Miller Fails in Slalom, Rocca Takes Advantage

Giorgio Rocca of Italy won a World Cup slalom event at Chamonix, France, and overall leader Bode Miller failed to finish the first leg Sunday.

Rocca took the lead in the slalom standings from runner-up Benjamin Raich of Austria after two excellent runs. Rocca has 280 points, Raich 270.

“I felt euphoric coming down,” Rocca said. “I felt confident nothing could prevent me from delivering the kind of performance I needed to in order to win.”

Rocca had a combined time of 1 minute 28.15 seconds, 1.33 seconds ahead of Raich. Markus Larsson of Sweden finished third in 1:29.51.

Miller has finished only one World Cup slalom this season, the night race he won at Sestriere, Italy, in mid-December. This time, he was caught on a tight gate.

Miller received a low start number (15th) for failing to show on time for the draw the previous evening. He had failed to turn up at all for the downhill draw and was made to start 30th instead of 28th, where he was supposed to begin based on his result from final training.

Miller is ninth in the slalom standings with 100 points, but tops the overall rankings with 908 points. Raich is second with 640.

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Marlies Schild of Austria covered the two runs in 1:29.96 to win a women’s slalom at Santa Caterina Valfurva, Italy, and Kristina Koznick was runner-up, 0.15 seconds behind.

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Ryan St-Onge led the U.S. men to a World Cup freestyle sweep at Mont-Tremblant, Canada.

St-Onge scored 242.32 points and was followed by Jeret Peterson with 232.73 and Joe Pack with 226.95.

Tennis

Top-seeded Carlos Moya of Spain retained the ATP Tour’s Chennai Open title by defeating Paradorn Srichaphan of Thailand, 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (5), at Madras, India, in a repeat of last year’s final.

Moya rallied from the brink of defeat at 2-5 in the third set as he broke Srichaphan twice and then clinched the title through a tiebreaker for the second consecutive year.

Moya donated the winner’s purse of $52,000 for the effort to help the victims of the Dec. 26 tsunami in Asia.

Third-seeded Iveta Benesova of the Czech Republic beat Lubomira Kurhajcova of Slovakia, 6-1, 6-7 (1), 6-1, in the first round of the Moorilla International at Hobart, Australia.

Miscellany

The NCAA and U.S. Olympic Committee are studying ways to preserve traditional Olympic sports at colleges.

In NCAA meetings at Grapevine, Texas, a task force of the two organizations identified 11 nonrevenue sports from the 39 NCAA championships it considered at high or moderate risk of being dropped.

Women’s and men’s gymnastics and five men’s sports -- fencing, rifle, volleyball, water polo and wrestling -- were on the high-risk list.

Rebecca Quinn of the U.S. won the silver medal in the women’s scratch and Jenny Reed of the U.S. won the bronze medal in women’s Keirin in the track cycling World Cup at Manchester, England.

Leading from start to finish, Adriano Bastos of Brazil finished in 2:19:16 to win his second men’s Disney Marathon in three years at Lake Buena Vista, Fla., and Florida native Amy Shertzer finished in 2:56:06 to win the women’s race.

Kevin Beck was second in the men’s race, more than nine minutes behind, and Dorian Meyer was second in the women’s race, more than three minutes behind.

Terefe Yae won the men’s division of the P.F. Chang’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Arizona Marathon at Phoenix in 2:14:24 and defending champion Shitaye Gemechu won the women’s race in 2:32:51 to give Ethiopia a sweep.

Ten police officers were injured after rival fans rioted before a Greek first-division soccer match in Athens.

The game between Olympiakos Piraeus and Panionios Athens was postponed.

Police said the riots erupted after more than 600 Olympiakos fans stormed the stadium, clashing with Panionios fans and anti-riot police.

Hundreds of youths, holding sticks and throwing stones, invaded the field and ripped up stadium seats.

Violence also broke out outside Olympic Stadium in Athens, involving fans of defending champion Panathinaikos and AEK Athens. Police said a fan and a passer-by were injured.

No arrests were announced in either incident.