Hamburg Olympics Nein Danke

Residents of the German city of Hamburg have voted against hosting the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Hamburg was one of five cities left in the running, alongside Rome, Paris, Budapest and Los Angeles.

But 51.6% of residents of the city voted no in a referendum on Sunday. The No camp argued that money earmarked for the Olympics could be better spent.

German Olympics officials had picked Hamburg as their preferred candidate city ahead of Berlin.

Germany has not hosted the Games since 1972 in Munich. Voters there turned down the chance to host the 2022 Winter Olympics two years ago.

Almost two-thirds of voters in nearby Kiel, where sailing events would have been held, backed the Olympic proposal in Sunday's referendum. But turnout in the relatively small city of Kiel was under 32%, while 651,000 voters in Hamburg took part - half of the electorate.

Hamburg's mayor Olaf Scholz was disappointed with the result: "That's a decision that we didn't want, but it's clear."

The remaining cities vying for the chance to stage the 2024 Games include Budapest, Paris, Los Angeles and Rome.

Critics of the Hamburg plan said it was wasteful, at a cost of €11.2bn ($11.9bn; £7.9bn).

Hamburg's city authorities had promised €1.2bn for the event, but the lion's share would have been contributed by the national government.

Florian Kasiske from the No campaign NOlympia said people could see that the money could be better spent. He saw a change in mood in Hamburg, suggesting that the vote was linked to the large numbers of migrants and refugees arriving in the city.

"It's really about city politics. Many people are just arriving in this city and have to sleep in tents - and there has to be money for that," he said.

Stefan Kretzschmar with his silver handball medal at the Athens 2004 OlympicsImage copyrightGetty Images

The result was a setback for German sport. The chairman head of the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB), Michael Vesper, said it was clear that "now it'll be impossible to hold the Olympics in Germany for decades".

He believed that the recent Paris attacks as well as the migrant crisis had played a part in the no vote. And he said that the continuing corruption scandal involving Fifa and the doping row in world athletics had also been key factors.

Others feared the negative effects on German sport. Olympic handball medallist Stefan Kretzschmar tweeted that "the gateway to the Olympic (sports)world has been closed forever. This No doesn't deserve any medals".

A spokesman for the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said that "a great opportunity for the city, the country and sport in Germany is lost".

"The city also misses the investment of the IOC of about $1.7bn to the success of the Games, which compares to the €1.2bn Hamburg wanted to invest," he added.

"Now there will be a strong competition with four excellent candidate cities. With these strong competitors we all can look forward to [an] exciting Olympic Games 2024, whoever the winner will be."

In July, the city of Boston decided to withdraw from the race to be host for 2024 amid a lack of public support.

The winning city will be selected in September 2017.

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A Bridge Too Far

A high court judge has been asked to decide whether bridge is a sport after it was refused recognition by Sport England.

Mr Justice Dove is expected to analyse arguments over the next two days at a hearing in London.

The English Bridge Union (EBU) took legal action after Sport England, the public body responsible for increasing participation in sport, refused to recognise the card game.

Union officials say recognition that bridge is a sport will be beneficial for the game and that Sport England’s ruling is “inconsistent with both the wishes of parliament and the opinion of significant international sporting organisations”.

An EBU spokesman said: “When ruling on what constituted a sport in the 2011 Charities Act, parliament specifically included ‘mind sports’, stating that sport comprised ‘activities which promote health involving physical or mental skill or exertion’.”

He said bridge required “undoubted levels of mental skill” and had “known health benefits”.

The EBU was granted permission in April to seek a judicial review. Judge Mr Justice Mostyn, who plays bridge, said at the time: “You are doing more physical activity playing bridge, with all that dealing and playing, than in rifle shooting.”

Lawyers for the EBU said officials want a judicial review to determine whether Sport England, the government body that distributes lottery funding, had acted lawfully in “adopting a policy that prevents it recognising sports that it does not consider to be ‘physical’.”

“The EBU is hoping that the judicial review will pave the way for bridge and similar sports to receive the recognition that they deserve,” said a spokesman for law firm Irwin Mitchell, which is representing the EBU. Recognition by Sport England is important because lack of recognition impacts upon EBU’s ability to take part in European and international competitions.

He added: “Chess has already been recognised as a sport by the International Olympic Committee and was demonstrated at the Sydney Olympics in 2000. It was also included in the 2006 and 2010 Asian Games and is being considered for the Pan-American Games.

“Organisers of the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo have invited both chess and bridge to apply for inclusion in the games, which, if accepted, will be the first time players have competed in the Olympics.

If bridge were to be recognised as a sport in England then EBU would be able to invest in a number of projects to teach bridge to people of all ages and to ensure that facilities are improved.”

Lawyer Alex Peebles said: “We will argue that a sport does not need to be physical to be regarded as a sport as a matter of law. We hope our legal challenge will result in Sport England reconsidering its decision not to recognise bridge as a sport, which will help the EBU to access the essential support they need to continue growing and attracting new players.”

Jeremy Dhondy, an international bridge player and chairman of the EBU, said: “We hope that this hearing will allow bridge to be recognised in the way that it should.”

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McLaren Wary About Spa

McClaren and Honda have warned against expecting any big performance jumps from them at this weekend's Belgian Grand Prix, with more grid penalties expected as they prepare to introduce a revised engine.

On the back of a morale-boosting two-car points finish in Hungary, Honda have been using the summer break to work on a new specification power unit and have placed particular emphasis on improving the internal combustion engine (ICE) via the spending of an as yet unspecified number of development 'tokens'.

Yasuhisa Arai, the Japanese manufacturer's motorsport chief, says F1's return to action at Spa will therefore be a key test of their work, but he is still expecting a challenging weekend.

"As we planned, Honda has updated our combustion characteristics to further improve our power units for Spa and the second half of the season," Arai said.

"This weekend's free practices will be important to test the pairing of the power units to the cars. The Belgian race, however, will surely be a difficult one for the team and drivers, with expected grid penalties and a long and unforgiving power circuit."

Having already exceeded their penalty-free allocation of engines for the season - which was retrospectively increased to five last month - McLaren's drivers will pick up further grid demotions any time they run fresh ICEs between now and the end of the season.

Team boss Eric Boullier insists the Woking outfit are "refreshed and determined to continue improving our form", but is also aware that high-speed Spa and Monza, the next two tracks on the calendar, are not likely to suit the MP4-30.

"Spa is a truly spectacular circuit - arguably the best on the calendar for many - but, given the unique power and downforce package required, the track won't play to our strengths," the Frenchman said.

"Therefore, of course, we must be measured in our optimism, and we will need to wait for Singapore and beyond before we can see the fruits of our labours reflected on track."

With 70 per cent of the undulating Spa circuit spent at full throttle, Fernando Alonso is expecting a "tricky" few days, but has stressed the importance of the race weekend to McLaren.

"The next few races will be important for us: we need to continue our forward momentum, and, with the addition of some tweaks to the car and power unit, we will be looking for more progress and good correlation between the simulator and our on-track performance," the Spaniard said.

"That might not necessarily appear above the surface in either Spa or Monza, but we'll keep pushing development forward at each race."

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Hungary an 'important' weekend for Ferrari - Alonso

Getty Images

Fernando Alonso reckons the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend is crucial weekend for him and the Scuderia - and that it will seriously affect the team's motivation should Sebastian Vettel extend his championship lead any further. 

Alonso lost further ground to Vettel in Germany earlier this month and now lies 34 points back going into round ten at Budapest's Hungaroring. 

“A good result this weekend would be very good for team motivation and our hopes,” he told Ferrari's official website. 

“If we can close the gap to Sebastian before the break it would be a good thing, but if it increased, it would make it a stressful break for us and less motivating. So, it's an important weekend.” 

Conditions for the race look set to be very hot, but Alonso is not overly concerned and said it won't influence how they get ready for the grand prix. 

“Nothing changes in terms of preparation, whatever the temperature on Sunday, we will do our normal preparation,” he confirmed. “We just need to be a bit more open on strategy, in case we need to make an extra stop because of the tyres, but we won't know until we start practice tomorrow.” 

Meanwhile, Alonso has backed the changes made in the wake of the incident that saw Formula One Management (FOM) cameraman Paul Allen injured at the Nurburgring, when he was hit by a wheel that had come loose from theRed Bull of Mark Webber. 

“Always when something happens in terms of safety, we must react and we are all in agreement on improving safety. However, finding the way to do it is difficult to agree on,” stated the Spaniard. “But I think reducing the pit lane speed limit cannot be bad, as it is the same for all the teams and there is less risk for the mechanics.

“Reducing the number of media in the pit lane during free practice can also be a solution, because sometimes there are too many of them in FP1 and FP2. 

“In pit stops we are all trying to find the limits; of driver reaction time, the wheelguns and the procedure itself, so if they find a solution to increase the time of a pit stop [as has been mooted] to improve safety and it is the same for all the teams, I don't think anyone will disagree.”

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