Paul Sherwen, one of the best-known pro-cycling commentators who is widely credited with introducing the English speaking world to the sport, died on Sunday at his home in Uganda. He was 62.

Sherwen’s voice became almost inextricable from the Tour de France and other major cycling events after a stellar career as a competitor. He rode in the Tour seven times during the 1970s and 1980s, twice becoming the British national champion. But the British cyclist is best known for his 33 years commentating on the world’s most famous and grueling cycling competition — many with co-commentator, Phil Liggett.

Over more than three decades, Sherwen spread his passion for cycling across British, Australian and American television and radio to new generations of fans. He covered the sport during five Olympic Games as an analyst for NBC Sports.

“We are saddened to offer our condolences to the friends and family of Paul Sherwen, who passed away this morning at his home in Uganda,” the news outlet said in a statement on Sunday.

“Paul was synonymous with the Tour de France in the U.S. and will be greatly missed by his legions of fans and the NBC Sports family, which was honored to be part of Paul’s 40th Tour last July,” NBC wrote. “Our thoughts are with Paul’s wife, Katherine, their children, and all of those in the cycling community who became Paul Sherwen fans over his many years calling the sport he loved.”

Members of the cycling community, including his longtime broadcasting partner, were blindsided by the news of Sherwen’s sudden death.

“I went to bed in Africa with a heavy heart last night feeling sadness like never before,” Liggett wrote on Twitter. “My team mate for 33 years was no longer with me. Your hundreds of messages showed how well @PaulSherwen was loved.”

British Cycling also noted the loss of the former national champion in a tweet, calling him “a great voice of our sport.”

Lance Armstrong, who won the Tour seven times before being stripped of his championships amid a major doping scandal, wrote about meeting Sherwen in 1992, when he worked as a press officer for Team Motorola. “He was always a class act and a great friend,” Armstrong said.

“The soundtrack to our July and our sport has been silenced,” Australia’s Cycling Central wrote on Twitter. “We are too gutted for words right now.”

Sherwen was born in Lancashire in the U.K. and raised in Uganda since age 7, NBC Sports reported. “He helped create Paul’s Peloton, which brought bicycles to Africa, and advocated for African wildlife as a chairman of the Ugandan Conservation Foundation and supporter of the Helping Rhinos initiative.”

The cause of Sherwen’s death is not yet known.

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A single season playing football might be all it takes to change a young athlete’s brain.

Those are the preliminary findings of research presented this week in Chicago at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America.

Researchers used special MRI methods to look at nerve bundles in the brain in a study of the brains of 26 young male football players, average age 12, before and after one season. Twenty-six more young males who didn’t play football also got MRI scans at the same time to be used as a control group.

In the youths who played football, the researchers found that nerve fibers in their corpus callosum — the band that connects the two halves of brain — changed over the season, says lead study author Jeongchul Kim, a research associate in the Radiology Informatics and Imaging Laboratory at Wake Forest School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C.

“We applied here two different imaging approaches,” he says. One analyzed the shape of the nerve fibers and the other focused on the integrity of the nerves.

Kim says the researchers found some nerve bundles grew longer and other bundles became shorter, or contracted, after the players’ initial MRI scans at the beginning of the season. He says they saw no changes in the integrity of the bundles.

The team says these results suggest that repeated blows to the head could lead to changes in the shape of the corpus callosum, which is critical to integrating cognitive, motor and sensory functions between the two hemispheres of the brain, during a critical time for brain development in young people.

The researchers say their ultimate goal is to help inform guidelines for safer football play for youths.

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A series of MRI images shows the signs of strain in nerve fibers following a season of football.

Courtesy of Wake Forest School of Medicine

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Courtesy of Wake Forest School of Medicine

Since the discovery of the degenerative brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy in the early 2000s, most of the research into the consequences of repeated head injuries during sports has been on adult athletes. This focus has occurred despite growing concerns that young athletes who experience the same kinds of collisions may also be vulnerable to their effects.

Radiologist Christopher Whitlow, a co-author of the new findings, says while the stories about NFL and collegiate players are very important, they have to be put into context.

“You have to understand that the NFL players were also most likely once collegiate players, they were also high school players and they were also probably youth players,” he says. “To us, it’s more than a question about concussions, it’s a question about long-term cumulative exposure.”

That being said, both Whitlow and Kim caution against making their findings out to be more than what they are: preliminary results from a single study with a relatively small number of participants.

“We don’t know what it means,” says Whitlow. “The natural next question is, do these changes persist over time? Do they accumulate with multiple seasons? And then No. 3, probably the most important: Do they have any relevance to long-term health?”

The results, presented at a medical meeting, haven’t been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Whitlow says that the team is working on a paper to be submitted to a journal.

These latest findings are actually part of a years-long research collaboration among University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Wake Forest University and Children’s National Health System in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Gerard Gioia is a pediatric neuropsychologist at Children’s National Health whose role in the larger study is to look at the functional outcomes of kids playing football. He says these latest findings are only a part of the piece of the puzzle they’re trying to solve.

“Everybody wants to know, ‘Should my kid play football? Should my kid play soccer? Should my kid play ice hockey?’ And we say, ‘Can we please study this and understand it?’ ” says Gioia, who has been pushing for funding for more long-term studies into youth and sports.

For now, he says, they still have a lot of unanswered questions.

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It came down to a series of rapid tie-break games, but defending world chess champion Magnus Carlsen has emerged victorious once again.

Carlsen, a 27-year-old Norwegian, has held the title since 2013. He defeated Fabiano Caruana, who would have been the first U.S. citizen to win the world title since Bobby Fischer in 1972.

The two appeared evenly matched in the 12 games they played over three weeks before Wednesday’s climax. Each of those 12 games resulted in a draw, making it the first time in the tournament’s history that no player won a game during regular play.

But Carlsen dominated the board at Wednesday’s matches in London, decisively winning three games in a row to clinch the title.

“After a generally close-fought 12 games of classical, today just felt like slaughter,” commented grandmaster Peter Svidler in a chess24 livestream of the match.

“This was a hard fought match to the end, and I want to congratulate Magnus on defending his title,” said Caruana. “I was up against one of the most talented players in the history of chess, and I gave it everything I had.”

The previous 12 games had been much slower-paced – they could take more than five hours to complete. In the tie-break rounds, the pace sped up a lot.

Carlsen won the best of four tie-break series in three straight games. These started with 25 minutes on each player’s clock, and 10 additional seconds after each move.

If the pair had been tied after those four games, it would have proceeded to additional rounds of even faster games.

Here’s an animation of the final game from FiveThirtyEight’s Oliver Roeder (Carlsen played white):

Carlsen was seen to have an advantage in the tie-break games because he is higher ranked than Caruana at faster play.

But on Monday, he made a decision that caused some chess experts to question whether he was losing his fighting spirit. Even though he was in a more favorable position in game 12, he suddenly offered Caruana a draw, which he accepted.

“In light of this shocking draw offer from Magnus in a superior position with more time, I reconsider my evaluation of him being the favorite in rapids,” legendary chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov wrote on Twitter. “Tiebreaks require tremendous nerves and he seems to be losing his.”

It appears that Carlsen kept a grip on his nerves for Wednesday’s games.

The Guardian quotes grandmaster Judit Polgár from the commentary booth: “What a match. What a player. What a drama.”

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The World Chess Championship is heading toward a dramatic conclusion on Wednesday, which could give the U.S. its first champion since Bobby Fischer took the crown in 1972.

The players will embark on a series of fast-moving tiebreaks at the event in London, which will get faster and faster if they continue to draw.

Fabiano Caruana, the 26-year-old Italian-American prodigy who grew up in Brooklyn, is definitely the underdog. For 12 games so far, he has taken on the current world chess champion, Magnus Carlsen. And each game has ended in a draw.

“I’ve had mediocre years, I’ve had good years,” Caruana said in a recent interview with The New York Times. “This year has been the best by far.”

According to the organizer World Chess, it’s the first championship match where nobody has won a game through the first 12 games of regular play.

Carlsen, who is 27 and from Norway, has been on top of the game for much of his adult life. He’s held the world champion title since 2013.

But some observers think he may be losing his edge. “He’s a shadow of himself, of his best times,” chess grandmaster Judit Polgár tells NPR’s Here & Now.

Carlsen raised eyebrows at a crucial moment in Game 12, when he appeared to be in a stronger position, yet suddenly offered to leave the game as a draw.

“For whatever reason, he chose not to invest the energy and, instead, proposed a draw after 31 moves, which Caruana accepted,” according to a write-up from World Chess.

That decision was baffling to legendary chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.

“In light of this shocking draw offer from Magnus in a superior position with more time, I reconsider my evaluation of him being the favorite in rapids,” Kasparov wrote on Twitter. “Tiebreaks require tremendous nerves and he seems to be losing his.”

At the same time, World Chess pointed out that even though computer calculations say Carlsen was more likely to win when he offered the draw, “the position was complicated and it was clear that it would take a lot of maneuvering, and many hours, if Carlsen hoped to break through.”

“I wasn’t in a mood to find the punch,” Carlsen said after the game, according to FiveThirtyEight.

Polgár said Carlsen has previously been known for avoiding draws. She says the two players are very evenly matched. “I think he lost the appetite of winning, or it is not so much important for him to win again, somehow he cannot motivate himself so much as he could before,” she said.

These past 12 games have been played according to time regulations that mean each game can take hours. The players have 100 minutes each for the first 40 moves, with even more time added after that.

But on Wednesday, the pace of the game is going to speed up – a lot. The challenge of the tie-breaks is that play happens in smaller and smaller amounts of time.

The faster play is expected to work in Carlsen’s favor. He’s higher-ranked in styles of chess with tighter time regulations.

The first four tie-breaker games start with 25 minutes each on the clock, and 10 additional seconds after each move.

After those four games, if the scores are still tied, it moves to even faster rounds called “blitz games.”

First, the players play two games with five minutes each plus three seconds after each move. If they’re still tied, they’ll play another two games, and this could continue up to 10 games total.

And if it’s still even after the end of the blitz games, they’ll go to a round referred to as “Armageddon.”

The player who has white pieces gets five minutes on his clock, one more minute than the player who has black. But, should the game end in a draw, the player with black pieces is automatically the winner.

And unless the referee decides otherwise, according to the rules, the players will have just 10 minutes between each of these tie-break games.

Besides the coveted title of world champion, there’s a lot of money on the line. The players are duking it out for a prize fund of 1 million euros ($1.1 million). If it had been decided in regular games the winner would get 60 percent and the loser 40 percent — now, because it has gone to tie-break games, the winner will get 55 percent and the loser 45 percent.

It’s worth noting that it’s highly unlikely that the matches will actually get to the epic conclusion of a sudden death round.

In fact, according to calculations by FiveThirtyEight, there’s a 0.02 percent chance this World Chess Championship will end in Armageddon.

We’ll just have to watch to find out. Games kick off Wednesday at 10 a.m. ET.

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The former president of Michigan State University was arraigned Monday on felony and misdemeanor charges surrounding her involvement with the school’s handling of serial sexual predator, Larry Nassar. Attorneys for Lou Anna K. Simon say pleaded not guilty, and plans to fight the charges. Officials say Simon lied to or mislead law enforcement officers about her knowledge of details about a Title IX investigation by the school into Nassar.

Nassar is the former Michigan State University sports doctor who sexually assaulted his patients for decades, many of them young girls. Nassar is currently serving a de facto life sentence in prison.

Simon was president of Michigan State from 2005 until January of 2018. She stepped down amidst mounting criticism over how the university handled Nassar.

After the proceedings, Simon was sent to the county jail to be fingerprinted. Her attorney, Lee Silver said, “Dr. Simon is about as far from a criminal as anybody that I could think of and it’s ridiculous that she is being treated like a common criminal.”

Simon faces two felonies and two misdemeanor charges. The felonies each carry a maximum penalty of up to four years in prison and/or $5,000 in fines. The misdemeanors carry up to two years in prison each and/or fines.

For years, Simon has said she didn’t know about any reports against Nassar until 2016, the year the IndyStar published an investigation into USA Gymnastics’s handling of sexual abuse complaints, and Rachael Denhollander, one of the first survivors to publicly come forward against Nassar, filed a complaint with Michigan State University Police accusing Nassar of sexual assault when she was a teenager.

The charges Simon faces stem from a 2014 internal investigation into Nassar after Amanda Thomashow reported Nassar for sexual misconduct to the Michigan State Sports Medicine Clinic director.

According to court documents, Simon met with law enforcement officials in May during their ongoing investigation into who knew what and when at Michigan State about Nassar. Simon told investigators that she was aware there was a “sports medicine doc” who was the subject of a review in 2014, but she didn’t know the doctor or what the complaint was about until 2016.

Officials say they have written documents to show that Simon knew Nassar was the subject of a sexual assault complaint.

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Lou Anna Simon, former president of Michigan State University, testifies during a Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee hearing in June.

Mark Wilson/Getty Images

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Mark Wilson/Getty Images

When asked about the evidence mentioned in court documents, Simon’s attorney Mayer Morganroth said, “Look we’re not going to get into the evidence because the evidence is false, ridiculous and would even be stupid for any of you to even consider it. You’ll find out.”

The former Michigan State University president is the third person charged during the state Attorney General’s Office’s investigation into the university’s handling of Nassar. Former dean of osteopathic medicine, and Nassar’s former boss, William Strampel is awaiting trial on various charges for failing to properly oversee Nassar and using his position as a dean to try and get sexual favors from students.

A former Michigan State coach also faces a criminal trial for allegedly lying to law enforcement. Two women testified during a court proceeding in September that when they were teens they told Kathie Klages that Nassar digitally penetrated them during treatment. But Klages told law enforcement – while it was conducting an investigation – that she didn’t recall those conversations.

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Dozens of people have been hospitalized after a charter bus transporting members of the University of Washington marching band rolled on a Washington interstate Thursday, according to Washington State Patrol.

Trooper John Bryant said “40-45 plus” people were transported to hospitals but that none of the injuries were serious. He said there were 56 people total on the bus.

“The injuries reported were cuts, complaints of general pain and back pain, but the injuries are not believed to be critical,” UW spokesperson Victor Balta said in a statement. “The University is doing everything it can to ensure the health and safety of our students and staff, and to get them back on their journey to Pullman.”

The Husky Marching Band was headed to Eastern Washington to perform at Friday’s Apple Cup football game between Washington and Washington State.

According to Bryant, the bus rolled at about 5:30 p.m. local time and was one of six carrying UW band members.

It wasn’t immediately clear why the bus rolled over, though Bryant warned incoming media members to drive carefully because the road was icy. He shared photos from the scene of the overturned bus, with the bumper partially ripped off and misshapen front window frames.

Bryant initially said 20 to 25 band members were transported to hospitals, but raised that number about two hours later.

The band members who were uninjured regrouped at an elementary school in the small town of George, Wash., where they received a warm welcome from the local community. One member of the band group said in a post on Twitter, “families left their thanksgiving dinners to bring us leftovers and hot food.”

The people in George rallying to help the band even included fans of their rivals from Washington State University, according to a tweet from UW Cheer.

The band has not officially said whether they plan to perform at the Friday evening game. But if they do, the opposing WSU Marching Band is asking their own fans to give the band a warm welcome.

“If the wonderful @huskyband is able to come down tomorrow after tonight’s accident, DO NOT boo those kids,” WSU Marching Band said in a tweet. “Applaud their efforts and sacrifice to be here supporting their team and university.”

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