Bishop Brothers win Kart Series championships
TEAM Bishop Brothers of Len Pianta and Chris Pevy found a winning combination to collect their maiden title in 2007 Port Moresby Kart Series championship recently.
Competing under team format, both Pianta and Pevy made use of the absence of former champions Urss Cotti and Yiannis Nicolaou to win early races of the 2007 championship to put them on course to victory.
The final race started off which much anticipation with a big turn out of drivers, spectators and sponsors, with Ela Motors putting a professional day. It was a huge day as Ela Motors sponsored the last race of the year which was followed by presentations.
Last years champion Ray Socan in the DHL kart came out to see who he was losing his title to and to see if he could compete with them. Despite winning a race or two, and being competitive, both contenders for the championship proved they were worthy of the title as they both beat Ray in a number of races.
After a late start during the season, Yiannis Nicolaou in the Lamana kart was making a strong push for the top spot and after winning the first race of the day was primed for another clean sweep. However a crash in the second race meant he missed the third and meant it would be difficult to catch the series leaders, providing they kept on the track and had to settle for second placing.
After dropping the clutch and fine tuning their kart, Chris Pevy and Len Pianta in the Bishop Brothers kart finished all six races on the day.
After winning round 1 this year, the Bishop Brothers kart has lead the series the whole year, and so are deserved winners of the 2007 Kart series and take home the perpetual trophy.
A great year was had by the new and relatively new drivers such as David Whitehead in the Cardno kart who managed to race consistently to take out third place. Had he been available for the last race day he would have been in a close battle with Yiannis in the Lamana kart for second place. But third placing is his best ever result. Despite some crashes, David Jones also had a successful year securing fourth place, and with more regular appearances can be a chance for a higher place.

Soccer grand final time in Tabubil
Tabubil Soccer Association is all set to stage it 2007 soccer grand final under the club system this weekend at the Tabubil Soccer Ground.
Hot favourites in town is the only outside team from Tabubil, Namates soccer club. The Kiunga-based club who travels the Kiunga Tabubil Highway every three to four hours every weekend has one set of mind and that is to wrestle the premierships from the reigning champion Bultem Rock Brothers or BRB.
BRB have won three consecutive grand finals and will be eyeing to retain the premiership tag if Namates are not adamant about their preparation. Both teams have met several times during the normal season games but Sunday’s decider will be a thriller with all equal ball skills and tactics to be exposed.
In the last meet Namates dethroned BRB 4-2 in the major preliminary finals and will be eyeing for the possible repetition of the dose.
According to BRB’s president Mike Atieng, they will take the game has it comes and treat it as the normal game. He said BRB is known for playing its simple game plan
and will use that to
retain the title.
Other matches scheduled for grand finals this weekend are Kimi and Kadix in the Under 21 division and Momase and Oksie in the Women’s division on Saturday.
The reserve grade and the main encounter on Sunday will be the Reigning Champion BRB up against Namates.

On the road again
RAIN, hail or floods will not stop POM Road Runners tomorrown afternoon at the Sir John Guise Stadium. Runners will tackle the “Amazing Half an Hour of Power Run” where the aim will be to run as many laps of the athletics track as possible in 30 minutes and then beat the cut-off to squeeze in another final lap.
The fitter runners will be out to challenge Milton Iakosi’s 21 laps in 2006. All welcome and it is still only 20 toea to participate.

Rain is a problem
THERE is doubt that most sports activities will be called off due to the wet weather in the city. The heavy down pour has caused flooding for many of the sporting avenues which has caused some competitions to be cancelled. Two competitions have called off their matches as of yesterday, the Corporate 9s challenge and Public Servants netball.
Netball spokesperson, Karo Gigimat says due to the wet courts there will not be any matches as this will be unsafe for players.
“The match committee and the executives have decided to postpone the games until the weather clears up. All games can either be played next week or teams can arrange to play their matches during the week,” Gigimat said.
Meanwhile the Public Servants and Private Companies netball executives will come down hard on clubs and teams to brush up on their punctuality or face the axe. As observed by executives there have been a lot of forfeits recorded since the competition started late last month.

Appeal from Madang
TEAM Madang is making an 11th hour appeal to all six Parliamentarians to financial assist their participation in PNG Games in Lae, Morobe province. The PNG Games will officially kick off today and end on Nov 24. Speaking on behalf of the Team Madang executive committee, Steven Kadam said Team Madang appeal to all its MPs to assist financially. “We are down by K30,000 after small business houses in town have chipped in,” he said.
Kadam said he was disappointed that no Madang MP never made any attempts to assist Team Madang something is very unusual of politicians. Team Madang will be participating in soccer, basketball, rugby nines, rugby touch, volleyball, hockey, dart, athletics and the disabled sports. About 270 sports men and women will be traveling to Lae today.
The women’s basketball team who won gold medal in last Grass roots Olympics in Goroka will out in full force to defend their title.

No fees will be charged at Games venues
By SAMPSON BONAI
PNG Sports Foundation said it will not charge any fees for the use of its facilities to host the 3rd PNG Games in Lae starting this week.
The PNG Games is a subsidiary of the PNG Sports Foundation.
And through its Games Council, it owns the host organising committee.
The host organising committee will however collect gate takings, “to make some money to cover expenses,” officials said.
The sporting fraternity was given a rattling yesterday when a report in this paper said that the PNG Sports Foundation was seeking a hefty sum for the staging of the games.
Host organising committee chairman Joseph Bau Maras yesterday relayed a message from PNG Sports Foundation’s executive director John Kambuou that “no one had the right to charge any fees for the use of its facilities during the PNG Games.”
Maras, Kambuou and PNG Games Council chairman Edris Kumbrawah also cleared the air over the erecting of a billboard by cellphone company Digicel.
Digicel is the official communications sponsor, they said.
Provincial authorities had halted progress “because it did not meet building board approval”, they added.
Maras further clarified that they will not be using show grounds to hold any of the games because the organisers had charged them excessive fees of K20, 000 and they had to move rugby 7s, touch, softball and hockey back to their original venues at Eriku, Lae rugby league and hockey fields respectively.
“We decided to give our people free access to certain venues to watch the games and will not be any charging fees for softball, hockey and rugby touch games as they will be played in the open fields.”

Sponsors make last-minute rush to secure Games deals
By SAMPSON BONAI
TELIKOM (PNG) reaffirmed its sponsorship commitment by coming good with sponsorship package of K10, 712 to Papindo and Shorncliffe Team Morobe to strengthen the team’s efforts to win more medals in the 3rd PNG Games this year.
Momase regional manager Leo Wamo who handed over the sponsorship and the mobile phones said they have fulfilled the commitment made by the managing director Peter Loko earlier this year to sponsor the team in cash and kind.
“Telikom (PNG) is pleased to sponsor Team Morobe with a total of K10, 712 (K5,000 in cash and K5,712 worth of 26 mobile phones with sim and prepaid cards to the management of Team Morobe,” Wamo said.
Team Morobe team general manager Tokey Mambare thanked Telikom (PNG) for its support towards team Morobe and said Team Morobe fully support Telikom (PNG) and will promote its product over the duration of the games.
“Thank you Telikom (PNG) for your kind gesture. We appreciate your timely assistance that really boost the morale of the team and will promote your product throughout the games,” Mambare said.
Meanwhile, Team Morobe has overshot its projection of raising more than K300,000 for its participation in the PNG Games.
It’s target was bettered by K74,000.
And it was all due to two local firms ñ as local as Biang Ngayam ñ Papindo Trading and Schorncliffe.
Papindo Trading served up K40,000 and Shorncliffe equaled it with another K40,000 to fulfill their commitment to Team Morobe.
Morobe has the largest contingent for the games with more than 600 athletes.
Papindo Trading business and human resources manager Jerry Juralbal said: “Papindo Trading is a locally owned company based in Lae and had been assisting the local community in Morobe over the years and is pleased to strengthen its support to Team Morobe.
Papindo attired Team Morobe with zulu laplaps and shirts with embroided PNG Games logo and caps.
Shorncliffe assistant general manager Rey de Guzman also handed over K40,000 and said the company is also pleased to provide financial support to Team Morobe to enable the team to win more gold medals for the province.