Swimming: Britain's Sarah Price set a world short-course record for the women's 200 metres backstroke shortly after Australia's Clementine Stoney had broken the old mark yesterday.
Price, competing in the consolation B final at the Australian short-course swimming championships, clocked two minutes 4.44 seconds to beat the 2:05.83 set 90 minutes earlier in the main final by Stoney.
China's He Cihong set the previous record of 2:06.09 at the world short-course championships in Majorca on December 5th, 1993.
Stoney said: "It was in the back of my head that I wanted to go out there and do that but I didn't fully believe that I could until tonight."
Ian Thorpe won the men's 400 metres freestyle in 3:36.20, well outside fellow Australian Grant Hackett's world record of 3:35.01.
Olympics: Mihaela Melinte, the women's world record holder in the hammer, has been banned for life by the Romanian Olympic Committee (COR) after testing positive for nandrolone, an official statement said yesterday.
Last year, Melinte was escorted from the field just minutes before the Olympic contest in Sydney.
She had tested positive at an athletics meeting in Milan in June last year. Last month, she failed to persuade the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) to review her case for alleged irregularities in the doping investigation. The IAAF said its arbitration panel had recommended a two-year ban.
Cycling: Spanish rider Angel Edo took the lead of the Tour of Portugal yesterday after his Banesto team outpaced the Kelme team of previous leader Constantino Zamballa in the fourth stage team time-trial.
Banesto were fastest along the 38.5-km course between Loule and Tavira, clocking 41 minutes 12 seconds, which was also enough to push their Portuguese rider Candido Barbosa up into second place, just one second behind Edo.
The Once team, who were favourites to take the stage, finished seven seconds behind Banesto in second place, while Portugal's La-Pecol formation were third.
Today's fifth stage covers 220.7 kms from Tavira on the Algarve coast along an undulating course through the sun-scorched Alentejo region to Evora.
Most of the challenging mountain stages are in the second half of the race.
Cycling: National road race bronze medallist Paddy Moriarty placed 6th in yesterday's Havant Grand Prix in England. Namesake Eugene Moriarty was the best of the Irish team for much of the world-ranked race, but cramped while in the leading break with Landbouwkredit professional Gordon McCauley and Mark Lovatt. As the Listowel rider faded, Paddy Moriarty came through strongly to eventually record a top placing behind winner John Tanner, with McCauley second and Lovatt third.
In Kerry, sprinter Micheal Fitzgerald proved fastest at the end of the Gene Moriarty memorial, storming past Michael McNena and Paul Healion in the final metres of the prestigious race. Brendan Graham was best of the senior two and junior riders up North, winning the FPM cross-Border three-day by a margin of over half a minute from David Gardiner.
