Canada Cup

After three days of competition on the Chesapeake Bay, during which much of the attention was on a seeming duel between Canada's Cup rivals in the high-tech, big-ticket Level 30 Class, the winner of this year's MORC International Championship was John White of Severna Park and his team, which came up from MORC B to take top honors in the 41-boat fleet.The regatta, which ran from Sunday through Tuesday, was sailed out of Annapolis Yacht Club. It was co-sponsored by Annapolis MORC Station 15, and featured two relatively short windward-leeward races in light and shifty breeze on Sunday; three increasingly longer windward-leewards in Monday's building breezes, which increased from light and fluky in the morning to a solid 15 knots by the third race, and a single race of almost 12 miles on Tuesday, the event's longest, sailed in the strongest breeze.

Auto racing Kahne ends 37-race drought, earns rare victory for Petty Kasey Kahne gave struggling Richard Petty Motorsports a much-needed boost Sunday, holding off Tony Stewart in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., to end a 37-race winless streak and earn his first road-course victory. Kahne was met in Victory Lane by Richard Petty, who made his first trip as a car owner in more than a decade. A Petty-owned car had not won a race since John Andretti's victory at Martinsville in April 1999.

"Back after these messages . . ."Are there any more terrifying words in the English language, words that simultaneously elicit anger, disgust, exasperation, a total feeling of helplessness bordering on despair?Probably not, although "Greetings," to prospective members of the armed forces, "the check is in the mail," and "we regret to inform you" are in the running.Perhaps you noticed these words became so much more prevalent the last several nights as NBC's coverage of the Olympics rumbles by. Lately, in prime time, the network has gone so far as to cut anchor Bob Costas out of the normal flow of things as, obviously, it has been able to sell the time usually reserved for the studio host.

Tyson-Holyfield sells out in 14 daysA grand jury investigation involving Mike Tyson has not damaged the commercial luster of Tyson's scheduled heavyweight-title bout against the champion, Evander Holyfield, on Nov. 8."We're sold out," Phil Cooper, an executive at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. "We sold out in 14 days and broke our previous record, 16 days for [Marvelous Marvin] Hagler-[Sugar Ray] Leonard."In a complaint filed with the Indianapolis Police Department, a woman accused the fighter of sexually assaulting her in the early morning of July 19.George Foreman's adviser, Ron Weathers, said there had been "a lot of conversation" between lawyers about Foreman's substituting for Tyson if events made that necessary.

Capriati knocks Seles from No. 1 spotJennifer Capriati knocked Monica Seles from the No. 1 ranking with a 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 (7-2) victory in the final of the Mazda Classic yesterday in Carlsbad, Calif.After Seles won three straight games to take a 6-5 lead in the third set, Capriati held serve in a 14-point game and then prevailed by taking the last five points of the tie-breaker.Seles, making her first tour appearance since bypassing Wimbledon with a sore leg, will drop to No. 2, giving up the top spot she's held since March 11 to Steff Graf.

The TV Repairman:You have to wonder why or how ABC came to the conclusion that it could score with a "Baseball Night in America" show when that has been ESPN's tag line for a couple of years now, and it's not like there's not a thousand ballgames on the tube already.You question the nights it chose, too, Saturday and Monday in the middle of the summer. Its ratings were horrible earlier this week, 6.4 million and 6.5 million households, but came within a point of the ratings the nets are choking on in prime time during the re-run season.

PRALOGNAN, France -- Eric Lindros is out in the cold. One night, he is riding a bus through western Czechoslovakia. The next, he is gasping for air and lurking like a Gulliver among Lilliputians while playing in indoor-outdoor arenas perched in the French Alps.Tiny players bounce off him and goalkeepers flop to the ice at the sight of his menacing shadow. He is 6 feet 4 and weighs 220 pounds, the closest thing to a linebacker on hockey skates. But the next Gretzky, the next Lemieux, is now a National Hockey League holdout in hiding.

Seles barred from Olympic tennisMonica Seles, the world's top-ranked women's tennis player, will be barred from next summer's Olympics because she played in an exhibition tournament this summer in New Jersey just days after withdrawing from the Yugoslav Federation Cup team because of shin splints.The ruling was announced yesterday by the International Tennis Federation.A player must make herself available for her national team at the Federation Cup to qualify for the Olympics.* Tennis star Martina Navratilova will meet her former companioa Fort Worth, Texas, courtroom next month, after a judge's decision not to delay the palimony trial.

USOC's Helmick cuts out consultingThe U.S. Olympic Committee executive committee told USOC president Robert Helmick yesterday they found nothing fishy about the outside sports consulting work that reportedly netted him $127,000 last year, but then they told him not to do it again.After a nine-hour meeting, the executive committee issued a statement saying it had found no evidence that Helmick tried to sway USOC decisions to benefit his clients that had business ties to the Olympics or were trying to develop them.

Pro basketballOlajuwon backs out of Shaq showdown because of injuryHakeem Olajuwon was described as embarrassed, disappointed and still hurting yesterday after backing out of his one-on-one matchup with Shaquille O'Neal.The Houston Rockets center, who appeared healthy and mentioned no injury at a news conference in New York on Thursday, pulled out of the $1 million contest yesterday because of a back injury suffered last week while lifting weights, promoters said. The heavily hyped showdown was scheduled for tonight at Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort in Atlantic City, N.J."