Sports Digest: Jessica Kürten scored her seventh victory in the past 15 days when claiming the Swiss Masters at the big Zurich Five Star International last night, writes Grania Willis.
Kürten and the Mayor Castle Forbes Libertini clocked the winning time of 38.13 seconds to continue the Irish rider's incredible run of success that includes the world's richest showjumping prize, the $250,000 winner's cheque for the Dubai Grand Prix a fortnight ago.
Last night's win earned Kürten a Mercedes car, with Michael Whitaker netting just €5,167 when finishing over a second slower to fill the runner-up spot on Portofino.
Yesterday the Equestrian Federation announced that Kürten will be Ireland's only representative at two World Cup fixtures in Holland and Sweden. Kürten, currently sharing 18th place in the Western European World Cup rankings, will travel to Hertogenbosch at the end of March and Gothenburg in mid-April.
The team for the season's first Nations Cup was also announced yesterday. Darragh Kearns, Conor Swail, Kevin Babington and Niall Grimes are the quartet for Wellington, Florida, in early March, with Robert Splaine named as chef d'équipe.
Hingis in title mix
Martina Hingis is closing in on her 15th career grand slam title after she and Mahesh Bhupathi reached the Australian Tennis Open mixed doubles final. They beat Australians Paul Hanley and Samantha Stosur 6-3, 6-3 in the semi-finals to reach tomorrow's championship match in Melbourne.
Standing between them and the title are the Canadian-Russian combination of Daniel Nestor and Elena Likhovtseva, who overcame Leander Paes and Nathalie Dechy 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (10-4).
Like Hingis, Bhupathi has won nine doubles titles at grand slam events, four in men's doubles and five in mixed, each with a different woman partner. Unhappy Barnes
To say that the finals of the National Senior Boxing Championships got off to an unsatisfactory start for the Ulster light-flywieght, Paddy Barnes, would be an understatement. Barnes took his defeat by last year's runner-up James Moore of Limerick not so well writes Pat Roche.
The young Belfast boy, who joins a team of seven Northern Ireland boxers for the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne in March, was convinced he had beaten Moore instead of being given a 12-10 defeat. Barnes used the ring well and led after the second round 5-4 in what was a very untidy decider. He was a point behind going into the last and Moore's confidence, not to mention his experience of having been there last year, gave him a slight advantage. The Ulsterman was not shy in expressing his disgust. He jumped out of the ring before the presentation and when he returned he said "They are a crowd of robbers. I know I won that fight." Barnes apparently was referring to the computer scorers by showing his disgust.
The flyweight T J Doheny from Portlaoise was a good southpaw but lacked experience to take on Conor Ahern from Baldoyle. Ahern did everything right to score a 17-5 win. Eric Donovan got the expected clean sweep for the St Michael's club, Athy, off the ground with a decisive 20-6 win over Ross Hickey from Kildare.
McWilliams returns
Northern Ireland's Jeremy McWilliams is set for a shock return to MotoGP after being named as a rider for the WCM Bimota team for the 2006 season. The Belfast-based rider, who endured a torrid time on the Stobart Honda in last year's British Superbike Championship, was on the provisional entry list released yesterday by the FIM, the sport's governing body. McWilliams is to be joined on the team by American Jason Perez.
Gallagher in touch
Giant Asia riders David McCann, Paul Griffin and Stephen Gallagher have been performing strongly in the 2.2 ranked cycling Tour of Thailand. McCann won both the prologue time trial on Tuesday and yesterday's fourth stage. He also led the race for the first two stages, although he then lost time on day three and dropped outside the top five.
Griffin placed third on the second stage of the race, while Gallagher - who had been fourth in the prologue - took third on the fourth stage and moved up from fifth to third overall.
Irish time trial champion McCann then won the marathon 221.7 kilometre fourth stage yesterday. Gallagher remained third overall. He begins today's penultimate stage 1 minute and 33 seconds behind race leader Fuyu Li of the Marco Polo team.
Jobe sets target
Brandt Jobe added a five-under-par 67 to his opening 65 to set a halfway target of 12-under-par 132 in the Buick golf Invitational yesterday. Jobe leads by two from South Africa's Tim Clark, who shot 66.
Meanwhile, Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods, the two men who have each won the Buick Invitational three times, made significant moves through the field in their second rounds at Torrey Pines.
Mickelson, champion in 1993, 2000 and 2001, fired a five-under-par 67 to make sure of weekend golf while Woods was also moving up the leaderboard at five-under-par for the day after 15 holes. Best of the early finishers was Spain's Jose Maria Olazabal, who shot six birdies on the back nine for an eight under par 64 and a total of 138 after a disappointing opening round of 74.
