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The Road to Australian Open 2011: Women’s Singles
The 2011 Australian Open is the first major tournament of the year on the women’s professional tennis tour. In preparation to peak at the Australian Open players will choose different paths to gain enough form and match play. The following women’s singles tournaments make up the road to the Australian Open. In order of when [...]
TENNIS: OnCourtAdvantage.com
The Road to Australian Open 2011: Men’s Singles
The 2011 Australian Open is the first major tournament of the year on the men’s professional tennis tour. In preparation to peak at the Australian Open players will choose different paths to gain enough form and match play. The following men’s singles tournaments make up the road to the Australian Open. In order of when [...]
TENNIS: OnCourtAdvantage.com
LA Matadors Score Road Win Over Memphis Force
Matadors Become First Americas Conference Team To Win On The Road:
The Los Angeles Matadors became the first away team to earn a victory in the Americas Conference of the World Series of Boxing Thursday night taking four out of five bouts and earning three points over the Memphis Force at the DeSoto Civic Center in Southaven, Miss. The Matadors have built up a commanding, four point lead in the Americas Conference over rival Miami Gallos, the only team to beat them and currently sit number one throughout the international …
ProBoxing-Fans.com
MAC Basketball: MAC Road Report – Final Exams
MAC Basketball: MAC Road Report – Final Exams
Written by Alex Keil for the Mid-American Conference.
The week of final exams is a busy time for any student, especially a student-athlete. In the world of college basketball, its one week where it may actually be an advantage to be on the road focusing on each upcoming opponent rather than hunkered down in a dorm with the TV and PS3 sitting there as distractions. With today being the end of finals week almost everywhere, we decided to take a look around the MAC at what “classes” our teams may be taking and what grade they earned on their test.
Akron – Conflict Resolution – D
In this case, D is for disqualification. After back-to-back efforts of 22 and 14 points before Thanksgiving, it looked like Zeke Marshall was ready to make the leap and establish himself as one of the premier post options in the conference. Lately though, the sophomore center has put himself in bad positions due to fouls, playing only 21 minutes a game in the last four contests, averaging five points a game and fouling out twice. The worst game came Wednesday when he only scored two points and grabbed one board in Akron’s otherwise competitive loss at Minnesota. The Zips are a different team on both ends when Marshall is playing well, so a return to form would be a big boost for them.
Ball State – Finance – A
DePaul has given our teams a number of good opportunities lately, but after near-misses from Northern Illinois and Central Michigan, it was the Ball State Cardinals who finally pulled out a win for the MAC against the Big East opponent. In a foul-plagued game played in front of a good crowd enjoying a rare on-campus appearance by the Blue Demons, it was back-up guard Tyrae Robinson who decided things with a driving lay-up with only 2.7 seconds left in overtime. A paycheck and a W? Recession or not, that’s just good financial sense.
Bowling Green – Meteorology – B+
Bowling Green was among the first to get hit by the snowstorm that blew over much of Ohio this past Sunday and the attendance for their home game with Florida International reflected that. Just 685 brave souls risked the drive to Anderson Arena to see the Isiah Thomas-led Panthers out of the Sun Belt but those that did were rewarded with BG’s first win over a Division I opponent this season. Without Scott Thomas in the lineup, Dee Brown picked up the scoring slack with 24 and the oft-outrebounded Falcons won that battle for just the third time all season despite two frontcourt players fouling out.
Buffalo – Greek Mythology – A
Battling the Phoenix of UW-Green Bay, the Bulls shot 60% from the floor, received productive minutes from the bench and got a combined 42 from the backcourt tandem of Byron Mulkey and Zach Filzen in a 78-64 win. Locked in a tight contest midway through the first half, Buffalo used an 11-0 streak to gain some separation, then after Green Bay closed the gap early in the second half, reeled off a 14-0 run in less than four minutes to all but put the game away.
Central Michigan – Psychology – C-
Couple more of these tough losses and the Chippewas are going to start having some self-esteem issues. After losing second half leads to both Temple and DePaul earlier in the month, it happened again Saturday when CMU was on the road playing LSU. The Chippewas turned a two-point halftime deficit into an 11-point advantage in just six minutes but after that, the Tigers regrouped and ended the game on an 8-2 run with CMU’s only points coming with four seconds left. Three nights later, the Chips couldn’t take advantage of 17 Wright State turnovers but were still in the game the whole way despite only hitting a third of their shots. Down 12 with less than 12 minutes to play, Central Michigan fought back and managed to tie the game once but could never pull ahead. Undoubtedly talented, CMU has been in every game it’s played this year but still stands at just 2-7. A win Saturday against Detroit could help start the healing.
Eastern Michigan – Geography – D+
The Eagles have put on some miles since the beginning of the year, especially with a trip to Idaho earlier this month. Finally back at home, EMU took on a team that only had to travel 40 miles to get to Ypsilanti in the Detroit Titans. In a return game from last year’s BracketBusters, the two teams played a nip and tuck affair for the second year in a row but once again, Eastern Michigan couldn’t pull out a tight game and now are just 1-8 on the season. Brandon Bowdry continues to dominate both in the scoring column and on the boards, but the lack of a true second option is dooming EMU so far.
Kent State – History – B
It wasn’t pretty but Kent State was able to come from behind to defeat South Florida and former coach Stan Heath on Sunday night. A nice crowd came out to see the nationally-televised game on a night that honored the Golden Flashes squad of 2002 which reached the Elite Eight led by Heath. With both teams struggling to find the basket, the difference in the game came from the bench where Justin Greene’s double-double of 15 points and 14 rebounds led a KSU bench effort that saw them outscore USF 32-4. If they can get bench production like that in March, the Flashes might be looking to make some more history.
Miami – Business – B-
It took 35 minutes of game time, but the RedHawks finally took care of business against the visiting Troy Trojans on Saturday afternoon. Down 71-62 with less than five minutes to go, Charlie Coles took a timeout to calm down his troops. Miami responded out of the break by nailing three consecutive 3-pointers, two by Orlando Williams, to tie the game at 71 with just over a minute having ticked off the clock. After Troy retook the lead off a steal and lay-up, the RedHawks cranked up the defensive pressure and didn’t allow the Trojans another point, scoring nine more in the process for the winning margin in an 80-73 victory. Miami will continue to get battle-hardened over the winter break, hosting the Cincinnati Bearcats next week and taking a trip to Lawrence, Kansas just after New Year’s to take on the Jayhawks.
Northern Illinois – Mathematics – A
The Huskies might soon be credited with developing a new formula that goes like this:
Xavier Silas + Ball in Hands = Two Points
The senior from Austin, Texas via Colorado is now the nation’s leading scorer after his 40-point performance on Tuesday night in an 80-78 win against UIC. What’s even more impressive is the variety of ways he’s found to score, hitting on half his three-point attempts, shooting 90% from the free throw line and managing to go 40-67 on his shots inside the arc through seven games. While it’s still to be seen if this kind of pace can be sustained, NIU has to be considered a threat to win the West Division and even the league as long as #13 is on the court.
Ohio – Hospitality Management – C
The only MAC team to host two games this week, the Bobcats got a five-star review from the IUPUI Jaguars who used an 18-0 run in the middle of the second half to go from down 10 to up eight with just a minute and a half to play. St. Francis (PA) was slightly less impressed as Ohio made sure their game with the Red Flash was never in doubt on Wednesday night, racing out to a 26-point halftime advantage and coasting to an 87-58 win. The roller coaster continues for Ohio, who have been the most enigmatic team in the league so far, but back-to-back games against A-10 opponents St. Bonaventure and Temple might help clear that picture up a bit.
Toledo – Early Childhood Education – A
For the Rockets, it’s all about baby steps. Trailing by eight at halftime, the Rockets fell behind by as much as 13 in the second half then stormed back to force overtime on Saturday against Valparaiso. In the extra session, Reese Holliday scored the first four points as Toledo never gave the Crusaders the lead back, hitting just enough freebies down the stretch to keep Valpo at bay, eventually earning a 75-72 win. For Tod Kowalczyk it was win #1 at Toledo and could be a harbinger of things to come for the Rockets, who enter a winnable portion of their schedule with games against Florida Gulf Coast and NAIA member Indiana University-Northwest, followed by a road trip to UNC-Wilmington.
Western Michigan – Theoretical Physics – A
Earning one last A for the MAC this week were the Western Michigan Broncos, who might be taking lessons from Stephen Hawking based on how well they timed their late-game run against Georgia State. Trailing by 10 with less than nine minutes left, the Broncos rallied behind a 15-2 run that put them in front by three with 36 ticks remaining. The Panthers were able to tie the game on a Brandon McGee three-pointer with 13 seconds left, but Flenard Whitfield coolly drained a jumper with one second left to give the Broncos the win. Winners of three in a row, Western faces off against an intriguing South Dakota State team on Saturday before flying to Utah for a three-game-in-three-day tournament at Utah State.
Owls hit several bumps on the road
Owls hit several bumps on the road
It was the signature victory for the Kennesaw State men’s basketball program, if not the athletic department and the entire university.
The Road to Indy gets wider and faster
The Mazda Road to Indy will provide scholarships to the 2011
The Mazda Road to Indy unites the open-wheel driver development ladder and provides scholarships for champions at each level to move up; USF2000 > Star Mazda > Firestone Indy Lights > IZOD IndyCar.
With today’s announcement of Mazda as the multi-year title partner of INDYCAR’s Road to Indy driver development program, top young open-wheel racers from around the world find themselves at the beginning of a new age of open-wheel racing; the Mazda Road to Indy will provide scholarships to the 2011, 2012 and 2013 champions of the three affiliated series – the Cooper Tires Presents USF2000 National Championship Powered by Mazda, the Star Mazda Championship presented by Goodyear and Firestone Indy Lights, to graduate to the next level of the sport.
The MAZDA Road to Indy, with its career-making scholarship program, is designed to dramatically increase both the numbers and skill level of drivers on the road leading to the IZOD IndyCar series and the Indy 500.
And the Star Mazda Championship presented by Goodyear has responded with the most diverse and high-profile schedule in the series’ 21-year history. Star Mazda teams and drivers will share race weekends with INDYCAR six times during 2011, including two road circuits (TBA, Infineon), two street courses (St. Petersburg, Baltimore) and two ovals (Milwaukee, Iowa).
Additionally, Star Mazda and Firestone Indy Lights will share top billing at the GP3R street circuit in Trois-Rivieres; this marks Indy Lights’ first stand-alone event since it raced at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s road course in support of the U.S. Grand Prix in 2007.
Rounding out the 2011 Star Mazda Championship schedule are two road course weekends (Mosport and Mazda Raceway) with the American Le Mans series, and the high-profile Night Before the 500 USAC event on the O’Reilly Raceway Park oval in Indianapolis.
As a further demonstration of the growing relationship between the Star Mazda Championship and INDYCAR, Star Mazda’s official pre-season test will take place during the IZOD IndyCar Series and Firestone Indy Lights ‘spring training’ event.
The teams and drivers of the Star Mazda Championship will share the track, as well as press and TV coverage, with Firestone Indy Lights and IZOD IndyCar Series. This will be the first of many opportunities during the season for drivers and teams to build relationships around INDYCAR’s Road to Indy program.
“These announcements mark a major step toward the creation of a fully-integrated, fully-functioning development program for open-wheel racing in North America,” says Star Mazda founder and CEO Gary Rodrigues.
“I want to thank everyone who worked so hard to make this a reality and to encourage young drivers around the world to pay close attention to the unique and exciting opportunities that Star Mazda and the MAZDA Road to Indy will offer in 2011 and beyond. It should be abundantly clear that any driver serious about racing in the IZOD IndyCar series and the Indy 500 needs to be a part of this program.”
Notable graduates of the Star Mazda Championship already competing in the IZOD IndyCar Series include Marco Andretti, Graham Rahal and Raphael Matos (the 2005 Star Mazda champion and 2008 Indy Lights champion). Additionally, competitors in the Indy Lights series who honed their skills in the Star Mazda Championship include James Davison, James Hinchcliffe, Pablo Donoso, Michael Potekhen, Daniel Herrington, Jay Howard and Jonathan Bomarito.
Five drivers from the 2010 Star Mazda Championship – including 2010 champion Conor Daly – have already tested Indy Lights cars and one, Canadian racer David Ostella, has announced he will run a full 2011 Indy Lights season with Jensen MotorSport.
“Our series has had a long relationship with the Star Mazda Championship over the years and a number of the drivers competing with us currently are Star Mazda graduates.” says Roger Bailey, Executive Director of Firestone Indy Lights. “The Star Mazda race car is just the right vehicle, with the right horsepower and driving characteristics, to produce drivers ready to hit the ground running in Firestone Indy Lights. Star Mazda has been the unofficial stepping-stone to Indy Lights for many years and to be able to officially recognize that now, along with all the other good things happening for INDYCAR and the IZOD IndyCar series, is perfect timing and a big step forward for open-wheel racing.”
The first Star Mazda Championship race of 2011 will be at one of IndyCar’s most high-profile events, the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on March 26-27. Also on the schedule, as they will be at many races this season, are the other series that are part of the Road to Indy: the Cooper Tires Presents the USF2000 National Championship Powered by Mazda; the Star Mazda Championship presented by Goodyear; and the Firestone Indy Lights series.
The Star Mazda Championship made its first appearance in the streets of St. Petersburg in 2010, a hotly-contested race won by Conor Daly. This was the first victory of Daly’s 2010 season and the first of a 4-race winning streak. Daly went on to win the Star Mazda championship with a total of seven wins and a series-record nine poles.
From there, the Star Mazda Championship moves to another IndyCar race weekend on a road course, with the date and venue to be announced.
Three oval races in a row distinguish the next stretch of the 2011 schedule; the Night Before the 500 at O’Reilly Raceway Park with USAC on May 27-28, the Milwaukee Mile with IndyCar on June 18-19 and Iowa Speedway, also with IndyCar on June 24-25.
The Night Before the 500 is a high-profile event on the schedule, with Star Mazda Championship drivers taking part in a comprehensive ‘Road to Indy Summit’ that includes an autograph session at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and meetings with top officials, teams and drivers of the Firestone Indy Lights and IZOD IndyCar series. 2010 was the first pairing of Star Mazda and the Night Before the 500, with Indianapolis native Conor Daly winning the inaugural event.
Star Mazda last raced at the Milwaukee Mile in 2009 with the NASCAR Nationwide Series; Norwegian driver Anders ‘The Viking’ Krohn won that event and returned for a second season of Star Mazda competition in 2010 and went on to finish 2nd in the championship.
2011 will be Star Mazda’s third consecutive visit to the 7/8ths-mile Iowa Speedway oval in Newton, Iowa; the series ran with the ARCA/RE MAX cars in 2009, a race won by Irish driver Peter Dempsey, and in 2010 with IndyCar, where Conor Daly won from the pole.
After three races in a row on ovals, the drivers and teams of the Star Mazda Championship head to one of Canada’s premier road racing circuits for the Mobil 1 Presents the Grand Prix of Mosport. This round of the American Le Mans series has historically been held at the end of August, but for 2011 moves to July 22-23. Conor Daly scored his final victory of the 2010 season, from the pole, at this event.
After the wide open spaces of Mosport, the shotgun-barrel confines of the legendary street circuit at Trois-Rivières in Quebec, Canada on August 6-7 will provide the drivers with a challenge, but the incredible energy and enthusiasm of the fans always makes this one of the most popular stops on the circuit. It will be a double-header / double-points weekend at the 42nd annual GP3R in which Star Mazda will be the co-feature with another high-profile open-wheel series.
In 2010, this race provided one of the season’s most memorable moments as the 2009 winner, Louisiana racer Alex Ardoin, on hand as a driver coach for Team GDT, found himself in the team’s spare car and, starting from the outside of the second row, went on to win the race for the second year in a row.
The next three races on the calendar will see the Star Mazda Championship team transporters criss-crossing the country… several times. From Trois-Rivières, the circus moves out to the West Coast for the IndyCar Grand Prix of Sonoma at Infineon Raceway August 26-27; and then it’s back to East Coast street circuits with an appearance at the inaugural Baltimore Grand Prix September 3-4.
While Baltimore will be new to all involved, the Star Mazda Championship has a long history at Infineon Raceway, though the last visit there was for a double-header with IMSA in 2005. The winners will be familiar to fans of the Indy Lights series; Chilean driver Pablo Donoso and Canadian James Hinchcliffe (he finished 2nd in the 2010 Indy Lights championship). And the 2005 Star Mazda Champion, was Brazilian racer Raphael Matos, now racing for the deFerran Dragon team in IndyCar.
The 2011 Star Mazda Championship season will wind up at the series’ traditional year-end venue, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca with the American Le Mans Series Presented by Patrόn. The series has a long and dramatic history at the legendary road course in Monterey, California, including the dramatic 2009 victory by English racer Adam Christodoulou (his third of the season) to win the championship.
Andretti Motorsports to field Star Mazda effort for Sage Karam
Even with another major Road to Indy announcement still to come early in December, additional news coming from the Star Mazda Championship confirms the forward momentum the series is building for 2011, including the revelation that Andretti Autosport will field a Star Mazda Championship effort for 2010 USF2000 champion Sage Karam with scholarship funding from the Mazda Road to Indy.
The announcement marks Andretti Autosport’s debut in the Star Mazda series and gives the team entries in each level of the Mazda Road to Indy, which includes the USF2000 National Championship, Star Mazda and Firestone Indy Lights. Karam, a 15-year old native of Nazareth, Pa., won the 2010 USF2000 driver championship with Andretti Autosport, scoring nine victories in 12 starts during the season.
Canadian Star Mazda Racer David Ostella graduates to Indy Lights
Demonstrating that the Star Mazda Championship is the ideal training ground for drivers to take the step up to the next level of open-wheel racing, five of the drivers competing in the 2010 Star Mazda Championship, including series champion Conor Daly, Norwegian racer Anders ‘The Viking’ Krohn, French driver Tristan Vautier, Florida racer Nick Andries and Canadian driver David Ostella, have tested Firestone Indy Lights cars – with Ostella announcing he will move up to a full season of Indy Lights racing with Jensen MotorSport in 2011.
Ostella competed in the 2009 and 2010 Star Mazda championships; last season, driving the #16 AIM Autosport / GP Global Precast Mazda, Ostella scored two top-5 and seven top-10 finishes. Canada-based Jensen MotorSport has a long history in North American open-wheel racing. During the past 15 years, the team has competed in championships including Firestone Indy Lights, the Atlantic Championship and Formula BMW Americas.
Star Mazda drivers top-ranked by eFormulaCarNews.com
With the pro junior formula car seasons now complete in North America, top open-wheel racing web site eFormulaCarNews.com has issued its final Driver Rankings of 2010… and four Star Mazda Championship drivers are in the top-10 among a list of 206 drivers competing in various open-wheel driver development series. Conor Daly, winner of the 2010 Star Mazda Championship presented by Goodyear, is ranked #1 on the list, followed by Anders ‘The Viking’ Krohn in 4th, Mazda-backed development driver Connor De Phillippi in 7th and Jorge Goncalvez in 9th. Additionally, expanding the list to the top-15 includes four more Star Mazda drivers; Tristan Vautier in 11th, Caio Lara in 12th, Mikael Grenier in 13th and Joao Victor Horto in 14th.
The EFCN Driver Rankings are calculated using a driver’s best finishes in the pro junior formula car series raced in North America (Indy Lights, Star Mazda Championship, F2000 Championship Series, Pacific F2000 Championship, USF2000 National Championship, Formula Enterprises Pro Series and Skip Barber National). Assembled using events from the last 12 months, EFCN uses a driver’s best 10 finishes in order to determine their overall current point total. Following a race, drivers receive points based on their finishing positions with 100 points earned for a win. To see the full story on the EFCN web site, click here or go to www.eFormulaCarNews.com.
For more information on the Star Mazda Championship and its drivers, please visit www.starmazda.com and www.mazdausa.com. For information, interviews and photos, please contact Star Mazda Communications Director Peter Frey at (818) 398-5733 or StarMazdaPR@aol.com.
For more information about the MAZDA Road to Indy, contact: Dean Case / Communications Officer / MAZDASPEED Motorsports (310) 318-4582 / Mazdaspeed55@MazdaUSA.com.
source: Star Mazda / Mazda Road