Heartbreak for Aussies
DESPITE another strong performance, Australia’s team of Donna Lobban, Christine Nunn, Sarah Cardwell and Alex Haydon has been denied a spot in the knockout quarterfinals at the Women’s World Squash Teams Championships in China.
The ninth seeds needed to beat eighth seeds Canada, with the winner to finish second in Pool A behind defending champion Egypt. The tie came down to the final match between Australia’s world No. 44 Nunn and Canada’s world No. 42 Danielle Letourneau, who won 11-8, 5-11, 11-8, 13-11. REBECCA WILLIAMS
DEFENDING champion Jamie Whincup and his codriver Paul Dumbrell made a statement to their Supercars rivals after dominating practice at the Sandown 500 yesterday.
The seven-time champion and his long-time co-driver fired the first warning shots of the endurance season after producing the two fastest times of the day in practice.
In a clear statement, the No.1 Red Bull Holden Racing Team Commodore would be the car to chase at Sandown, Dumbrell set the track alight in first practice with a lap record of 1:07.8467 in the codrivers only session.
He lowered the previous practice record set by Whincup – who he is teaming up with in the endurance races for the seventh year – in 2014.
Whincup then backed it up with the fastest time (1:07.9688) in second practice, the only session for the main Supercars drivers yesterday.
The Holden ace led a Red Bull one-two, with teammate and championship leader Shane van Gisbergen clocking the next best time ahead of Walkinshaw Andretti United’s James Courtney. The first five cars were Holdens with Tickford Racing’s Cameron Waters the best of the Ford drivers in sixth.
Championship contender Scott McLaughlin was the 11th fastest.
Whincup said it was a strong start for himself and Dumbrell, but they still wanted to find more improvement for the weekend’s racing.
“We’ve generally had a quick car, we’ve just made rookie errors and mistakes later in the weekend,” Whincup said.
“So we’re not getting carried away with car pace, we’ll just keep our head down and try to minimise errors.”
Whincup sits third in the Supercars championship standings, 362 points behind van Gisbergen.