Pietro_Mercurios said:At last, just the sort of Fortean sport story that you've all been waiting for. It's got everything. A top footballer, an African witch doctor and a voodoo curse.
Paraplegic in robotic suit kicks off World Cup
A paraplegic man has made the first kick of the World Cup using a mind-controlled robotic exoskeleton.
Juliano Pinto, a 29-year-old with complete paralysis of the lower trunk, performed the symbolic kick-off at the Corinthians Arena in Sao Paulo.
Using his robotic suit, Mr Pinto kicked the official ball a short distance along a mat laid down by the touchline.
But some observers argued the historic event was not given the attention it deserved during the opening ceremony.
The identity of the young volunteer was kept a secret until after the event.
His robotic exoskeleton was created by a team of more than 150 researchers led by Brazilian neuroscientist Dr Miguel Nicolelis.
Dr Nicolelis tweeted called the event a "great team effort" and afterwards tweeted: "We did it!!!"
"It was up to Juliano to wear the exoskeleton, but all of them made that shot. It was a big score by these people and by our science," he commented.
The neuroscientist, who is based at Duke University in the US, is a leading figure in the field of brain-machine interfaces. In breakthrough work published in 2003, he showed that monkeys could control the movement of virtual arms on an avatar using just their brain activity.
Paraplegic
The identity of the young paraplegic - seen here training in the lab - was kept a secret until after the event
Dr Miguel Nicolelis and paraplegic
Dr Nicolelis (R) is a leader in the field of brain-machine interfaces
The scientists have been working under the banner of a consortium called the Walk Again Project. In a statement, the consortium said the World Cup demonstration would be "just the beginning" of a future "in which people with paralysis may abandon the wheelchair and literally walk again".
But some TV networks didn't capture the event, prompting criticism on Twitter. Some commentators also took aim at ceremony organisers for apparently sidelining the moment in favour of performing acts.
Dr Nicolelis had been training eight patients at his lab in Sao Paulo, all of whom were over 20 years of age, with the oldest about 35.
"It's the first time an exoskeleton has been controlled by brain activity and offered feedback to the patients," Dr Nicolelis, a neuroscientist at Duke University, told the AFP news agency
"Doing a demonstration in a stadium is something very much outside our routine in robotics. It's never been done before."
The exoskeleton uses a cap placed on the patient's head to pick up brain signals and relay them to a computer in the exoskeleton's backpack. ...
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-27812218
Nigeria football team says they took 'no witch doctor' to WC
Even if Nigeria’s football team ever had a witch doctor on their team, that was years ago - and now it is fair game only, says forwards Peter Osaze Odemwingie.
“Do we have a personal witch doctor in our team? Of course not,” Odemwingietold ITAR-TASS. “If we ever had a witch doctor, then it was no less than 20 years ago.”
Follow RT’s updates on 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil
Odemwingie says his country is strongly determined to beat its previous World Cup record and make it through to the quarter finals. ...
http://rt.com/news/165884-nigeria-warlock-balls-wc/
Aquatic hoverboard goes on sale, takes water sports to whole new level
A futuristic new product is hitting the shelves, and it’s making Marty McFly jealous. A French personal watercraft racing company unveiled an aquatic hoverboard, propelling riders over waves and through the air at speeds up to 23 miles per hour.
Over a year before Marty McFly hops on a hoverboard in October 2015 during the movie Back to the Future II, Franky Zapata, a French jet-ski champion and creator of the Flyboard, has unveiled a new device designed to take extreme water sports to the next level. The Hoverboard is a cousin of the Flyboard, a 2011 Zapata Racing invention that attaches to a nearby personal watercraft to allow the rider to fly above the water at high speeds, The Verge reported. That device, a small board with two water nozzles that riders stand on, lead to the creation of the Flyboard World Cup.
Zapata’s new invention looks like “a cross between flying and surfing and looks a little bit like a wakeboard attached to a large hose,” the Daily Mail reported. The 59-foot hose attaches to a personal watercraft (like a speed boat or JetSki), then propels the Hoverboard into the air by a powerful jet of water. The watercraft then follows the rider “giving freedom to surf amongst the waves,” the Zapata Racing website said. ...
http://rt.com/usa/165836-aquatic-hoverb ... s-on-sale/
Mythopoeika said:Lots of fun!
It reminds me a bit of the aquatic jetpack that came out a few years back.
Soccer-mad husband slashed wife and two children’s throats before watching World Cup match in bar
Carlo Lissi with his wife and victim Cristina Omes
A SOCCER mad husband slashed his wife and two children’s throats before going to a bar to watch a World Cup match.
Carlo Lissi has been charged with triple murder after his wife and two children were found in the family home near Milan.
He stabbed his 38-year-old wife Carlo on the couch while she was watching TV, before stabbing his two daughters (aged five and 20 months) while they slept.
He then headed to a bar after the alleged killings to watch Italy’s World Cup match against England.
Investigators believe he tossed the knife used in the murders down a drain on his way to the bar.
Lissi then returned home at around 2am, and officers believe he feigned shock at finding the bodies.
After several hours of questioning he eventually admitted to police that he carried out the murders.
He told them that he was in love with someone else, and that he was hoping the World Cup match would provide him with an alibi for the killings.
- See more at: http://www.independent.ie/world-news/eu ... fWs07.dpuf
From California to Michigan, golf course operators are trying out FootGolf, which has holes that are 21 in (53cm) in diameter and separate flagsticks.
Other than that, the course looks the same, and the rules are much like traditional golf — players try to advance a football into the cup in the fewest number of kicks.
Philip Taucher, who helps to manage a newly created FootGolf course at Fox Hills, west of Detroit, says the sport has been “a huge success” financially and it has brought in players who have never visited a golf course.
http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/quir ... 73642.html
Move over, Canada! Was Charles Darwin one of ice-hockey’s first players?
Blow to Canadian cousins as book claims their national sport evolved on frozen ponds of England
Britain has given the world a number of its greatest sports, from cricket and rugby to golf and even ping-pong (or whiff whaff, if you believe Boris Johnson).
But it now appears that ice-hockey, Canada’s national game, can be added to the list, with a letter from Charles Darwin suggesting the naturalist was one of the game’s first players.
The news will come as a shock to Canadians, who are taught the game as soon as they can walk, but the authors of a forthcoming book on the subject claim to have proved conclusively that the game was invented in England in the 19th century, with a young Darwin an exponent during his school days.
In a letter dated 1 March, 1853, Darwin writes to his son William, who has gone to Shrewsbury School where the father of evolutionary theory had been a pupil: “My Dear Old Willy… have you got a pretty good pond to skate on? I used to be very fond of playing at Hocky on the ice in skates.”
Darwin attended the school from 1818 to 1825 and researcher Jean-Patrice Martel, a member of the Society for International Hockey Research, told The Independent that this was around the time that a game recognisable as ice hockey first started to be played.
Mr Martel, a French Canadian, and two Swedish colleagues, Carl Giden and Patrick Houda, called their book On The Origins Of Hockey in a deliberately nod to Darwin.
“There’s no doubt about it,” Mr Martel said, arguing that there are so many historical references to ice-hockey in England that “no reasonable person could have a doubt.” ...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/th ... 33766.html
US referee killed after being assaulted by red carded player
The offending player attacked the referee after disagreeing with a decision made by the 44 year-old referee
A US football referee has died after being punched by a player during altercation following his sending off.
According to witnesses and police, John Bieniewicz, 44, suffered fatal head injuries when he was struck by the offending player during a park match in the US state of Michigan on Sunday.
He was left unconscious on the pitch until medical staff and authorities arrived, but after spending two days on a life support machine he was pronounced dead in hospital on Tuesday.
Baseel Abdul-Amir Saad, 36, has been the man accused of the attack and is in custody charged on assault with the intent of causing great bodily harm.
According to the witnesses that were present, Saad had complained about a decision made by Bieniewicz and was dismissed from the field of play for his dissent.
Saad reacted badly to this and is reported to have hit Bieniewicz while he was reaching for his card before leaving the pitch and driving away. ...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 78211.html
GOLFERS TAKE A SWING AT EACH OTHER
USA:
Two golfers have been charged with fighting after they argued about the rules of the game while playing together and one of them is accused of hitting the other over the head with a 3-wood.
State police say Roger Lee Harris, 63, and Bryan Bandes, 42, were playing with three others at the Springdale Golf Course near Uniontown, Pennsylvania, on Sunday when they argued about rules involving ‘casual water’ — otherwise known as puddles.
After settling that dispute on the 5th hole, police say they argued again on the 7th hole, with Harris hitting Bandes with the club and the men trading punches.
Harris is charged with aggravated assault and simple assault, while Bandes is charged with simple assault.
http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/quir ... 78762.html
GOLFERS TAKE A SWING AT EACH OTHER
USA:
Two golfers have been charged with fighting after they argued about the rules of the game while playing together and one of them is accused of hitting the other over the head with a 3-wood.
State police say Roger Lee Harris, 63, and Bryan Bandes, 42, were playing with three others at the Springdale Golf Course...l
GAA whistle up bird stunt but falcon gets red card
Don’t work with children or animals, they say. With the former, the GAA have long succeeded in defying that idiom, but in Croke Park yesterday they tried their hand with a bird of prey and, well, it didn’t go too well.
“Something a little different” was how the MC introduced Flash the falcon as he directed everyone’s gaze towards the Etihad Sky-Line at the corner of the Cusack and Davin Stands.
Flash was expected to swoop down to his handler to deliver the referee’s whistle to James McGrath for the Kilkenny-Limerick hurling semi-final.
But Flash had other ideas; flying behind the Cusack Stand despite vain attempts to beckon him on the pitch. The falcon, who was supposed to be the star of the sponsors’ stunt, eventually appeared but seemed more interested in circling the stadium. ...
http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/ga ... 79115.html
Breaststroke brigade: Cross-channel swimmer mistaken for ‘illegal immigrant’ by border police
An extreme endurance swimmer was confronted by UK police and border officials who mistook the athlete for an illegal immigrant, as he prepared to dive into the English Channel.
John Vane Wisse was preparing to swim from the south coast port of Dover to northern France as part of an extreme sports challenge. It was then that concerned locals called the police.
Port of Dover Police, the coastguard, Kent Constabulary and Border Force officials descended on the beach, expecting to confront a migrant struggling ashore.
Instead, the red-faced officials found the Australian athlete, who had run from London to Dover as part of a London to Paris endurance challenge, limbering up in the water for the next stage of his 289-mile journey.
Laughing off the incident as “priceless,” Vane Wisse was allowed to continue with his cross-channel swim, arriving in Paris later that day. ...
http://rt.com/uk/183448-illegal-immigra ... r-athlete/
LEGAL THREAT
SWITZERLAND: A Swiss goalkeeper has threatened legal action after fans of a rival lower league team urinated in his water bottle and then taunted him when, unawares, he took a sip during a match at the weekend.
FC Muri goalkeeper Reto Felder said he had felt sick after tasting the warm contents of the bottle, which he had left near the goalpost during the Liga (third tier) game at FC Baden near Zurich. ...
http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/quir ... 86901.html
A goalkeeper played on after suffering a suspected broken neck in a collision with a team-mate.
Laura Wareham, 21, suffered the injury after only 15 minutes of Newcastle United Women’s FA Women’s Premier League North match against Bradford City after she and defender Kate Brooks combined to stop a Bradford forward scoring. She played on for five or six minutes of the eventual 3-2 defeat before being substituted — only because pain in her ribs had left her unable to kick the ball, she said.
She then collapsed twice, once after coming off and once in the dressing room at the end of the game at Northumbria University. Incredibly, in 2011, the sports science student also broke her neck playing in goal, returning to the side only after a year on the sideline.
http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/quir ... 99963.html
Rumours of “mechanical doping” first surfaced in 2010, when the Classic and time-trial specialist Fabian Cancellara was forced to defend himself against apparently unfounded allegations that he had mechanical help. At the time, a consultant to the governing body said that he estimated that the use of a small electric motor hidden in the bottom bracket could save between 60 and 100 watts as the rider pedalled, a considerable boost to performance.
Not long afterwards the UCI began examining machines on a random basis, using a scanner and later a small camera. There have been high-profile searches for the boosters but nothing has ever been found, as was the case last year at the Tour de France, for example, when half a dozen machines including that of Chris Froome, were examined after the finish of stage 18 through the Alps.
Here's a new cycling cheat - 'mechanical doping'.
Small electric motor found in the bottom bracket of a rider in Belgium. Ingenious!
Small electric motor found in the bottom bracket of a rider in Belgium