Cycling
Slagter wins Stage 4, while Thomas leads Paris-Nice
BELLEVILLE, France – Tom Jelte Slagter of the Netherlands won the fourth stage of the Paris-Nice on Wednesday, with British rider Geraint Thomas taking the overall lead after finishing second in a sprint to the line.
Thomas moved three seconds ahead of previous leader John Degenkolb of Germany, who finished 31st.
Cavendish and Omega win Tirreno-Adriatico opener
SAN VINCENZO, Italy – British sprinter Mark Cavendish leads the Tirreno-Adriatico after his Omega Pharma-Quick Step team won a time trial to open the weeklong cycling race Wednesday.
Omega clocked 20 minutes, 13 seconds over the flat 11.5-mile route from Donoratico to San Vincenzo.
NBA
Bryant’s 18th NBA season ends after just six games
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. – Immediately after the Los Angeles Lakers declared Kobe Bryant out for the season, he already was thinking about how to make sure the Lakers will be much less miserable when he returns.
Bryant expressed only mild frustration Wednesday after the long-expected decision to end his 18th NBA season after just six games. The superstar guard’s broken bone in his left knee has kept him out since shortly before Christmas, and it still hasn’t healed enough for weight-bearing exercise. With just five weeks left in their injury-ravaged season, the Lakers (22-42) elected to preserve Bryant for next year, when he’ll be 36.
Soccer
Germany wins Algarve Cup; USA wins seventh place
FARO, Portugal – A flurry of goals at the start the second half helped Germany to a 3-0 victory over world champion Japan in the final of the Algarve Cup on Wednesday.
The United States beat North Korea 3-0 for seventh place.
Iceland scored two first-half goals and hung on to beat Sweden 2-1 in the third-place game at the annual competition.
The U.S. women ended their first two-game losing streak in 13 years, beating North Korea at Parchal, Portugal, as Heather O’Reilly scored in her 200th international appearance.
O’Reilly became the seventh American to make 200 appearances, and Abby Wambach scored twice to increase her world record to 167 goals, including 21 at the Algarve Cup.
World Cup Skiing
Mayer wins his first on tour; Svindal takes overall lead
LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland – Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway retook the lead in the overall World Cup standings Wednesday by placing fifth in a downhill won by Olympic champion Matthias Mayer of Austria.
Svindal earned 45 points to move 41 ahead of two-time defending overall champion Marcel Hirscher of Austria, who skips downhills.
Mayer earned his first career World Cup win in 1 minute, 29.99 seconds, 0.11 faster than Christof Innerhofer of Italy and Ted Ligety of the United States, who tied for second.
Hoefl-Riesch crashes out of World Cup competition
LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland – A dramatic season-ending crash for Maria-Hoefl Riesch on Wednesday denied Alpine skiing one of its two overall title duels at the World Cup Finals.
Hoefl-Riesch’s exit – from the downhill course into safety nets, then airlifted from the slope by helicopter – left Anna Fenninger of Austria the favorite to win her first crystal trophy one month after becoming an Olympic champion. Fenninger’s sixth-place finish in the final downhill built a slim 11-point lead in the standings over the 2011 champion with three races remaining.
Lara Gut of Switzerland won in 1:32.31. Runner-up Elisabeth Goergl of Austria was 0.05 back, and third-placed Swiss Fraenzi Aufdenblatten was 0.57 behind.
Associated Press
