Richard Childress Racing is moving crew chief Slugger Labbe of Saco into a leadership role in its research and development department.

Labbe has been crew chief for Paul Menard since 2010. The team said Wednesday that race engineer Justin Alexander will replace Labbe as crew chief for Menard following next week’s race at Charlotte.

Menard is 20th in the Sprint Cup standings.

Labbe said in a statement he is “looking forward to slowing down” his NASCAR career and spending more time with family. His initial responsibility will be helping RCR prepare for NASCAR’s 2015 rules package.

OLYMPICS

2002 GAMES: Oslo became the latest city to drop its bid for the 2022 Winter Games after the Norwegian government rejected financial backing for the project amid concerns the games were too costly – a decision the IOC said was based on “half-truths and factual inaccuracies.”

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Oslo’s exit leaves Beijing and Almaty, Kazakhstan, as the only two contenders.

Oslo is the fourth city to pull out of a race that has been thrown into turmoil in the wake of the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, where the overall price tag was put at $51 billion, scaring off politicians and taxpayers, and leaving the International Olympic Committee with a major image crisis.

Stockholm; Krakow, Poland; and Lviv, Ukraine, also withdrew their bids in recent months.

TENNIS

JAPAN OPEN: Fourth-seeded Kei Nishikori of Japan beat Ivan Dodig of Croatia 6-3, 6-4 to advance to the second round in Tokyo.

CHINA OPEN: Top-rankedNovak Djokovic extended his winning streak at the China Open to 21 straight matches, beating Canada’s Vasek Pospisil 6-3, 7-5 in Beijing.

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SOCCER

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Ten-time champion Real Madrid trailed early against Bulgarian newcomer Ludogorets Razgrad, had a Cristiano Ronaldo penalty saved and needed substitute Karim Benzema’s 77th-minute goal to escape with a 2-1 win.

WOMEN’S WORLD CUP: American soccer star Abby Wambach and a group of elite international players filed a lawsuit in Canada challenging plans to play the 2015 Women’s World Cup on artificial turf.

The women claim that playing the sport’s premier tournament on fake grass amounts to gender discrimination under Canadian law. Their male counterparts have always played the World Cup on natural grass surfaces and will again for the foreseeable future.

The players say there is a greater risk of injury on artificial turf.

SWIMMING

MICHAEL PHELPS: Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps registered .14 percent on a blood-alcohol test after he was stopped on a speeding violation, according to charging documents released. The legal limit for intoxication in Maryland is .08.

Phelps’ trial is scheduled for Nov. 19.

– From news service reports


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