Doping case with Chinese swimmers has brought years of pent-up feeling into public domain – and shows no sign of stopping

At its glitzy 25th anniversary gala in Lausanne last month, the World Anti-Doping Agency screened a slick montage highlighting how it had changed sport for the better. There were images of Muhammad Ali defying Parkinson’s to light the Olympic flame and Pelé lifting the World Cup, before a history lesson – and a promise. “Today Wada is a more representative, accountable and transparent organisation,” explained its director general, Olivier Niggli , “that truly has athletes at the heart of everything we do.”

Not everyone in the room was buying it – one source felt it was too PR-focused, while another raised their eyebrows when Thomas Bach – the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) – and the former Wada president Sir Craig Reedie picked up awards. However, frustrations with Wada were largely limited to corridor conversations. It turned out to be the relative calm before the thermonuclear storm.

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Gary Cantrell, aka Lazarus Lake or Laz, completed his first trans-continental trek in 2018. He’s now attempting his third, but this time against medical advice

Lazarus Lake is shifting in a straight-back chair, searching for the right spot to ease his pinched nerve. After days of steep climbs and steeper descents, the Capon Valley of West Virginia is a welcome oasis. The world is again mercifully flat, if only for a moment. Somewhere out there, the Alleghany mountains lie in wait. But Laz, the mastermind of such grueling endurance tests as the Barkley Marathons and Backyard Ultras, doesn’t want to think about that now; the pizzeria is filling up with smoke.

A 20-year-old scurries from the back to apologize while the man sitting next to us is still staring. He’s been speechless since Laz told him he’d just walked 17 miles over Timber Ridge to get here. Under a farmer’s cap pulled down to his squinty eyes, the man grins, rubs his jaw, and finally says: “Come again?”

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• Atlanta selected the Washington QB with No 8 pick in the draft
• Cousins signed $180m contract with Falcons this offseason

The Atlanta Falcons provided the shock of the first round of the NFL draft by selecting quarterback Michael Penix Jr with the No 8 overall pick on Thursday night.

The Falcons extended their recent trend of selecting offensive skill players in the first round by drafting Penix one month after signing Kirk Cousins to a four-year, $180m contract with $100m guaranteed. Using a draft slot normally targeted for players expected to make an immediate impact, the Falcons picked Penix as the apparent long-term successor to the 35-year-old Cousins.

The Falcons had been expected to use the pick to boost their pass rush.

The Falcons also focused on offensive playmakers with their last three first-round picks. Tight end Kyle Pitts was the No 4 overall pick in 2021, followed by wide receiver Drake London and running back Bijan Robinson, each No 8, the last two years.

Penix, who will be 24 as a rookie, led FBS schools with 4,903 passing yards and was third with 36 touchdown passes at Washington in 2023. He won the Maxwell Award as the nation’s top player.

Mike McCarthy, Cousins’ agent, said the quarterback was ‘surprised’ by the selection. “Yes, it was a big surprise,” McCarthy told NFL Network. “We had no idea this was coming. The truth is the whole league had no idea this was coming. We got no heads up. Kirk got a call from the Falcons when they were on the clock. That was the first we heard. It never came up in any conversation.”

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• Caleb Williams, Jayden Daniels, Drake Maye tipped for top three
• Chicago Bears to make first overall draft pick at 8pm ET
• High demand and supply set to create a glut of first-round QBs
• Send Oliver a tweet at @OllieConnolly at or email him

This is Detroit’s first time hosting the league’s annual carnival. And they’re doing things in a typically Detroit style. How about Dan Campbell as a ‘Grit and Glory’ fortune teller?

If you can’t be in Detroit to hang out with Campbell, you can catch the draft here:

US: 5pm, NFL Network/ABC

UK: 1am, Sky Sports Main Event

Australia: 10am, ESPN

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• Bears unveil $5bn proposal for new domed lakefront stadium
• Plan calls for $900m from Illinois Sports Facilities Authority

The Chicago Bears unveiled a nearly $5bn proposal Wednesday for an enclosed stadium next door to their current home at Soldier Field as part of a major project that would transform the city’s lakefront, and they are asking for public funding to help make it happen.

The plan calls for $3.2bn for the new stadium plus an additional $1.5bn in infrastructure. The team and the city said the project would add green and open space while improving access to the city’s Museum Campus and could also include a publicly owned hotel.

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Our writers take a look at the best prospects coming out of college, and which teams needs to nail their picks over the coming days

It feels like a lock that it will be LSU’s Jayden Daniels , thought I wouldn’t put it past the Commanders to fall in love with Michigan’s JJ McCarthy . Daniels is a funky prospect; he was a starry duel threat at LSU, but it’s tough to see whether the best elements of his game – his running, his deep ball – will smoothly transition to the NFL. He doesn’t possess Lamar Jackson-esque breakaway speed and has a brittle frame. As a thrower from the pocket, he has a snappy delivery but struggles to shift to his second and third reads. There is some RGIII to his game. Do Washington really want to tread that path again? OC

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The franchise has long been dismissed as backwards looking. But it is set to draft a star who happily pushes back on athlete stereotypes

Among the NFL’s heirloom franchises, the Chicago Bears are the still living in the last century – the pride of George “Papa Bear” Halas, a league founding father. From their neoclassical stadium to their 101-year-old owner-matriarch to their stubborn reverence for “Bear Weather” (ie: lake-effect winter conditions that only affect the other team), everything about the franchise is old-fashioned. Even the Bears being in position to select a quarterback with the first pick in this month’s draft has arrived about 30 years too late in a league where the passing game dominates. What’s notable is that the passer in their sights isn’t the second-coming of 1940s hero Sid Luckman or a Harvard man or some other statuesque golden boy. It’s Caleb Williams, Gen Z’s poster boy quarterback.

On paper, Williams would appear to possess precisely the resume that Virginia McCaskey, the owner-matriarch in question, might describe as “the cat’s pajamas.” He went to USC – a college football program that Chicagoland’s many Notre Dame fans at least respect. He won the Heisman trophy, putting him in a league with early Bears two-way star Johnny Lujack. And Williams played most of his college games in the LA Memorial Coliseum, one of the few stadiums left that can rival Soldier Field’s antiquity – so he shouldn’t be a snob about the patchy quality of the Bears natural home turf.

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• Initial release provoked debate over sexism in sport
• Athletes say they are comfortable with choices offered

In the moments before she fired off the Instagram comment heard around the world , Tara Davis-Woodhall could hardly believe her eyes.

The American long jumper and world silver medalist had just seen a photograph of one of Nike’s Team USA uniforms for this summer’s Games, a high-cut leotard barely covering the bikini line that was unveiled at a launch event in Paris last week. The running publication Citius Mag had posted an image of the slinky uniform on a female mannequin alongside a male one-piece kit with longer legs.

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• World No 2 has been vocal critic of Saudi-backed tour
• Viktor Hovland has also been linked with LIV move

Rory McIlroy has brushed aside reports he is considering a move to LIV Golf, and insists he is committed to playing on the PGA Tour.

The world No 2 has been a vocal critic of the Saudi-backed series but City AM this week reported he is considering a move to LIV worth $850m that would also give him a 2% equity in the tour.

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