GOLF

Tiger Woods withdrew Monday from the Arnold Palmer Invitational with what he described as a neck strain.

Woods announced his decision on Twitter, saying his lower back is fine and he has no concerns over the long run. Woods said he’s had the neck strain for a few weeks and it hasn’t improved with treatment to the point he can play.

This is the first time the 43-year-old Woods has withdrawn from a tournament in two years, shortly before his fourth back surgery to fuse his lower spine.

CYCLING

DOPING ADMITTED: The professional cycling team Groupama-FDJ said Austrian rider Georg Preidler admitted to blood doping related to a case that began with the arrests of five skiers.

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The team said Preidler offered “his immediate and spontaneous resignation, justified by his inexcusable involvement” in the doping case. He allegedly had undergone “blood collection” procedures twice last year.

SLED DOG RACING

IDITAROD: A Frenchman who saw the Iditarod slip from his grasp when he got lost in a blizzard last year is again leading the world’s most famous sled dog race.

Nicolas Petit was the first Imusher to arrive in Rainy Pass, a community of two people.

IRVING WOODLANDS CAN-AM: A Canadian musher won Maine’s biggest dog sled race for the 10th time. Martin Massicotte of St. Tite, Quebec, crossed the finish line in Fort Kent of the 250-mile race at 7:02 a.m. Monday, about 29 minutes ahead of Andre Longchamps of Pont Rouge, Quebec. Third was Katherine Langlais of Glenwood, New Brunswick. The wilderness course takes mushers from Fort Kent to Portage Lake, then to Allagash before Fort Kent.

BASKETBALL

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WNBA: The Indiana Fever hired a former White House adviser, Allison Barber, as its new president and chief operating officer, and promoted a former star, Tamika Catchings, to vice president of basketball operations.

SOCCER

WOMEN’S WORLD CUP: South Korea’s soccer leadership said it has sent a proposal to North Korea to jointly bid for the 2023 event and is awaiting a response.

Bidding for the FIFA showpiece could be a significant move toward building peace on the Korean Peninsula, which remains technically at war because the 1950-53 conflict ended in an armistice, not a treaty.

2022 WORLD CUP: Qualifying games will begin in Asia in June, though political tensions between Qatar and its neighbors means FIFA’s push to expand the tournament from 32 to 48 teams remains uncertain.

– News service report


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