Sport

On the same day Tony Stewart announced his return from a serious back injury, he also found himself the recipient of a $35,000 fine for comments that questioned NASCAR’s commitment to safety pertaining to loose wheels and the number of lug nuts teams are using. Stewart criticized NASCAR Wednesday for its rule that does not require all five lug nuts to be secured on a wheel before a driver…

Golf was added to the Olympics this year for the first time since 1904. The qualifying rules are a little weird and the event is a 72-hole individual stroke play format making it seem just like any other tournament and not something special like it should be. While there are several players who are definitely excited for the event, there are many who see it as just another tournament in…

Kelly Holmes has admitted for the first time she fears she never competed in a clean race at the Olympics or world championships. Britain’s double Olympic gold medallist also revealed her frustrations that she was deprived of major championship medals by athletes who cheated. “In the Commonwealth Games I reckon I was probably up against clean athletes,” she said, when asked about major championships, “but if you get one person…

Flags frame the Olympic Stadium as participants form the Olympic rings on the field during opening ceremonies in Seoul on September 17, 1988. (AP Photo / Lineno Cironneau) Thanks to an exhaustive as well as emotionally exhausting article published by the Associated Press, we now know that the 1988 Seoul Summer Games in South Korea were a horror show of torture, rape, slavery, and death. There has long been a fiction…

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RELATED: Full Stewart coverage Three-time NASCAR premier series champion Tony Stewart will return to competition this weekend at Richmond International Raceway, ending a season-opening run that saw the 44-year-old sidelined due to a back injury sustained in late January.   Stewart made the announcement Thursday via his Twitter account. Well, the long wait is over. I’ll be back in my @Mobil1 Chevy this weekend at Richmond. I can’t wait to race again 👍🏼😁👍🏼 #SmokeWillRise…

Team USA including World Cup soccer champion Abby Wambach faces Team Japan at the ANA Footgolf Faceoff held March 29, 2016, as part of the ANA Inspiration at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, Calif. Crystal Chatham/The Desert Sun

Philadelphia Flyers’ Scott Laughton is taken off the ice after crashing into the boards during Game 4. (Matt Slocum/Associated Press) PHILADELPHIA — John Carlson took a deep breath and shook his head. His hit on Philadelphia Flyers forward Scott Laughton caused Laughton to lose an edge and crash hard into the boards with his back. Now, he was struggling to reconcile a legal check and routine hockey play with an action that led…

Philadelphia Flyers’ Scott Laughton is taken off the ice after crashing into the boards during Game 4. (Matt Slocum/Associated Press) PHILADELPHIA — John Carlson took a deep breath and shook his head. His hit on Philadelphia Flyers forward Scott Laughton caused Laughton to lose an edge and crash hard into the boards with his back. Now, he was struggling to reconcile a legal check and routine hockey play with an action that led…

x Embed x Share USA TODAY Sports’ Jeff Gluck breaks down what to expect in Richmond. USA TODAY Sports Tony Stewart during qualifying for the Good Sam 500 at Phoenix International Raceway. (Mark J. Rebilas, USA TODAY Sports)(Photo: Mark J. Rebilas, USA TODAY Sports) DENVER, N.C. — Tony Stewart is “beyond mad” with NASCAR over the sanctioning body’s lack of lug nut enforcement on pit road, the driver/team owner said…

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LONDON (AP) — Defending the integrity of athletics ahead of Sunday’s London Marathon, Kenyan runners insisted Wednesday that they run clean and don’t need to resort to doping in the pursuit of glory. “It’s a noble sport,” Eliud Kipchoge said as he prepares to defend his London title on Sunday. “We are really working hard in training and I can assure the general public that we are really clean as…

One of NASCAR’s most popular venues, Bristol Motor Speedway has a knack for eliciting strong emotions from both drivers and fans. This past weekend was no exception, with the inbox filling with those reacting to what unfolded on the track, in the grandstands and even in the garage. To submit a question for the weekly NASCAR mailbag, email Jordan. It seemed like everyone on Twitter was bitching about…

Golf hasn’t been an Olympic sport since the third modern games, back in St. Louis in 1904. Since then there hasn’t been a clamoring for the sport to return to the quadrennial event – no large protests or player-led crusades. Most in the sport seemed perfectly happy with the status quo: Four major tournaments, a few other top-tier events, an annual team competition and then run-of-the-mill tournaments that pepper the schedule…

We’re heading to Richmond this weekend after an entertaining race at Bristol Motor Speedway, that saw seven of the top nine finishers have their best results of the year and two drivers — fourth-place Chase Elliott and sixth-place Matt DiBenedetto — post their respective best career finishes.  With that in mind, here are some final thoughts on Bristol and a look ahead to Richmond. LOOSE WHEELS — There’s a lot of hand-wringing…

Jess Varnish has been dropped from the Great Britain cycling team weeks after suffering Olympic disappointment for a second time. The 25-year-old from Halesowen was told in March she would not be considered for selection for August’s Olympics in Rio after failing to qualify in the two-woman, two-lap team sprint. Related: Jess Varnish rips into GB coaches after team miss Rio sprint spot Varnish, who was disqualified from the event…

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The death of a Lexington cardiologist in a bicycle crash Sunday rocked the city’s tight-knit cycling community and renewed interest in a recently defeated bike safety law. Dr. David Cassidy, 62, was the second member of a small cycling group to be killed in a collision in less than a year. He was hit about 4:15 p.m. by a woman who didn’t see him as she merged into a lane…

i Larisa Andreea Iordache of Romania performs on the balance beam during the 2015 World Gymnastics Championships in Glasgow, Scotland. Matthias Schrader/AP hide caption toggle caption Matthias Schrader/AP Larisa Andreea Iordache of Romania performs on the balance beam during the 2015 World Gymnastics Championships in Glasgow, Scotland. Matthias Schrader/AP After four decades of Olympic glory, the Romanian women’s gymnastic team has failed to even qualify for the Summer Games in…