The Sports Note: Americans take over Europe
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It was a good weekend to be an American athlete in Europe. Tiger Woods won his 11th career major, winning the British Open by two strokes, and American cyclist Floyd Landis followed in the footsteps of Lance Armstrong and won the Tour de France. Its nice when Americans can go over to Europe and show those silly Europeans that America still has the best of the best of the sporting world. Except for soccer; we suck at soccer.
It was an emotional victory for Tiger; this being the first major he's won since the passing of his father. After not making the cut at the U.S. Open mere days after Earl Woods' death, Tiger was back in top form and there was little doubt from the start who was going to win this thing. Sergio Garcia made a run at it on Saturday but come on, he's Sergio Garcia, so of course he fell apart on Sunday. Tiger is now tied for second on the all-time major victories list with 11, 7 behind Jack Nicklaus. Anyone want to bet that Tiger doesn't catch Jack?
Everyone thought Floyd Landis was done, that he'd blown his chance at winning the Tour. And then the guy rode like a lunatic on Thursday and put himself in position to recapture the yellow jersey. Landis at one point was down 8:08 minutes to the leader but he made up 7 1/2 minutes in that crazy Thursday run and then retook the lead during the time trial Saturday. Landis is no Armstrong, though he is a former teammate, but Landis' victory deserves to stand on its own. He's been riding with an injured hip that's going to require surgery in the very near future. He came back even when left for dead and, even better, the guy's a beer drinker. Whats not to like people?
The moral of the story? Americans win on European soil. Except for World Cup soccer. In the World Cup we suck.
I Hate This Kid
Remember last week when we wrote about the 21 year old kid, Jeff Madison, who won a World Series of Poker bracelet to become the youngest ever to do so? Well he just won another one, this time in the $5,000 Short-handed No-Limit Hold'em tournament. Not only does he get a second bracelet, he also collects $643,381. Nice work if you can get it. The two wins, plus a third place finish in another event, means Madison has won $1.4 million in two weeks. Yeah, thats $1.4 million and yeah, thats why I hate the guy. Madison is a film student at UC Santa Barbara and he claim's he's still going to go back and finish college:
"I'm going to finish school, Madsen said shortly after ending a stunning week that few players of any age have accomplished on poker's greatest stage. "I've got one more year. I could drop out, but I like my school. Santa Barbara is a nice place. There's no reason not to go back. But I'll be playing poker the whole time, as many big events as I can.
If he does go back to school, you think anyone's going to let him in their home games? Its not every college kid who has two WSOP bracelets to their credit after all. The big event, the $10,000 buy-in No-Limit Hold'em tournament starts Friday and despite the huge number of people who are going to be in it, no one's hotter then Madison right? He's got as good a shot as anyone.
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Date
Mon 07/24/06, 9:30 am EST
