Capriati, Playing Hurt, Is Beaten

Jennifer Capriati hit a bump on the comeback trail Friday when, hampered by a strained upper left thigh, she lost to Jana Novotna in the $450,000 Faber Grand Prix tennis tournament at Essen, Germany.

Novotna, a former Wimbledon finalist, beat Capriati, 7-6 (8-6), 2-6, 6-3, in the quarterfinals.

“Everything’s been sore,” said the 19-year-old Capriati, who hadn’t played in a tournament in 15 months and was absent from the women’s tour for 2 1/2 years. “I really pushed it this match. I got tired. I was playing with pain.”

A highly-publicized victim of tennis burnout, Capriati also spent time in drug-rehabilitation centers during her absence from the game.

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Goran Ivanisevic kept his hopes alive for a third consecutive tournament title by winning in the quarterfinals at the European Community Championships at Antwerp, Belgium.

Third-seeded Ivanisevic, who beat Italian Renzo Furlan, 4-6, 7-6 (7-4), 6-2, will play top-seeded Boris Becker in today’s semifinal of the $1-million event. Becker overwhelmed Spain’s Francisco Clavet, 6-3, 6-3.

Ukraine’s Andrei Medvedev also relied on a second-set tiebreaker to come from behind and upset eighth-seeded Marc Rosset, 4-6, 7-6 (7-2), 6-3. Medvedev will play sixth-seeded Michael Stich, who beat Dutchman Richard Krajicek, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4).

Winter Sports

Alpine skiing superstar Alberto Tomba finally beat his World Championship jinx, winning the men’s giant slalom at Sierra Nevada, Spain. It was the first World Championship title for the 29-year-old Italian, the most successful Alpine skier in Olympic history with three gold and two silver medals.

Leading after the first leg, Tomba delighted his noisy fans with a storming second run down the Sierra Nevada course for a combined time of 1 minute 58.63 seconds, .44 of a second ahead of Swiss silver medalist Urs Kaelin. Another Swiss, Michael Von Gruenigen, was third.

Finland’s Jari Mantila won the opening ski jumping portion of the Nordic combined in a World Cup meet at Trondheim, Norway, and his countrymen took the ski jumping team event. Mantila had two jumps of 97 meters and will start nine seconds ahead of Kenji Ogiwara of Japan in today’s 15-kilometer freestyle cross-country race. Ari-Pekka Nikkola soared 128 meters for the longest jump of the day as Finland won the team jumping competition, finishing 21.3 points ahead of Japan.

Olympic gold medalist Alexei Urmanov led the men’s competition at the Grand Prix figure skating finals in Paris, and world champion Chen Lu led the women’s event after the short programs.

Pro Football

The Chicago Bears re-signed defensive end Alonzo Spellman, matching an offer sheet he had received from the Jacksonville Jaguars for $12 million over four years. To make room under the salary cap, the Bears released running back Lewis Tillman, who had a year left on a $2.7-million contract.

The Denver Broncos signed unrestricted free-agent linebacker Bill Romanowski, who spent the last two seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles. . . . Defensive end Fred Stokes, who played the last three seasons with the Rams, signed a three-year contract with the New Orleans Saints.

Auto Racing

Chevrolet teammates Terry Labonte and Jeff Gordon swept the front row in qualifying for the Goodwrench Service 400 at North Carolina Motor Speedway in Rockingham, N.C. Labonte, earning his fourth Rockingham pole and the 22nd pole of his career, turned a fast lap of 156.870 mph on the 1.017-mile oval. Gordon was next at 156.756.

There will still be two 500-mile races on Memorial Day weekend, at Indianapolis and Michigan, despite a report that Championship Auto Racing Teams and the Indianapolis Racing League, the warring factions in Indy car racing, had negotiated a compromise.

Andrew Craig, president and chief executive officer of CART said there have been recent informal discussions with Tony George, president of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and founder of the IRL, but that plans for the U.S. 500 at Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn, Mich., had gone too far for the race to be dropped.

Craig said CART was ready to talk about “a long-term solution regarding the issues for 1997 and beyond.”

Miscellany

African television networks were awarded rights to this summer’s Atlanta Olympics at no cost, according an IOC official.

Rugby union stars expressed outrage in Gloucester, England, over a nine-month jail sentence given a player for assaulting an opponent during a game.

A court in London imposed the longest-ever sentence for on-field violence in British sports history when it jailed Gloucester forward Simon Devereux for breaking Jamie Cowie’s jaw in three places with a punch during a game in February 1995.

Names in the News

Former Yankee first baseman Joe Pepitone pleaded guilty to driving while impaired and was ordered to turn over his driver’s license after crashing his car in the Midtown Tunnel last October. Pepitone was also fined $350 and ordered to attend an eight-week rehabilitation program. . . . Baylor University officials selected Tom Stanton, a 46-year-old business executive who played basketball and baseball for the Bears, as to be the school’s new athletic director. . . . Taylor Lewis, a member of the UCLA track team from 1946-49 and a Pacific Eight Conference discus champion, was killed along with his wife, Anna, in an auto accident. . . . Helmut Schoen, under whom Germany won the European Championship in 1972 and the World Cup in 1974, died in a Frankfurt at age 80.