have been cleared to compete by World Archery, which says they have been tested extensively. None of the three has previously been sanctioned for doping. The World Archery president, Prof Dr Ugur Erdener, said: “The World Archery executive board was satisfied that, within the framework established by the IOC, archery’s three qualified Russian Federation athletes should…

Too muscular. Too short. Too stocky. Too young-looking. Former gymnast and Olympic gold medalist Shawn Johnson was called a lot of things by the media in her time as an athlete. Often, few of them had anything to do with her athleticism. Her mother would tell her over and over: “Honey, look at your success. Look how happy you are when you are out there on the floor. Don’t let…

Philly sports fans have a reputation. They’re loud. They’re drunk. They’re occasionally violent. It’s possible that a Philly sports fan might not even realize that a teen running out on the field mid-game until he’s tasered into submission by a security guard is unusual behavior until one leaves their hometown. However, if there’s one thing that people from at least 100 miles outside the greater Philadelphia metropolitan area love doing,…

x Embed x Share A resident of Rio’s Marina da Glória at Guanabara Bay, where Olympic sailing and rowing will take place, describes the state of the water quality. USA TODAY Sports Workers gather debris carried by the tide and caught by the “eco-barrier” before entering Guanabara Bay July 20.(Photo: Yauyoshi Chiba, AFP/Getty Images) RIO DE JANEIRO – Luiz Goldfeld was excited in 2009 when he heard the Olympics were coming…

Some things never change. When Baron De Coubertin, founder of the Olympic movement, estimated the costs of the inaugural 1896 games in Athens, he thought that a quarter of a million drachmas should do the job. The final bill, about $10 million in today’s terms, was six times that. The country’s experience of Athens 2004 was not dissimilar in terms of sticking to the budget, but the comparison ends there….

Which nation will field the most doping-free team at the Rio Olympics, due to start on Aug. 5? Russia, the country that narrowly avoided a blanket ban from the games for drug abuse.  On Sunday, the International Olympic Committee’s executive board decided that Russian athletes will not enjoy a presumption of innocence — in other words, they will all be considered potential dopers and subject to “a rigorous additional out-of-competition…

When you think of the founding fathers of the modern professional soccer in the United States, names such as Clive Toye, Phil Woosnam, Lamar Hunt and Robert Hermann come to mind. They did their own thing to make sure the game gained a foothold. But when William Drought Cox is mentioned, you’re more likely to be met with a blank look. As it happens, he did a lot. Cox had…

In July 2015, one year before the Olympic Games that will begin in Rio de Janeiro next month, the Associated Press conducted a five-month-long investigation into the “chronically polluted” water where some of the events will take place. What the AP described in an impressively reported 2,500 words, the British photographer Giles Price presents in a single image. His aerial photo of Rio’s Guanabara Bay shows water tinged a noxious…

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A Virginia baseball player was saved when his teammate administered CPR moments after he was struck in the chest by a baseball. The Manassas baseball team was practicing for the Southeast Regional Tournament on July 14 when the catcher threw the ball and hit Steve Smith directly in the chest, according to Steve’s father Tim. “His heart stopped immediately,” Smith said, who is also the team’s coach. “When you get…

Archery Has a decision been reached? Yes All three Russian athletes selected for Rio have been cleared to compete by World Archery, which says they have been tested extensively. None of the three has previously been sanctioned for doping. The World Archery president, Prof Dr Ugur Erdener, said: “The World Archery executive board was satisfied that, within the framework established by the IOC, archery’s three qualified Russian Federation athletes should…

The IOC’s ruling against a blanket Olympic ban for Russia was met with disappointment by many.(Photo: James Lang, USA TODAY Sports) Thomas Bach asserted, reiterated and repeated that, yes, indeed, the International Olympic Committee’s decision not to ban Russia from the Rio Olympics was in the interest of clean sport. In delegating the decisions about the eligibility of athletes in a state-sponsored doping program, the IOC was respecting the rights…

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Jefferson’s Scott Trail, left, catches the ball to get an out on Manchester’s Dan Sepic at second base during Central League baseball action in Manchester on Monday(Photo: Dawn J. Sagert, York Dispatch) Story Highlights Austin Allison and Dan Sepic played key roles for Manchester. Joe Jasinski, Jared Kashner, and Jordan Witmer each had two hits for Jefferson. Manchester is now 17-9-1, while Jefferson is 14-6-3. MANCHESTER — Austin Allison spent last…