DUBLIN, Ireland -- Marcel Kittel sprinted to a second straight stage victory in a wet third leg of the Giro dItalia on Sunday while Michael Matthews retained the overall leaders pink jersey. Brad Richardson Coyotes Jersey . Kittel looked to have left it too late on his 26th birthday after losing contact with his rivals inside the final kilometre. But the German cyclist came from behind to edge out Ben Swift on the line and deny the Briton a maiden Grand Tour stage victory. Kittel finished in four hours 28 minutes 43 seconds. Elia Viviani was third in a bunch sprint at the end of the 187-kilometre cross-border leg from Armagh to Dublin. Svein Tuft of Langley, B.C., was 74th while Victorias Ryder Hesjedal finished 96th. Tuft is in a four-way tie for fourth in the overall standings while Hesjedal is tied for 156th. Matthews -- whose Orica-GreenEdge team won Fridays opening time trial -- will lead the race back to Italy and the Australian has an eight-second advantage over Italian cyclist Alessandro Petacchi. Rain fell intermittently for most of the day and wet roads caused several crashes, including two large ones, but all the riders were able to continue. Former winner Michele Scarponi was one of the riders caught up in a large crash around 60 kilometres from the finish. Several cyclists also suffered technical problems and Swift briefly dropped off the back of the peloton when he had to change his bike with 25 kilometres to go. Maarten Tjallingii, who is still wearing the blue King of the Mountains jersey, led for most of the stage for the second day in a row. He was part of an early breakaway of five riders, along with Yonder Godoy, Miguel Angel Rubiano Chavez, Gert Dockx and Giorgio Cecchinel. They had a lead of six minutes before the peloton started reeling them in with more than 100 kilometres remaining. Their advantage briefly increased as the peloton slowed to wait for riders involved in the major crashes to catch up, but the group was back together with more than seven kilometres remaining after a brief solo escape from Cecchinel. After three wet days in Northern Ireland and Ireland, the Giro takes a rest day on Monday as it travels back to Italy. The Giro ends in Trieste on June 1. Joe Vitale Coyotes Jersey . It was the quickest three-goal sequence in Olympic history, with the latter two coming just eight seconds apart. Kessel, Lamoureux and Kendall Coyne all scored twice for the Americans, and Molly Schaus made 10 saves in her Sochi debut. Mikkel Boedker Coyotes Jersey NEW YORK, N.Y. - Statement from Michael Garcia, Chairman of the Investigatory Chamber of the FIFA Ethics Committee:For the first two years after my July 2012 appointment as independent Chairman of the FIFA Ethics Committees Investigatory Chamber, I felt that the Ethics Committee was making real progress in advancing ethics enforcement at FIFA. In recent months, that changed.On September 5, 2014, I and Cornel Borbely, the Deputy Chair of the Investigatory Chamber, sent a Report on the Inquiry into the 2018/2022 FIFA World Cup Bidding Process (the Report) to the FIFA Ethics Committees Adjudicatory Chamber. The Report identified serious and wide-ranging issues with the bidding and selection process. (Mr. Borbely also filed separate reports from his inquiries into the activities of the bid teams from Russia and the United States.)Soon after, the Chairman of the Adjudicatory Chamber, Hans-Joachim Eckert, indicated publicly that only limited information from the Report would be made public. Concerned that insufficient transparency would not serve FIFAs interests, I issued a public statement calling on the FIFA Executive Committee to authorize the appropriate publication of the Report. The Executive Committee took no action on this subject during its September 2014 meetings - other than to refer me to the FIFA Disciplinary Committee for allegedly violating the Code of Ethics through my public comments, namely, my public request that the Executive Committee authorize appropriate publication of the Report and the on-the-record statement Mr. Borbely and I released concerning watches given to certain football officials. The Chairman of the Disciplinary Committee, Claudio Sulser, ultimately rejected the Executive Committees referral.On November 13, 2014, Mr. Eckert issued a 42-page Statement of the Chairman of the Adjudicatory Chamber of the FIFA Ethics Committee on the Report on the Inquiry into the 2018/2022 FIFA World Cup Bidding Process prepared by the Investigatory Chamber of the FIFA Ethics Committee (the Eckert Decision). In a cover letter, Mr. Eckert described the statement as his findings, including certain descriptions of the contents of the Investigatory Chambers report.The issues raised by Mr. Eckerts selection and omission of material from the Report, and his additional comments, went far beyond the initial transparency concerns. As my public statement at the time explained, the Eckert Decision contained numerous maaterially incomplete and erroneous representations of facts and conclusions. Dylan Strome Jersey. Accordingly, I appealed.A brief I filed with the FIFA Appeal Committee on November 24, 2014, outlined the Eckert Decisions most serious failings. Among other points, the brief explained why, when viewed in the context of the Report it purported to summarize, no principled approach could justify the Eckert Decisions edits, omissions, and additions.Yesterdays decision by the Appeal Committee declined to address these points. Instead, the Appeal Committee rejected my appeal on procedural grounds, concluding that it is not necessary for the FIFA Appeals Committee to enter into considerations on the substance of the appeal. The Appeal Committee found that the Eckert Decision was merely a personal opinion on the Report and had no legally binding effect whatsoever. It reached this conclusion even though, under Article 36 of the Code of Ethics, only final decisions may be made public, as the Eckert Decision, which was published on FIFAs website, obviously was. The Appeal Committee also overlooked the Eckert Decisions self-described findings, including one stating that the evaluation of the 2018/2022 FIFA World Cups bidding process is closed for the FIFA Ethics Committee. FIFA President Blatter recently reaffirmed that finding during an interview published by FIFA, stating: Furthermore, there is no change to Judge Eckerts statement that the investigation into the bidding process for the 2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cups is concluded.I disagree with the Appeal Committees decision.It now appears that, at least for the foreseeable future, the Eckert Decision will stand as the final word on the 2018/2022 FIFA World Cup bidding process. While the Appeal Committees decision notes that further appeal may be taken to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, I have concluded that such a course of action would not be practicable in this case. No independent governance committee, investigator, or arbitration panel can change the culture of an organization. And while the November 13, 2014, Eckert Decision made me lose confidence in the independence of the Adjudicatory Chamber, it is the lack of leadership on these issues within FIFA that leads me to conclude that my role in this process is at an end.Accordingly, effective today, December 17, 2014, I am resigning as independent Chairman of the Investigatory Chamber of the FIFA Ethics Committee.Cheap Jerseys Wholesale Jerseys Wholesale Jerseys Cheap Jerseys Cheap NFL Jerseys Cheap Jerseys China Wholesale Jerseys ' ' '
