FORMER Victorian Alec Stevens is riding the crest of a winning wave, all with dogs from his former home state.That continued on Thursday night when Coulta Amy (Awesome Assassin-Coulta Bandit) led throughout to win by six and a quarter lengths at Albion Park.She won in 30.41 beating Lindale Guest with a head to Briara Boy getting home well for third.It is the third win in five starts for Coulta Amy since she has come north to the Stevens kennel.“They are calling me ‘Honest Al the Punter’s Pal’,” said Stevens.“I thought she was a good thing out of the rails draw and I told everyone.”But Stevens also believes the bitch will be even better suited from the eight box.“It’s a funny thing,” he said.“I’ve found that most of the Coulta breed like the eight box best.”Coulta Amy began better on Thursday night than she has in her five runs in Queensland to date.She took her overall record to nine wins from 33 starts.The bitch is raced by Robert Irvine a long-time friend of Alec and his wife Judy.“Robert tells me my old favourite Coulta Mara is in pup to Hallucinate,” said Alec.“I’ll look forward to training a few of those in years to come.”

Hoping the luck of the Irish would be on their side, 195 Players were ready for action this afternoon to begin Day One 'A' of the European Poker Tour Stop at Dublin. The Regency Hotel is the host of the tournament. Refreshingly, the tournament room is huge, which leaves players (and media) plenty of room to circulate. Also refreshing is the fact that there is no smoking allowed in the tournament room. So, unlike a couple EPT stops, you don't leave the tournament room smelling like an ashtray. Tournament officials had implemented a new system, called 'CardRoom Magic', which manages the entire tournament from beginning to end. The system even has a voice that announces the new blind levels, when breaks are, etc. The

system is apparently gaining widespread use throughout Europe, and has the blessing of the British Gaming Control Board. The majority of the big names are scheduled to play tomorrow on Day 1 B, but some of them decided to come down to the poker room early, just to 'have a look'. Ram Vaswani was playing Chinese Poker with a friend in the corner. Greg Raymer was playing some freerolls - just to give poker players the pleasure to be able to say that they had played at the same table as a former WSOP Champion. Raymer also gave some tips to his tablemates. "I wish I had played a sit & go with him. I would have raised him with 2-7 and then showed it to him" says a young man watching from the corner. One thing I found interesting as I walked by the cash games, is it seemed if a player got up, and missed a big blind, he or she didn't have to post to get right back into the game – they call it "player joins the table as a guest". There is no time charge here in Ireland, and it seemed to be the rake was running at about 5%, which, depending on where the player was from, was either met with delight, or dismay. I saw one player at the 2/5 No Limit table with only about €35 left in front of him (the buy in was €500) . I looked at him quizzically, and he said he had just had his Aces cracked the hand before, and was ready to go after he dumped his last few chips. Three hours later, I walked by again, and he had €1,800 in front of him, claming he had never re-bought in. A couple players at the table verified his tale, as he sat with the world's biggest grin on his face – you gotta love No Limit Hold 'em. The hand of the day involved Marc Goodwin. After calling a players all in for 7,200 chips, the player behind Marc re-raised 13,000 more all in. About 2 minutes of deliberation later, Marc decides to call with 6 6. The original all in player flips over 3h 4h. The re-raiser, however shows Q Q, and Goodwin is in trouble. But, there are five more cards to come, and if you follow tournaments, you probably know what's coming. The flop is 7 8 10, and Marc picks up a few outs. The turn is another 7, but the river is a 6, and Marc wins a 47,000 chip pot, making him one of the monster stacks at that time. Goodwin managed to wield that stack like a hammer, and finished the day second in chips with 98,200. Day one 'A' finished with 49 of the original 195 players still standing. The chip leader is Norway's Jonas Helness, with top European players Paul Testud, Roy 'The Boy' Brindley, and Andy Black lurking near the top. Norwegian wunderkind Johnny Lodden finished the day on about 45,000 chips, slightly above average. Chip Counts are below. Day 1 B will start Friday at 2:00pm local time, and the list of big names playing is a mile long. See you tomorrow. Chip Count for Day 1 A: JONAS HELNESS 117,400 MARC GOODWIN 98,200 KEVIN BREESEY 83,900 TESTUD PAUL 77,100 ROY BRINDLEY 71,600 STUART FOX 69,800 ANDY BLACK 69,000 JOAKIM HAMMAR 66,500 DAVID CLAYTON 61,100 JIM KERRIGAN 57,500 NICK SLADE 52,600 AZOD PIROOTI 50,100 JEFF GALZA 50,000 FERGAL MCKEEVER 49,200 EOIN OLIM 47,100 JOHNNY LODDEN 44,900 RAVI U 44,600 TRIGAS MAXIMILIANUS 41,800 CHRISTOPHER STALIE 40,900 KATJA THALER 39,500 ROUE NILOLAISEN 38,000 JIM REID 37,200 MARTIN KENOR 37,000 JIMMY DAHLAVIST 35,700 JONATHAN LEWIS 35,100 JEPPE JUML 32,700 NIKLAS WALLGREN 32,000 MARC F 31,800 ANDREAS VILSON 30,700 NADIYBRIKALJA 29,700 REYAAZ MULLA 29,100 RAY COBURN 25,400 SASMA ROSEWOOD 24,400 BOSCH OLIVER 22,400 ROBERT TAYLOR 22,200 MICHAEL RABENSRIFNER 21,600 DANNY RYAN 19,400 DANIEL WADMAN 19,300 ADRIAN WALSHE 16,500 IAN MCTAVISH 12,800 CHRISTOPHER SANESSON 12,500 ROI ELMALIAH 12,000 MARCUS DEIFGEN 11,100 DAVID ATRABIN 9,800 GEORGE GEARY 8,700 G ANDASON 8,400 HEINING THOMAS 8,200 JOHN STORAKERS 7,600 PASCAL PERRAUCT 5,300

Alonso enjoys the spoils of victory on the Interlagos podium
Renault's Fernando Alonso won a second straight drivers' title with second place at the Brazilian Grand Prix as rival Michael Schumacher hit trouble.

Schumacher needed to win with Alonso out of the points to clinch an eighth title in his final race, but his Ferrari suffered a puncture early on.

The German put in a storming recovery drive to finish fourth but could do nothing about Alonso's title march.

Ferrari's Felipe Massa won the race, with Jenson Button's Honda third.

Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella finished sixth, behind McLaren's Kimi Raikkonen, and the result was enough for the team to beat Ferrari by five points and win the constructors' championship for the second year in a row.

The Ferraris were the fastest cars in the race by far and Massa, who started from pole position, was in control throughout to become the first Brazilian to win his home race since the late Ayrton Senna in 1993.


Massa wasted no time in pulling out a huge lead in the Ferrari
"This is amazing. To win here in front of my own people - it is a dream come true," Massa said.

"It is incredible. The car was wonderful and it was the easiest race of my life because of that.

"But I must say thank you to Michael for all his help and he is a great friend and a great driver. I am sorry for him but this is the best day of my life."

Massa romped away into the lead in the first two laps before a heavy crash suffered by Williams' Nico Rosberg brought out the safety car.

When racing resumed, the Brazilian again stormed off into the distance, leaving Raikkonen - his future Ferrari team-mate - trailing.

At this stage, Schumacher appeared to have a good chance of winning his final race before retirement.

Stuck down in 10th place on the grid because of a fuel-pressure problem in qualifying, he made a dynamic start to the race, and was up to sixth by the time the safety car came out.

When racing resumed three laps later, Schumacher began to pile the pressure on Alonso's team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella.

After trailing him for a couple of laps, he made a move on the Italian at the end of lap eight.

The Ferrari took the lead as they powered down the pit straight, and fended off Fisichella's attempt to re-take the position as they dived into the Senna S.


Schumacher drove his final race as he did the rest - on the limit
But halfway through the corner, the rear of the Ferrari slid wide, and heading out on to the back straight Fisichella streaked past as Schumacher slowed dramatically with his left rear tyre coming apart.

He was forced to tour slowly around the rest of the lap before coming into the pits for a new tyre.

He rejoined last, just ahead of Massa, and set to work on making what he could of his final competitive appearance in an F1 car.

Out of sync on fuel stops with the rest because Ferrari fuelled his car at the same time as replacing his punctured tyre, he began to put in the sort of drive that has defined his career - relentless pace, commitment and consistency right on the limit.

He set a series of fastest laps as he scythed through the field once his fuel load came down and others' pit stops brought them back towards him.

As the race balanced out after the final stops, Schumacher was again in sixth place on the tail of Fisichella.

This time, though, he did not find it so easy to pass the Renault.

He harried Fisichella for 10 laps before the pressure finally told. Fisichella misjudged his braking into the first corner with nine laps to go and ran wide.

606: DEBATE
Brilliant last race from Schumi. But I am pleased Alonso is champion

DW
606: Have your say

That allowed Schumacher past to chase Raikkonen.

The Ferrari quickly caught the McLaren, and Schumacher made it past with a very brave move as Raikkonen robustly defended his position at the first corner with three laps to go.

With Button more than six seconds ahead in third place, that was as far as Schumacher would go, but his performance at least ensured he bowed out of F1 in style.

Behind the untouchable Massa at the front, Alonso had made a cautious start to the race, holding position in fourth place behind Raikkonen and Jarno Trulli's Toyota.

But the Spaniard began to come on strong in the run up to the first pit-stop period once the Italian retired early with suspension failure.

Raikkonen made his stop first, at the end of lap 21, but Alonso had another five laps of fuel left in his car, and he rejoined just ahead of the McLaren.

Alonso now had to worry about Button, which made strong progress after starting 14th and passed Raikkonen at the end of the pit straight on lap 29.

Button was close behind Alonso until the second stops, but the Renault again stayed out longer and easily held on to second place to the end of the race.

Raikkonen was never far behind Button, but was forced to end his McLaren career in an understated fourth place, to end McLaren's first winless season since 1996.

Honda's Rubens Barrichello was seventh ahead of the McLaren of Pedro de la Rosa, who did an unconventional one-stop race.



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Brazilian Grand Prix result:

1. Felipe Massa (Brz) Ferrari one hour 31 minutes 53.751 seconds
2. Fernando Alonso (Spa) Renault +18.658 seconds
3. Jenson Button (GB) Honda +19.394
4. Michael Schumacher (Ger) Ferrari +24.094
5. Kimi Raikkonen (Finland) McLaren-Mercedes +28.503
6. Giancarlo Fisichella (Ita) Renault +30.287
7. Rubens Barrichello (Brz) Honda +40.294
8. Pedro de la Rosa (Spa) McLaren-Mercedes +52.068
9. Robert Kubica (Pol) BMW Sauber +1:07.642
10. Takuma Sato (Jpn) Super Aguri-Honda 1 lap behind
11. Scott Speed (US) Toro Rosso-Cosworth 1 lap
12. Robert Doornbos (Ned) Red Bull-Ferrari 1 lap
13. Vitantonio Liuzzi (Ita) Toro Rosso-Cosworth 1 lap
14. Christijan Albers (Ned) MF1-Toyota 1 lap
15. Tiago Monteiro (Por) MF1-Toyota 2 laps
16. Sakon Yamamoto (Jpn) Super Aguri-Honda 2 laps
17R. Nick Heidfeld (Ger) BMW Sauber 8 laps
R David Coulthard (GB) Red Bull-Ferrari 14 laps completed
R Jarno Trulli (Ita) Toyota 10 laps
R Ralf Schumacher (Ger) Toyota 9 laps
R Mark Webber (Aus) Williams-Cosworth 1 lap
R Nico Rosberg (Ger) Williams-Cosworth 1 lap

R = retired

Fastest lap: Michael Schumacher, 1:12.162, lap 70.

Friday night's football can be seen as the tasty starter before the international main course on Saturday.

England's under-21 side take on their German counterparts in the first match of a two-legged play-off and the edge that always involves encounters between these two traditional enemies will make this 90 minutes worth seeing.

With a place in next summer's UEFA European Under-21s Championship Finals at stake, Peter Taylor's men know they will probably have to leave the Ricoh Arena with a lead to take to Leverkusen for the return game on Tuesday.

The home leg in Coventry is already a sell-out, with 32,000 expected but we reckon the Germans can play through the passion of the England fans and get the draw that will out them in the driving seat for the second-leg.

Bet Direct's 2/1 for the draw is too tempting for us to ignore - so we won't!