Sports highlights: UFC, F1 and mostly racing

It was Super 14's final last Sat. I couldn't watch the 2nd half but I guess I didn't miss much. The Bulls was leading at half time and went on to beat the Stormers and successfully defended their title. There won't be Super 14 next year as the league has expanded to 15.

The Rampage-Evans fight turned out to be not bad. Rampage looked passive in the beginning but he showed a bit of his old explosiveness at round 3. Evans did a great job trying to dominate.

The weekend was mainly about auto racing though: I watched both NASCAR races, Indy 500 and F1. I can't remember when was the last time the F1 race was actually more dramatic among all of them! I mean, the dominating driver in the beginning didn't win! The TV commentators mostly agreed that Vettel ruined teammate Webber's day but it wasn't so clear cut according to post-race analysis. After that crash, there was another close battle between teammates, Hamiton and Button. And that was just spectacular: Button passed the race leader Hamilton and the latter was able to regain his lead and went on to win. Another great finish I watched was the GT class of American Le Man Series at Laguna Seca Raceway at Monterrey. The Porsche passed the Bimmer at the final restart. These cars are more stock than those race for National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (yeah, that's NASCAR) and they didn't need double file restart to have exciting passes during restart! It deserved to be more popular than it currently does. The coverage was not typical (wasn't even live). Instead, it's more like a documentary, which served as a great introduction to uneducated fans like me. As predicted, hardcore fans didn't like it but I agree with the posters here that it would have got even fewer audiences if the full 6 hour race was broadcasted. Kudo to CBS for showing it.

Congrat to Danica Patrick for her 6th place finish at Indy 500. It was much better than expected!

Games of the day: Super 14 Semi and Heineken Cup final

This is a great weekend for sports fan. The list goes on and on: NHL Stanley Cup semi-final, NBA semi, Baseball's interleague games. And outside of North America, it's also semi-final for Super 14, the Southern hemisphere's premiere professional rugby competition, and the final of Heineken Cup, the top rugby competition in Europe (rugby's version of UEFA Champion's League) Finally, everybody is looking forward to the mid-week matchup between Manchester United and Barcelona, fighting for the crown of the UEFA Champion's League.

It has not been a great one for fans of teams named Hurricane though. Both the Super 14 side (from Wellington, New Zealand) and the NHL team (from Carolina) have lost. The former is eliminated and the latter is down 0-2 in its best-of-7 series. Both teams have put up great fights though.

The game I look forward to the most is another Super 14 semi between the Bulls and the Crusaders. These 2 teams were winners of the last 2 Super 14 titles. The latter is Super 14's version of NFL's Pittsburgh Steeler. And they overcame a poor start earlier this season to make it to the playoff. The winner will take on the Chiefs (from Hamilton, New Zealand.)

Even though the European rugby matches are lower scoring, the matchup between Leinster and Leicester will be interesting as the Magner league side (representing Scotland/Ireland) and Guinness Premiership side (England) will fight for its bragging right.