Wilder vs Opetaia is now official, and it gives the Tyson Fury v Anthony Joshua night in Cardiff a second major attraction. Former WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder will meet Australia’s unbeaten cruiserweight Jai Opetaia at the Principality Stadium on 11 December. Opetaia will make his heavyweight debut, and the card streams live worldwide on Netflix.

Why Wilder vs Opetaia matters

The appeal is in the contrast. Wilder, 41, is 45-4-1 with 43 knockouts and has spent his whole professional career at heavyweight. He is 6ft 7in and widely regarded as one of the most feared punchers of his era. Opetaia, 31, is 31-0 with 24 knockouts and has been the dominant force at cruiserweight, the 200lb division, since winning the IBF title against Mairis Briedis in 2022. The two men’s knockouts total 67, a figure Zuffa Boxing’s Dana White used on social media to sell the fight.

The BBC notes that Wilder is almost ten years older than his opponent. It also reports that the WBA “super” heavyweight title is on the line, though the other sources do not mention a belt.

Two careers at different points

Wilder held the WBC belt from 2015 to 2020 and made ten successful defences before losing it to Fury. Their trilogy ended with one draw and two defeats for the American. After a one-sided loss to Joseph Parker and a brutal knockout defeat to Zhilei Zhang in 2024, retirement looked likely. He has since won twice, against journeyman Tyrrell Anthony Herndon and then Derek Chisora, whom he beat by split decision in London in April.

Opetaia’s situation is more complicated. The BBC reports that his move to Zuffa Boxing has brought difficulties. He stopped WBC cruiserweight champion Noel Mikaelian in September but could not claim the belt because of a sanctioning dispute. After that win he faced off with David Benavidez, and a cruiserweight fight between them could still happen if the Mexican gets past Michal Cieslak in a three-belt unification bout. A win over Wilder would give Opetaia a heavyweight scalp and make him the first man to beat him. It would also do no harm to his bargaining position.

The bigger picture in Cardiff

The headline act is Fury (36-2-1) against Joshua (30-4). The fight was confirmed in September after years of failed negotiations. They came closest in 2021, when a US arbitrator ruled that Fury had to fight Wilder a third time, and the fight collapsed. Both men have since lost twice to Oleksandr Usyk, who relinquished his remaining world title belts in June but insists he has not retired. Fury has won twice since coming back, and Joshua has spent the year rebuilding after his 2024 knockout loss to Daniel Dubois.

The schedule is unusual. The undercard runs on Friday night, and the main-event ringwalks are expected in the early hours of Saturday 12 December. The BBC says around 01:00 GMT, while the Guardian cites reports of about 2am, and the stadium will stay open until 03:30. The timing is meant to suit a prime-time American audience on Netflix. The Guardian reports that the streamer’s preferred plan to stage the fight at Madison Square Garden fell through. The BBC says tickets for the main event sold out in under an hour.

The rest of the undercard has yet to be announced. The BBC says Welsh former IBF super-featherweight champion Joe Cordina is thought to be negotiating a fight with Manny Pacquiao.

For a co-main event, Wilder vs Opetaia carries real risk on both sides. Wilder’s power has ended fights in an instant throughout his career, and Opetaia has never lost. Something has to give in Cardiff.

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File photo: Deontay Wilder 2018 (cropped).jpg by Zach Catanzareti Photo, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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Rachel Apa, a 24-year-old former college field hockey player running her first New York City Marathon, collapsed near mile 24 on Sunday and died at a Manhattan hospital that night, about two miles short of the finish line. Her family says doctors told them the cause was rhabdomyolysis, a rare muscle condition, but the city’s medical examiner has not yet confirmed that.

A race that began with “I’ve never felt this good”

Apa, from Lewisberry, Pennsylvania, had trained for months, her father Steve told The New York Times. He described her as in “perfect health, perfect shape.” He stayed home and followed her on the race’s tracking app while exchanging texts with her. Her mother, Michelle, was in New York with friends.

Early messages were upbeat. Several miles in, Apa wrote that she felt amazing and had never felt so good, according to NBC News. Her mother filmed her smiling and waving at around mile 14. Later texts were shorter and more worrying, among them “ugh” and “ow.” Accounts differ on exactly where each message arrived, with outlets placing the “ow” texts anywhere from mile 18 to mile 21. Steve Apa said the messages stopped around that stretch, though the tracker showed her still moving until it halted at mile 24.

Bystanders, CPR and a six-hour fight

Police said officers assigned to the race saw a woman having a medical episode near the mile 24 marker at about 1:40 p.m. Reports say bystanders, including two people who identified themselves as doctors, began CPR before medical crews arrived with a defibrillator. The sources vary on the timing, with one placing the collapse at about 1:33 p.m. and another saying crews took roughly seven minutes to arrive.

Apa was taken to Mount Sinai in critical condition. Her father told the Times that doctors worked for more than six hours to save her, and that she was declared dead at about 9:40 p.m. Her mother, who had rushed to the scene and learned from an EMS worker that her daughter had already been taken away, followed in a separate ambulance.

What is known about the cause

Multiple outlets report that the family was told Apa died of rhabdomyolysis, in which damaged muscle cells release a substance into the bloodstream that can lead to kidney failure. The Mayo Clinic lists marathon runners among those who can be affected. Yahoo Sports, citing a spokesperson, reported that the Office of Chief Medical Examiner is investigating and has made no final determination, so the diagnosis remains the family’s account of what doctors said.

The condition is uncommon. The Cleveland Clinic estimates about 26,000 people in the U.S. develop it each year, with runners at higher risk. A 2022 study found dozens of runners had been treated for it at the New York City Marathon, though the Independent noted there appears to be no data on marathon deaths from rhabdomyolysis specifically. Cardiac events are the better-studied danger. An Emory School of Medicine study published in 2025 put the risk of cardiac death at roughly one in 500,000 runners, and found that the risk during long-distance races has halved since the early 2000s.

Who Rachel Apa was

Apa spent four years on the Bucknell University field hockey team, making 42 starts in 63 games and scoring 17 goals. She earned Academic All-Patriot League honors and graduated in 2024 with a business degree. (One report says she played through 2023.) She worked as a product manager at TE Connectivity and had started an MBA at Charleston Southern University. Bucknell called her a “key contributor” to the program and said its community “mourns her loss.”

She ran with the Parkinson’s Champions team in honor of her grandfather, who died in 2022 after living with the disease. “He taught me to stay active, push my limits, and embrace challenges,” she wrote on her fundraising page. She had set a $4,000 goal. The sources give different totals, from about $7,600 to more than $21,000, and the figure may have risen after news of her death spread. One source mistakenly called the relative her father, but the others consistently identify him as her grandfather.

New York Road Runners, which organizes the New York City Marathon, said it was “deeply saddened” and offered sympathy to her family, friends and the running community. More than 61,000 people took part this year in the world’s largest marathon. The Independent reported that the last death tied to the event was in 2024, when a man fell from his Brooklyn apartment window while trying to watch the runners. Other coverage describes the 2024 case differently, and the sources do not agree on when a participant last died after a medical emergency during the race.

For now, the facts are limited: a healthy young runner, a sudden decline in the final miles, and a medical examiner’s review still under way. Her father’s description of the loss as “unfathomable” is likely to hang over the next New York City Marathon conversation about how runners are monitored and educated about exertion-related risks.

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Fifa has agreed to let its ruling council examine “key documents” on Gianni Infantino’s abandoned World Cup sell-off, but only in person, only in Zurich and only under tight confidentiality rules. The offer came hours before a deadline set by Uefa, and it falls well short of the full public answers Uefa’s leaders have been demanding.

What Fifa has actually offered

In a letter sent on Monday, Fifa secretary general Mattias Grafstrom told the 37 members of the Fifa Council, a body that includes Infantino and eight vice-presidents, that they can view the paperwork at the organisation’s Zurich headquarters. They must register within two weeks. According to the BBC, which saw the letter, the material will be available “under strict review protocols to preserve confidentiality.” It is not yet clear which documents will be included, and nothing is being released to the public.

Debbie Hewitt, chair of the English Football Association and a Fifa vice-president, is known to intend to take up the offer. She criticised Infantino for a lack of transparency after the council’s last meeting. The FA itself has declined to comment.

Why Uefa set a deadline

The Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal would have opened Fifa’s premium competitions, including the World Cup, to private investors. Reports differ on the details. One put the scheme at $4.2bn, while another described a minority stake in a new $20bn entity managing World Cup commercial rights. Sources also differ on whether it was dropped in July or August. They agree that it was withdrawn after a fierce backlash.

The row did not end there. At a council meeting on 15 October, Infantino apologised for the plan but did not explain how it was devised, and he asked members to submit questions in writing. Uefa then sent a lengthy letter with eight pages of questions, giving Fifa until 2 November to respond. Accounts of the number of questions vary, from 42 areas of concern to more than 100. The topics included who approved the plan, why the council was not involved at the proper stage and why exclusivity was reportedly awarded to Thrive Capital. They also covered the Fifa Peace Prize given to US President Donald Trump and the suspension of a ban on American striker Folarin Balogun at the World Cup.

Uefa argued that the withdrawal and the promise of “potential governance reforms” do not answer how the decisions were made. It said those answers “cannot be deferred until the next meeting of the Fifa Council.”

Fifa’s defence and the legal backdrop

Grafstrom’s letter called the demand “significantly more questions than the Fifa administration could reasonably have anticipated.” He said a fuller response would go to all council members “in due course.” He also argued the FFE could not have proceeded without approval from the council and a majority of member associations, and that Fifa faces no penalty for pulling out.

Fifa has described the two-week deadline as unfeasible, pointing to its work on a new youth World Cup in Azerbaijan and preparations for an extraordinary congress later this month. BBC Sport was also told that Fifa’s room to answer some questions is limited by legal action Uefa began in the United States. That action seeks evidence for a possible criminal mismanagement complaint against Infantino in Switzerland. No complaint has been filed, and nothing in the sources establishes any wrongdoing.

The election clock

The timing matters politically. Candidates have until 18 November to declare against Infantino in the presidential election, set for 18 March in Rabat, Morocco. He is seeking a fourth term. Uefa has so far struggled to find a credible challenger. Concacaf president Victor Montagliani has said he wants another term at his own confederation, and former Switzerland defender Ramon Vega has said he is willing to stand but may lack the necessary support. The Asian Football Confederation’s backing for Infantino on 23 October was a significant boost to him.

The document-viewing window, which runs to roughly the same period as the candidacy deadline, gives council members a chance to scrutinise the World Cup sell-off at first hand. Whether a supervised read-through in Zurich changes any votes, or satisfies Uefa, remains to be seen. Uefa has not said what it will do next, and it has been approached for comment.

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The Nuno sacking has left West Ham searching for their fourth permanent manager in under two and a half years, with former club captain Scott Parker expected to take over before Wednesday’s Championship trip to Cardiff City. The club dismissed Nuno Espirito Santo on Tuesday, 14 months after he arrived, following back-to-back home defeats by Southampton (3-2) and West Bromwich Albion (3-1).

Why the Nuno sacking came now

West Ham went down from the Premier League last season under Nuno and were widely tipped to bounce straight back. They are now eighth after 13 games. Reports differ slightly on the gap: the BBC puts them six points behind leaders Middlesbrough, while the Independent and the Standard say they are four points off the automatic promotion places. Both can be true, given that the leaders sit above the top-two cut-off.

The slide has been sharp. A run of four straight wins in early September, including a 6-0 thrashing of Wrexham and 16 goals in total, lifted the club to the top and suggested they had adapted to the second tier. Since then the picture has changed. They have won only two of their last six or seven games, depending on the count, and the two home defeats knocked them out of second place.

In a statement, the board said a “thorough review” of the season’s start had led it to conclude a change was needed “to ensure that the club’s objectives and expectations remain on track”. Assistant head coach Rui Pedro Silva and goalkeeper coach Rui Barbosa have left too.

Parker’s route back to East London

The BBC says the club are in advanced talks with Parker, and the Standard says a deal is close. Nothing had been officially confirmed in the reports. He has been out of work since leaving Burnley after their Premier League relegation in May. The Standard says that exit was by mutual consent.

He spent four years at West Ham as a player from 2007 to 2011, captaining the side and winning the club’s Player of the Year award in each of his last three seasons. As a manager, he has earned promotion from the Championship three times, according to the Independent and the Standard, including with Bournemouth and Burnley. Mark Noble, Steve Potts and Gerard Prenderville will be in temporary charge if the deal is not done in time for Cardiff.

A squad rebuilt on a budget

Parker would inherit a squad reshaped by financial pressure. The BBC reports the club posted losses of more than £104m, and relegation forced summer sales that brought in about £150m. Some of that money went on a Championship-record £22m for Celtic midfielder Arne Engels and a reported £12m for winger Edvin Austbo. Engels has three assists and no goals in 12 games, and Austbo has started only two league matches. Tomas Soucek missed the first two months with an ankle injury, though Jarrod Bowen and Konstantinos Mavropanos remain.

The wider pattern is hard to miss. David Moyes left in May 2024, Julen Lopetegui lasted six months, and Graham Potter went after eight. Nuno’s 14 months was the longest spell of the three, and the Nuno sacking suggests the board’s patience is limited even when promotion is the stated aim. Parker’s task will be to show that a quick change can steady a team that, on paper, still looks strong enough to go up.

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File photo: Nuno Espírito Santo (cropped).jpg by Carla Cortés, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Michael Wilbon’s indefinite leave of absence from ESPN, announced Monday, takes one half of one of sports television’s best-known pairings off the air, with no return date set. The 67-year-old co-host of Pardon the Interruption said in a post on X that “multiple health issues” have forced him away from both PTI and ESPN’s NBA coverage.

“This isn’t retirement, but it is a trip to the injured list,” Wilbon wrote, adding that he hopes it is “not an extended one.” He gave no specifics about his condition, but he made clear what it was not. The struggles, he said, are “all health related, not to alcohol” and not to gambling.

What Wilbon said about the leave

Wilbon was candid that he had been warned. He wrote that medical professionals and people close to him, Tony Kornheiser among them, had seen “worrisome signs in recent years” and urged him to step back sooner. He did not. A close friend, he said, put it this way as his problems grew: “the bill has come due.”

Speaking later on Kornheiser’s podcast, Wilbon gave a fuller picture of how he has felt. He described being “exhausted; beyond exhausted, lifeless” and said colleagues had spent weeks trying to persuade him to rest. He also pointed to his diabetes, which he has discussed before. Years of red-eye flights and ignored warning signs, he said, matter more when you are diabetic, and the cost is higher than it might be for others. “My way is to run through the brick wall,” he said. “You go to work until somebody stops you from going to work. Well, that’s what this is now.”

The timeline is slightly muddy across reports. Wilbon described missing a full week of the show, while OutKick reported that he co-hosted from his Arizona home last Monday and was absent for the rest of that week. The Guardian lists 26 October as his last PTI appearance.

Who covers for Wilbon at ESPN

The timing is notable. PTI marked its 25th anniversary with a special episode on 22 October, less than two weeks before the announcement. The show debuted on that date in 2001, has aired more than 5,500 episodes, and has long been the most-watched program in ESPN’s weekday studio lineup. It grew out of the friendship between Wilbon and Kornheiser, who became colleagues at the Washington Post in the 1980s, and it is widely credited with popularizing the TV sports-debate format.

For now, regular guest hosts Pablo Torre and Frank Isola will sit in this week. Plans beyond that are undecided. Yahoo Sports, citing Front Office Sports, reported that executives will work out a longer-term plan with executive producer Erik Rydholm, with other frequent guests such as Mina Kimes potentially in the mix opposite the 78-year-old Kornheiser.

On the NBA side, ESPN says its roster of analysts will absorb Wilbon’s work. Reports named Tim Legler, Richard Jefferson, Brian Windhorst, Doris Burke and Stephen A. Smith, along with newly hired Jason Kidd and Jeremy Lin.

ESPN’s response and what comes next

ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro said Wilbon and his family have the network’s “full support” and that ESPN looks forward to welcoming him back “whenever he is ready.” Colleagues and outlets responded with similar warmth, with OutKick calling him one of the most universally respected figures in the business.

How long the Wilbon leave of absence lasts is unknown, and Wilbon himself said he has “no idea exactly how this part of my journey will wind up.” His stated goal is modest and clear: to come back feeling much better than he does now and ready to resume sparring with Kornheiser. Until then, PTI will go on without one of its two voices.

File photo: Michael Wilbon 2011.jpg by Diamondback Photo, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Jake Paul Doumbe fight is official: the YouTuber-turned-boxer will return to the ring on Christmas Eve in Dubai, just over a year after Anthony Joshua broke his jaw and stopped him in Miami. Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions (MVP) announced the matchup on Monday, confirming a professionally sanctioned eight-round cruiserweight contest at the Coca-Cola Arena.

The Jake Paul Doumbe fight: what we know

The bout will be fought at 200 pounds with 10oz gloves. It will be Paul’s first professional fight in Dubai and his first outing since the sixth-round stoppage by Joshua on 19 December 2025. Paul, 29, was knocked down twice in that fight. He has said he needed two titanium plates and the removal of some teeth. Reports describe the jaw as broken in two places.

His opponent is Cedric Doumbe, a 34-year-old Cameroon-born Frenchman. Doumbe twice held the Glory welterweight kickboxing title and now competes in MMA for the Professional Fighters League (PFL). Source figures put his kickboxing record at 75-7-1. He announced himself in the PFL with a nine-second knockout of Jordan Zebo in September 2023.

MVP merged with the PFL in July, so the pairing keeps the business in the family. Paul’s promotion is matching its own headline name against a fighter from a company it is now tied to.

A comeback that medical advice did not endorse

The return looked far from certain. In May, Paul said his boxing career was “most definitely” in doubt after the injury. The Independent reports that he is going ahead despite medical advice, following multiple surgeries on the damaged jaw. The sources do not say what the advice was or who gave it, but the framing makes clear this is a risk he is choosing to take.

Paul’s own words leaned into the injury rather than away from it. “I’m rusty, my jaw is janky, and I don’t have kickboxing world titles like you do,” he said in an MVP statement. “But guess what, this isn’t kickboxing mon ami. This is boxing.”

Doumbe’s boxing inexperience and the weight question

That jab points at the central tension in the matchup. Doumbe’s résumé is impressive, but it comes from other disciplines. The BBC says he has just one professional boxing bout, a win in 2015, and the Independent calls this his second. The Jake Paul Doumbe fight is therefore a test of whether striking pedigree translates under boxing rules.

Weight adds another variable. Doumbe predominantly competes at 170lb, so the 200lb limit asks him to fight well above his usual division. Paul has fought mostly at cruiserweight since turning professional in 2020.

Doumbe’s answer was blunt. “I’m going to finish the job Joshua started,” he said, promising to hand Paul another knockout defeat.

What Paul needs from Dubai

Paul’s record stands at 12-2, with seven knockouts. His only defeats came against Tommy Fury and Joshua. His wins include Mike Tyson in 2024, when Tyson was 58, and former world champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr in July 2025. The Chavez win earned Paul a place in the WBA cruiserweight rankings, but he lost it after the Joshua defeat.

A win over Doumbe would not by itself restore that ranking or settle questions about the jaw. It would show he can take punches again after a serious injury and a heavy knockout. A loss, against a fighter with so little boxing experience, would do more damage to his credibility than the Joshua defeat did, since Joshua is a two-time heavyweight world champion.

The build-up starts soon. MVP has scheduled press conferences in Paris on 10 November and in Dubai on 12 November.

File photo: Jake Paul (53116882732).jpg by Erik Drost, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Kimi Antonelli is Formula 1’s youngest-ever world champion. He sealed the title with third place at the Mexico City Grand Prix, aged 20 years and 68 days, and with several races of the season still to run.

The Mercedes driver beat Sebastian Vettel’s long-standing age record by more than three years. He is also the first Italian champion since Alberto Ascari in 1953. Max Verstappen won the race for Red Bull, but the day belonged to the new Antonelli world champion narrative and to a Ferrari row that nearly overshadowed it.

How Antonelli secured the title

Antonelli arrived in Mexico needing little more than a clean afternoon. Only a win for team-mate George Russell or Lewis Hamilton could have delayed his coronation, and even then a finish in the points would have been enough. Russell, who started on the front row, made a poor start. He later picked up a 10-second penalty for a collision with Isack Hadjar and finished sixth.

The race was chaotic. A virtual safety car, two full safety cars and a red flag all disrupted it. Valtteri Bottas’s Cadillac suffered a front suspension failure and hit the barriers at Turn One, which halted the race. Bottas walked away, gave a thumbs-up and was released from the medical centre. A later crash between Arvid Lindblad and Oscar Piastri brought out the second safety car.

Antonelli stayed out of trouble throughout. He ran fourth early, passed Leclerc after the restart and then sat third in a tight three-car train for the final sprint. Verstappen, Hamilton and Antonelli finished nose to tail, with Verstappen 0.799 seconds clear of Hamilton and Antonelli 3.207 seconds behind the winner.

Emotion on the radio, records in the books

Antonelli’s reaction was the human heart of the day. When race engineer Peter Bonnington told him he was champion, he could barely speak. “We did it. Thank you so much,” he managed. He later said he had eased off on the last lap because he could not see the track through his emotion. His parents and sister were waiting for him, and the team mobbed him.

He admitted to feeling “a bit more tense” this weekend, but said he now intended to enjoy the rest of the season. Bonnington reminded him that this was “just the first chapter”.

Mercedes now lead the constructors’ standings with 630 points to Ferrari’s 504. Al Jazeera, citing Reuters, reports they could clinch that title in Brazil next weekend. Antonelli’s own margin was a decisive 119 points at the end of the race.

Ferrari’s internal feud overshadows the podium

The sub-plot was at Ferrari. Hamilton took pole, the 105th of his career, and led into the first corners. But Charles Leclerc went around the outside at the Turn Four chicane, ran across the grass and took the lead. Verstappen slipped past the wide Hamilton into second. Hamilton’s radio message was blunt: he had been “pushed out by my own teammate”.

Stewards gave Leclerc a five-second penalty. That is half the usual punishment, because Hamilton had also run wide and neither car could have made the corner. Hamilton never got ahead of Verstappen again. He was visibly frustrated afterwards, believing Ferrari had the pace to win. “We have to hold some serious talks behind the scenes,” he said.

Verstappen called the opening lap the key to his race, having charged from fifth to second. He said he was “sweating” to keep Hamilton behind at the end. The sources differ slightly on how many wins that makes this season, so that figure is best treated with caution. All agree it was a record-extending sixth victory for him in Mexico.

Whatever follows at Ferrari, the image that will last is two champions with 11 titles between them leading the new Antonelli world champion across the line. It looked like a changing of the guard.

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File photo: Kimi Antonelli at the Melbourne Walk during the 2026 Australian Grand Prix (028A7923) cropped.jpg by Yu Chu Chin, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Hamilton Ferrari pole that Formula 1 had waited more than three years for arrived in Mexico City on Saturday, and it came by the thinnest of margins. Lewis Hamilton edged Mercedes’ George Russell by 0.009 seconds to take the top spot on the grid. It is his first pole in Ferrari red and the 105th of his career.

A record-flavoured pole for the 41-year-old

Hamilton’s previous pole came at the 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix, driving for Mercedes. He is also the oldest driver to start from pole since Mario Andretti did so for Ferrari at the 1982 Italian Grand Prix. Reports noted he had taken pole for last year’s sprint race in China, but conventional qualifying had eluded him ever since.

He was candid about how unlikely it had looked. An engine problem on Friday left Ferrari on the back foot and without a long run. He had only been fourth after the first runs in the final session, more than four-tenths behind Charles Leclerc’s benchmark. Yet he said his last lap contained no lost time. “It’s my first pole for Ferrari, and 105th, I like that number,” he said, adding that it took him back to watching Michael Schumacher collect poles for the team.

He also tied the result to his longevity. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” he said, crediting a fitness regime that includes plenty of ice baths and the support of fans around the world.

Russell’s gamble and Verstappen’s lock-up

The margin was small enough that several details could have changed the outcome. Russell revealed he had made a unilateral call to skip the preparation lap after his out lap on his final run, going on a “gut feeling”. His team had wanted the prep lap and had fuelled the car for the extra distance. By his own estimate, the time lost to that extra fuel weight was a tiny number, “but it’s bigger than the gap to pole.”

Max Verstappen looked the likeliest threat. He was fastest after two sectors before locking up at the stadium hairpin. He blamed traffic: dirty air into Turn 12, then a car on his right that forced an awkward entry and cost him his reference point. Leclerc ended up third on the grid, 0.119 seconds off Hamilton’s time.

Lando Norris, fastest in the second session, could not repeat that lap in the final segment and settled for sixth. Isack Hadjar, Arvid Lindblad and Pierre Gasly filled out most of the top ten. Liam Lawson also qualified in the top ten but was later disqualified from qualifying for a technical infringement involving the electrical deployment of the power unit, and he will start from the back.

What it means for the championship

The pole matters beyond the headline because the front row is made up of the only two drivers who can still stop Kimi Antonelli clinching the world title on Sunday. Antonelli qualified fifth but moves up to fourth because Verstappen carries a one-place grid penalty, reportedly for a clash with Lawson on Friday.

The arithmetic is stark. According to the BBC, Antonelli can only be denied if Russell wins and the Italian finishes lower than ninth, or if Hamilton wins and Antonelli fails to score. Finishing ninth or higher would make him the youngest champion in F1 history.

So the Hamilton Ferrari pole gives the seven-time champion a real chance to play spoiler. Starting from the front gives him track position, though converting it into a win will depend on a fast Mercedes and a Ferrari that has already been tested by reliability trouble this weekend. Hamilton’s own message was simple: “Hope I can do it for them tomorrow.”

A tough day for Alonso

Not everyone had a good afternoon. Fernando Alonso had set the fastest time of the session on his first lap, ahead of cars that have usually beaten his Aston Martin this season. As he began his second attempt, a water leak in the energy recovery system hit his Honda power unit, and he was told to stop on track while still third. His frustration with the year’s performance and reliability was plain afterwards.

For Hamilton, though, the day was about something different. After a long wait and a rocky weekend, the Hamilton Ferrari pole is finally on the record, and it leaves him one result from complicating a title that Antonelli would otherwise be expected to take.

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File photo: 2025 ImolaGP Lewis Hamilton.jpg by Buczkowiak94, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Esteban Ocon has publicly rejected claims that a confrontation with Haas team principal Ayao Komatsu turned physical, after the team abruptly removed him from the Mexico City Grand Prix weekend. The statement, issued on Saturday, is the only account of events so far from anyone involved, and it leaves several questions open.

What led to the Haas dropping?

The trouble appears to have started in second practice on Friday. Race engineer Laura Mueller told the Frenchman that the plan to run soft tyres had changed and he would use the mediums instead. Ocon’s response was caught on team radio: “No, no. I want to do soft… don’t do that to me, come on.”

On Saturday morning Haas announced that Ryo Hirakawa would take his car for the rest of the weekend. No reason was given. The team confirmed only that Ocon was not ill. Team principal Komatsu told Sky Sports F1 he could not say much, adding that the team was focused on getting Hirakawa in the best shape for qualifying.

The report Ocon is pushing back against

The physical-confrontation claim traces back to France’s L’Equipe. According to the BBC’s summary of its report, a meeting between Komatsu and Ocon “ended abruptly, perhaps even physically”. The wording is tentative, and none of the sources reviewed offers evidence of what happened in that meeting.

Ocon’s statement acknowledges that “a difference in viewpoints led to a discussion with the parties involved.” He then drew a firm line: he “categorically” rejected “any reports or allegations suggesting that any form of physical violence was used to resolve any differences of any nature.” He added that he “strongly condemn[s] violence in all its forms” and asked for speculation to be avoided “while the matter is being addressed”, with further updates promised “in due course”.

So there is a gap between what is confirmed and what is rumoured. Both sides agree a discussion took place. A physical element has been reported but denied, and Haas has not publicly addressed it.

A season already winding down for Esteban Ocon

The incident lands on a relationship that was already ending. Haas announced last month that Ocon would leave at the end of the season, with Rafael Camara, the Formula 2 championship leader and a Ferrari driver academy member, taking the seat. Ocon has been at the team since the start of 2025.

His results this year have been modest. Sky Sports notes he has scored seven points, 16 fewer than team-mate Oliver Bearman. The 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix winner, who took that victory with Alpine, currently has no seat for next season.

Whether he will race for Haas again this year is unclear. The team has not commented on its line-up for next weekend’s Brazilian Grand Prix, and sources close to Ocon’s management have not said either.

Reaction and the Hirakawa factor

Former world champion Jenson Button, speaking as a Sky Sports F1 pundit, was blunt about the sporting cost. He argued that a driver without a future seat should be driving as hard as possible to prove his worth, and that Ocon “has possibly thrown away the rest of his career in F1” over a tyre disagreement in practice. That is one pundit’s opinion, and it is based on the tyre dispute alone, since the full circumstances are not public.

Hirakawa, meanwhile, got his opportunity at 32. He qualified 19th, which made him the oldest F1 debutant since André Lotterer at Caterham in 2014, according to Sky.

For now, the facts are thin. A radio row over tyres, a post-session discussion that Ocon confirms, a team that will not explain its decision, and a denial of violence that the team has neither backed nor contradicted. Until Haas or Ocon provides the promised update, the reason behind the removal remains unexplained.

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File photo: Esteban Ocon 2017 Malaysia 1.jpg by Morio, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Header image: AI-generated illustration by WordUp News.

The Atlanta Dream led at halftime and were one win from their first championship, but WNBA Finals Game 7 ended in a 68-63 loss to the Golden State Valkyries on Saturday night at Chase Center. The Valkyries took the title in only their second season as a franchise, winning the series 4-3.

Williams Turns a Quiet Half Into a Finals MVP Night

Gabby Williams had just two points at halftime, with Atlanta up six. She finished with 30, 28 of them in the second half, and was named Finals MVP. Her third quarter alone produced 15 points and a 45-44 Valkyries lead going into the fourth. Sky Sports noted she scored her team’s final 11 points of the period. She also blocked four shots, and teammate Veronica Burton said Williams told them at the break that she “just got to get going.”

The decisive blow came late. Atlanta had pulled level at 57-57 with less than three minutes left, helped by baskets from Allisha Gray and Jordin Canada. With 2:18 remaining, Williams hit a 31-foot three-pointer to make it 60-57, and Golden State never trailed again. Williams joined Penny Taylor, who did it in 2007 for Phoenix, as the only players in WNBA history to score 30 or more in a winner-take-all Finals game.

The win also ends a run of near misses for the 30-year-old. She lost the 2024 Olympic gold-medal game to the United States by a point while playing for France, and fell to the U.S. again at the FIBA World Cup in September. “I just walked into a group full of love,” she said afterward. Coach Natalie Nakase called her “our closer.”

Atlanta Let a First-Half Edge Slip Away

For two quarters, the Dream looked like the team that would win. They held Golden State scoreless for more than five minutes in the second quarter, and Canada scored 13 of her 18 points in that period alone. Gray added 16. But Atlanta could not contain Williams on the perimeter once she found her rhythm, and the Dream spent most of the second half chasing the game.

Reese’s Struggles Shadow the Dream’s Season-Ending Loss

Angel Reese finished with eight points on 3-for-7 shooting, 12 rebounds and four turnovers. OutKick reported that she did not attempt a field goal in the fourth quarter. Her only point of the period was a free throw with 18.6 seconds left. The numbers over the last four games of the series were rough: 12-for-45 from the field (26.7%) and 19 turnovers. Game 7 was her fourth straight game with more turnovers than made baskets.

Reese’s postgame message, per an OutKick headline, was “We’ll be back.” Atlanta’s roster showed enough to back that up, but the series suggested the Dream still need more late-game answers, especially when the offense stalls. In the first half of Game 7 it went nearly six minutes without scoring before Reese ended the drought with a layup.

Off-Court Questions Linger in Atlanta

The Dream’s season came with logistical problems that predate the Finals. Most home games were played at Gateway Center Arena in College Park, which seats about 3,500 and is reportedly the league’s smallest venue. Before the series, ownership published an open letter saying its concerns “did not receive the attention, nor the urgency that they deserved,” a line that pointed toward Commissioner Cathy Engelbert’s league office. Whether that framing holds up is debatable, since Golden State also dealt with venue issues last year yet sold out games.

Another storyline ran through the series. OutKick reported that both teams left the floor during the national anthem before all seven games, a pattern that continued before the finale.

On the floor, the night belonged to Golden State. The sell-out crowd at Chase Center erupted as confetti fell and players rushed the court. For the Valkyries, that was a title won in just their second year. For the Dream, it was another Finals defeat, this one after leading at the half.

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