05 April 2015

Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis won womens doubles in Miami Open

Sania Mirza achieved yet another career milestone by capturing her 25th WTA doubles title as the Indian continued her dream start with Martina Hingis to win the Miami Open trophy, here on Sunday.

The top-seeded Indo-Swiss pair overcame a sluggish start to take the title with a 7-5, 6-1 scoreline against second-seeded Russians Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina.

Sania and Hingis were trailing 2-5 in the opening set but regrouped and turned the tables on their fierce opponents by reeling off eight games in a row.

They had beaten the same Russian duo at Indian Wells to win their first title together.

It has been an absolute dream start for Sania and Hingis as they are yet to lose a set since they began their partnership.

“We just tried to keep telling each other to enjoy the struggle. Last week everything came very, very easily to us — we didn’t lose more than four games in a set.

“Over here we were down, and we were panicking. It was like, ‘Oh my God, we’re not playing well.’ We just weren’t used to that,” Sania said after the match.

Tips from Imran Mirza

Hingis credited the win to tips provided by Sania’s farther Imran Mirza during the match.

“Today the coaching really turned it around — your dad came on court,” Hingis said to Sania.

“The most important thing is that we never stopped believing we’re a great team. They played a great set to get us to that position, 5-2 down. Then we just tried to stay in there and get our chances. We just built on every point, which is what we did well last week too,” the Swiss great, who now has 43 doubles titles, said.

With this win, Sania and Hingis now will move to No. 3 from nine in the Road To Singapore doubles leaderboard.

She took a giant leap towards becoming world No. 1 player in the doubles by pocketing 1000 ranking points, following her stupendous title win in the Miami Open.

Sania’s ranking remained at number three but she closed the gap to just 145 points with the world No. 1 Italians Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci, who both have 7640 points each.

01 April 2015

Vettle won First time for Ferarri in Malaysian GP

Vettle won First time for Ferarri in Malaysian GP
Sebastian Vettel stunned Mercedes' world champion Lewis Hamilton on Sunday with an audacious Malaysian Grand Prix victory which set the Formula One season alight

The Ferrari man took advantage of an early safety car as he hit the front and held off Hamilton and Nico Rosberg after pitting only twice, compared to three for the Mercedes pair.

The four-time world champion now has 40 career wins but it is his first with Ferrari, and breaks a dry spell stretching back to his last victory with Red Bull in 2013.

Few of his wins can have been as satisfying. He shattered assumptions of Mercedes' unassailable superiority in 2015, after they dominated the season-opener in Australia.

"Fantastico, fantastico!" he screamed down the radio in Italian. "Yes boys, can you hear me? Thank you, thank you. Forza Ferrari!"

Further back, there were also celebrations for Max Verstappen as the 17-year-old finished seventh, becoming the youngest points-scorer in Formula One history.

Hamilton got away smoothly from pole and Vettel aggressively defended second from a charging Rosberg, helped by a nudge against the Mercedes as they battled round the first corner.

Kimi Raikkonen and Pastor Maldonado were quickly hit by punctures, and Sauber's Marcus Ericsson lasted just three laps before he spun off on Turn 1, prompting the safety car.

Vettel chose not to follow Hamilton into the pits during the intervention and had built up a healthy lead by the time the Briton weaved from sixth to second by lap 11.

- 'Don't talk to me!' -

When Vettel finally pitted after lap 17, he re-emerged behind the two Mercedes but he set the day's fastest lap so far and scorched past his fellow German at the end of lap 21.

Vettel was on Hamilton's tailpipe when the Briton made his second stop at the end of lap 25, dropping back behind the Ferrari driver and Rosberg.

Rosberg pitted to promote Hamilton to second, and the Briton floored it with a pair of fastest laps as he set about whittling away Vettel's big lead of more than 20 seconds.

Behind them, Daniil Kvyat was lucky to resume unscathed when he spun under pressure, and Romain Grosjean also went off-piste when he clipped Jenson Button's front wheel.

Vettel and then Hamilton pitted on consecutive laps and the Briton complained "This is the wrong tyre!"as he resumed on the hard compound.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing!" he shouted, after hearing perplexing chatter on the radio which appeared to suggest a third stop.

With 14 laps and a gap of 14 seconds, the chase was tense and Hamilton snapped: "Hey man, don't talk to me through the corners!" as Mercedes tried to update him over the radio.

But Hamilton, who won the season-opener in Australia, was unable to catch Vettel as the German claimed Ferrari's first win since Spain 2013 by a gap of 8.5 seconds.

Raikkonen was fourth for Ferrari, ahead of the Williams cars of Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa. Young Verstappen finished a brilliant seventh in just his second drive.

But there was more woe for former superpower McLaren as ex-world champions Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button were both forced to retire.