Sports Digest: Indianapolis 500 will run with 50 percent fan capacity at speedway - Press Herald

janamabigit.blogspot.com

INDIANAPOLIS — The Indianapolis 500 will run in August with 50% fan capacity, a total that could still hit six figures at the famed Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The Indy 500 was bumped from its traditional May date because of the coronavirus pandemic. The 104th Indy 500 will run Aug. 23 at half the total of what is traditionally one of the biggest sporting events of the year. The event does not release official attendance figures, but it is estimated that past crowds have been between 300,000 and 400,000.

“We’re committed to running the Indy 500 on Sunday, Aug. 23 and will welcome fans to the world’s greatest racing venue,” IMS President J. Douglas Boles said. “We will be limiting attendance to approximately 50%, and we are also finalizing a number of additional carefully considered health and safety measures.”

The IMS team is working with public health officials to complete a comprehensive plan of health measures.

Indianapolis Motor Speedway will still host an IndyCar-NASCAR doubleheader on the July 4 weekend without fans.

SOCCER

INVESTIGATION: French soccer great Michel Platini has been formally placed under investigation in Switzerland in relation to a $2 million payment he got from FIFA in 2011.

Swiss federal prosecutors this month extended their open criminal proceedings into then-FIFA president Sepp Blatter’s role in the payment to include Platini, according to a document seen Friday by The Associated Press.

Platini, who was the president of European soccer body UEFA at the time, is suspected of being an accomplice to criminal mismanagement, misappropriation and forgery, the document states.

The former France national team captain submitted invoices to FIFA in January 2011 seeking payment for an uncontracted salary when working as a presidential adviser in Blatter’s first term, from 1998-2002. He was paid the next month.

Five different courts and tribunals – including the FIFA ethics committee, the Court of Arbitration for Sport and the European Court of Human Rights – have ruled against Platini since Swiss prosecutors revealed the allegation in September 2015.

Platini and Blatter, who were both banned by FIFA, deny wrongdoing and have not been charged by Swiss prosecutors. Platini’s four-year ban expired in October and he has been planning to return to the sport.

TENNIS

DAVIS CUP: The Davis Cup men’s tennis competition has been canceled this year because of the coronavirus pandemic and will pick up again in 2021.

Matches were scheduled for this September and the Davis Cup finals were set for November in Madrid.

Now the World Group I and World Group II preliminary matches will be played in various sites in either March or September 2021. The finals will be in Madrid during the week of Nov. 22, 2021.

The International Tennis Federation says the 18 nations that already qualified for the 2020 finals will get a spot in 2021.

The ITF has also scrapped the women’s Fed Cup finals for this year and says they will be played April 13-18 in Budapest, Hungary.

The Fed Cup originally was supposed to be played this April but was initially postponed because of the pandemic.

TRACK AND FIELD

DIAMOND GAMES: Diamond League track meets in France and the United States have been canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Organizers say the Sept. 6 event in Paris and the Prefontaine meet on Oct. 4 in Eugene, Oregon, cannot be held because of the current restrictions on mass gatherings and international travel.

A meet in Gateshead, England, has been postponed from Aug. 16 to a possible date in mid-September.

The next possible Diamond League meet is scheduled for Aug. 14 in Monaco.

BOXING

DURAN POSITIVE FOR COVID-19: Panamanian boxer Roberto Durán, who held world championships in four weight classes during his more than three-decade career, has tested positive for the coronavirus but has had only mild symptoms so far, one of his sons said Thursday.

Robin Durán said his 69-year-old father was tested after going to a private hospital with cold symptoms.

“At the moment he’s not having symptoms beyond a cold. We’ll be passing on more information over the days,” the son wrote on his Instagram account.

He said he decided to take his father to a hospital as a precaution, because one of his lungs hasn’t functioned at full capacity since a car crash in Argentina in 2001, an accident that led the boxer to retire.

Invalid username/password.

Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.

Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.

« Previous

Ivanisevic, coach of Djokovic and 2001 Wimbledon winner, positive for virus

NHL not planning to quarantine players for training camps

filed under: