July 2005 in Sports - 17 July 2005

17 July 2005

• Major League Baseball
  • The Kansas City Royals defeat the Detroit Tigers 5–0 in a game that is marred by a massive bench-clearing brawl in the sixth inning. It begins when Royals starter Runelvys Hernández hits Tigers batter Carlos Guillén in the helmet with a pitch, the third batter in the game Hernández plunks. The two exchange words, and both benches and dugouts clear. At first, only words are exchanged between the teams. Then, Tigers pitcher Kyle Farnsworth picks up Royals reliever Jeremy Affeldt and slams him to the ground, resulting in exchanged punches. When all is said and done, seven people are ejected — Hernández, Guillén, Farnsworth, Jeremy Bonderman, Emil Brown, Alberto Castillo, and Royals manager Buddy Bell. (Yahoo!)
• Auto racing:
  • NASCAR Nextel Cup: Tony Stewart wins the New Hampshire 300 at the New Hampshire International Speedway in Loudon, his third win in the last four races, after not having won at all this season before this recent stretch. (NASCAR.com)
  • Champ Car World Series: Sébastien Bourdais picks up his second win of the season at the inaugural West Edmonton Mall Grand Prix of Edmonton at the Finning International Speedway in Edmonton. Polesitter A. J. Allmendinger slaps the wall with 8 laps to go while leading, damaging both his left side suspensions. Bourdais now leads Paul Tracy by 21 points in the series standings. If Bourdais holds on in points from here, it will be his second straight series title, and the first time Newman-Haas Racing has ever won back-to-back Champ Car titles. (ChampCarWorldSeries.com)
• Golf: The Open Championship
  • Tiger Woods wins at St Andrews. Challenged early in the final day by Colin Montgomerie and playing partner José María Olazábal, Woods eventually cruises to a five-stroke win over Montgomerie. He becomes only the second golfer, after Jack Nicklaus, to win all four majors more than once. (Opengolf.com)
• Cycling: Tour de France
  • Stage 15, 205.5 km from Lézat-sur-Lèze to Saint-Lary-Soulan. The toughest mountain stage of the whole Tour. A dramatic chase over six mountain passes decimates the peloton as Ivan Basso, Lance Armstrong and Jan Ullrich pursue a breakaway group of six riders up vicious Pyreneean slopes. George Hincapie (Discovery Channel) wins in 6 hrs 06 min 38 secs, becoming the first member of Lance Armstrong's team, other than Lance, to win a stage since 1999. Óscar Pereiro (Phonak) (+06 secs) Pietro Caucchioli (Crédit Agricole) (+38 secs), Michael Boogerd (Rabobank) (+57 secs) and Laurent Brochard (Bouygues Télécom) (+2 min 19 secs) were also in the breakaway. Ivan Basso (CSC) and Lance Armstrong (Discovery Channel) finish 6th and 7th, both in +5 min 04 secs, followed by Óscar Sevilla and Jan Ullrich (T-Mobile Team) (both +6 min 28 secs) and Michael Rasmussen at +6 min 32 secs.
  • In the General Classification, Lance Armstrong picks up yet another Maillot jaune in 62 hours 09 min 59 secs, but Ivan Basso (+2 min 46 secs) leapfrogs Michael Rasmussen (+3 min 09 secs) into second place. Jan Ullrich is at +5 min 58 secs, followed by Francisco Mancebo (+6 min 31 secs), Levi Leipheimer (+7 min 35 secs), Floyd Landis (+9 min 33 secs), Alexander Vinokourov (+9 min 38 secs), Christophe Moreau is the leading Frenchman at +11 min 47 secs while Andreas Klöden is in 10th place at +12 min 01 secs. Monday is a rest day. (Le Tour)