Archive July 1, 2025

Blair Kinghorn tapped the keycard on his hotel room door at just before midnight on Monday, the long journey from Paris to Dubai to Brisbane now complete, his bed beckoning.

He flicked on the light, threw the bags on the floor and made himself at home. At which point, Maro Itoje popped his head up to say hello.

“I was thinking ‘surely there won’t be anyone in the room’. I was like, ‘Oh sorry! You were asleep, weren’t you?’ It was funny. He woke up, shook my hand and then went straight back to sleep.”

He may have landed a little too unceremoniously for his captain’s liking, but the last and one of the most decorated Lions is here now.

It’s been quite a season and a half at Toulouse since Kinghorn’s move from Edinburgh at the end of 2023. A Champions Cup win over Leinster in 2024 after extra time. He played full-back, kicked four penalties in a narrow win and was on the field for the full 100 minutes.

Next, the Top 14 semi-final and final. Played left wing in both, scored a try in both and made it two trophies in one month and three days, two more than he managed in his previous eight seasons with Edinburgh.

This was fantasy stuff. The thing about dreams is that you normally wake up. Kinghorn is still in that happy place having won another Top 14 title last weekend, again on the wing, again after extra time, again with a 100-minute contribution.

Social media carried a shot of him in the mixed zone at the Stade de France, standing around chatting in his Toulouse-branded underpants, as you do.

After the final the champions got back to their hotel in Paris at 3am Sunday morning, partied, and then Kinghorn headed for the airport. How much sleep did he get? “Confidential,” he said, with a smile that told you nothing and yet told you everything.

You’d have expected him to fetch-up for a chat in Brisbane looking a little ropey, but adrenaline was getting him through. These are the best of days for the Scot. At every turn, there’s a new adventure.

“It’s been a massive focus on winning the Top 14 with Toulouse,” he said, at the side of the pitch at the Lions training base in east Brisbane.

Kinghorn’s fantastic versatility is part of why he’s here. Full-back is, in his own words, his favourite position, and it’s where he plays his Test rugby. He’s played five of his last six games for Toulouse on the left wing and he’s also played right wing. He scored a try for Scotland against the Wallabies while playing 10.

“I’ve played the majority of my rugby at full-back, so I still say that’s probably my best position,” the 28-year-old says. “At club level, it’s different. We have positions, but we don’t really have positions. Everything’s interchangeable, it’s not structured, so you’re floating around. Winger’s the same as a full-back in most instances.”

On the night the Lions were playing the Pumas in Dublin, Kinghorn was playing Bayonne in the Top 14 semi-final in Lyon. When the Lions were going up against Western Force in Perth, Kinghorn was running out in front of French president Emmanuel Macron and 80,000 others in Paris for the domestic final against European champions Bordeaux. It turned out to be an all-time classic.

He continues: “I was so focused on finishing the season well with Toulouse that I hadn’t many thoughts about [the Lions]. I tried to keep them at the back of my head just because I wanted to stay in the moment. Now I can turn my full attention to this and it’s really exciting.

Did Andy Farrell or any of the Lions coaches keep him up to speed with what was going on in their camp? “No, I think all the coaches understand how intense it is to be in the knockout stages of your league competition. They all know that overloading information is not going to help anyone.

“The next couple of days will be head-in-the-book days for me, I just need to learn everything and catch up with where the boys are at. Hopefully I’ll catch on pretty quickly. All I can do is learn as fast as I can and show what I can do if I get the chance to play.”

He’s got some ground to make up, for sure. Elliot Daly is the early Lions pace-setter at full-back and Hugo Keenan has a big opportunity against the Queensland Reds on Wednesday. Best-case scenario is that Kinghorn starts against the Waratahs on Saturday. That’s game three in Australia. There are only two more after that before we get to the Test series.

Toulouse has been the most extraordinary move for him. Everything is different there, he says. “The squad is so deep and so talented that you’ve got to be on top of your game. You’ve got to come into training every day and work hard. Coaches are on your back the whole time, which is great. It’s high pressure, but it makes you thrive.

“Having great players and great coaches around you does make you a better player. The way that Toulouse see the game is similar to the way I like to play, so it’s matched up nicely there. Competition for places, consistency of training, high pressure.”

Back in April, Kinghorn picked up a knee injury and missed two months of the season, a blessing in disguise in a sense. “I was injured for eight weeks. It’s never fun, but it freshened the brain up a little bit.”

Summer tour first Test: Japan v Wales

Venue: Mikuni World Stadium, Kitakyushu Date: Saturday, 5 July Kick-off: 06:00 BST

Back row Aaron Wainwright says Welsh fans deserve to see the side end their losing run by winning both Tests in Japan this month.

Wales are on a record 17-Test losing sequence that stretches back to October 2023.

Matt Sherratt’s side take on Eddie Jones’ Japan on the back of a second successive Six Nations clean sweep of defeats.

The dismal run has seen Wales slump down the world rankings to 12th, only one place above Japan.

The tourists face the Brave Blossoms in Kitakyushu on Saturday, 5 July before the series concludes in Kobe a week later.

“It’s massive,” said Wainwright.

“The Welsh public deserve it. All the Welsh fans that are going to be out here and back home deserve it.

“Our minds are fully set on bringing home not just one, but two wins from this tour.

Wainwright is also hoping to gain an elusive victory after a barren season with club and country.

The 27,year-old has played 13 games for Dragons and a further seven internationals for Wales during the 2024-25 season.

There has been just one victory in those 20 matches which came for Dragons against Newcastle in Europe’s Challenge Cup in January.

“Going so long without a win, being able to put an end to that this weekend is something that we’re all aiming for,” said Wainwright.

“As a collective, we’re hoping that’s the outcome. “

British Grand Prix

Venue: Silverstone Dates: 4-6 July Race start: 15:00 BST on Sunday

Lando Norris led home team-mate Oscar Piastri in a fourth McLaren one-two this season, after a race-long battle in Austria.

Formula 1 now heads to the UK for round 12 at the British Grand Prix this weekend.

Is it conceivable that Mercedes could ditch George Russell in favour of Max Verstappen for 2026? Irrespective of Max’s pedigree as a multiple world champion, bringing him in to replace George would be incredibly harsh on a driver who has performed pretty much flawlessly so far this year. – Ieuan

Yes, it’s conceivable. We have summed up the situation with Mercedes in an earlier piece.

It was already well known that Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff was likely to explore his options with Verstappen this summer – as he did last year. And it was Russell who broke this situation out into the open before the Austrian Grand Prix, by saying it was “only normal that conversations with the likes of Verstappen are ongoing”.

Russell has driven an exceptional season so far. But Verstappen is regarded as the best driver in the world. Wolff is talking to him and his management to work out whether a deal is do-able and desired by both parties.

If the answer to that is yes, Wolff then has to decide who would be Verstappen’s team-mate. It would likely be Kimi Antonelli, in the interests of creating the best balanced team.

Relations between Verstappen and Russell are tense, and it’s hard to imagine them working as team-mates.

Yes, that would be harsh on Russell – just as it was harsh on Carlos Sainz when Ferrari decided they preferred to sign Lewis Hamilton for 2025. But it would also be understandable from Mercedes’ point of view.

As for Red Bull, team principal Christian Horner has emphasised that Verstappen has a contract until 2028.

“The rest,” as Horner put it, “is all noise that’s not coming from him. “

Will Lewis Hamilton have any authority to change the engineering structure around him at Ferrari? It seems like he’s overruled strategically in almost every race, and very rarely (in his eyes at least) for the better. – Alex

This is a topic that keeps coming up a lot with regard to Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari – the perceived tension between him and his engineer Riccardo Adami on the radio.

But whenever Hamilton is asked about it, he dismisses it.

In Spain last month, Hamilton said: “Our relationship is great, no problems. We’re constantly learning more and more about each other. We’re constantly adapting to the way both of us like to work.

“He’s worked with lots of different drivers before. We don’t have any problems whatsoever. “

Of course, you would expect him to say that, but it is also what is being said by Ferrari, and by insiders behind the scenes.

Team principal Frederic Vasseur characterises what is sometimes broadcast from the team radio as the standard to and fro between driver and engineer.

And Hamilton feels his messages are regarded differently from those of other drivers – he has pointed out how stroppy Max Verstappen sounds from time to time with Red Bull, for example, but that people don’t react the same way to that.

As for the specific situation in Austria on Sunday and Hamilton saying he wanted to stay out longer rather than pit when he was called, deputy team principal Jerome d’Ambrosio said there was no fundamental disagreement over strategy.

“It was more a matter of setting, so staying a few more laps,” D’Ambrosio said. “It’s nothing out of the norm. What we tried to do was our optimal strategy. Try to optimise your race time. That’s what we did with both drivers.

“There was no incentive to do anything different because the McLarens were clearly far ahead and George quite far behind. So we just did the standard optimum strategy and that was the best thing to do.

Do you think Alex Dunne will get a seat in F1 next season and what potential does he have? – Ralph

Alex Dunne has certainly put himself on the radar of F1, first with his strong showing in Formula 2 in his debut season, and then with his accomplished performance in first practice in Austria at the weekend with McLaren.

Of that, team principal Andrea Stella said that the Irishman had been “very precise” when doing the data acquisition work, and on performance runs later “not short of impressive”.

Dunne, 19, ended the session just 0. 069 seconds slower than race driver Oscar Piastri, although his time was set later in the session, when the track was quicker.

The question is, what do McLaren do with him next?

If Dunne doesn’t win F2, he can stay there for another season. If he does win F2, he will have to move on. But where to?

McLaren don’t have an available seat in F1, and there are not many he could take.

Farming him out to another team is an option, but that’s always complicated because teams are not always that keen to have a driver who is on a piece of elastic to a rival.

McLaren do have other options – they have an Indycar team, for example. Dunne could possibly go there for a couple of years. But if his ultimate trajectory is F1, which it seems now it might be, that might not be considered a desirable option.

What are Cadillac’s chances of survival in F1? Especially considering they are starting from scratch rather than taking over an existing team like Audi with Sauber. – Adam

Cadillac – the luxury brand of US car giant General Motors – is entering F1 next year with a new team, in partnership with the US investment group TWG.

They have set up a team from scratch and will use a Ferrari customer engine until a bespoke GM engine is ready. GM has been accepted by the FIA as a power-unit supplier from 2029.

The media was given a tour of the Cadillac factory site at Silverstone last week by team principal Graeme Lowdon.

He said: “You will not see this team over-promising in any way. But we do want to convey the fact that the ambitions are really limitless, as they should be. “

Lowdon, who previously worked in F1 with Manor/Marussia, said the team were realistic about what they can achieve next year.

He said: “Can you imagine if you’ve owned a Formula 1 team for 10 years and then another team rocks up and beats you? You would be apoplectic. You would be so annoyed.

“And so you have to assume that any new team coming in is going to be last, otherwise, you know, what’s gone wrong somewhere else? We know how difficult it is. “

The team is currently spread over six units at Silverstone. This will be rationalised down to four, in addition to the main new TWG base being constructed in Fishers, Indianapolis, and due to be finished next year, and the GM engine plant in Charlotte, North Carolina.

To deal with this disparate set-up, Lowdon says they have developed a “very flat management structure, highly modelled on the Apollo project. We’re not putting a man on the moon, but it feels like it sometimes. “

He added: “Race teams are often described in military terms, organised in a kind of pyramid and you have one person at the top. And the typical military structure is command and control. So you issue commands, people do things.

“When it’s multi-site like this, that becomes a massive challenge. So instead, it’s a different structure where it’s mission control instead of command and control.

“Engineers are able to talk directly to each other. And the thing that’s heavily imparted on them is the mission itself. “

TWG and GM are massive companies and say they are in it for the long haul. Survival is not really the question. It’s how successful they can be and in what timeframe that is more the unknown.

Nearly three decades after the moment that ended her cycling career and changed her life forever, every day is a gift for Sarah Rowe.

The Scot’s story may not be one with which a lot of people are familiar, but it is a powerful tale of happiness, heartbreak and return to happiness that deserves to be told again.

In the mid-1990s, Sarah [then Phillips] very much had the cycling world at her feet.

Aged 29, she competed at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, finishing 19th in the women’s individual road race and 21st in the individual time trial.

“The next event would have been the Commonwealth Games two years later, two years before the Olympics again, so the aim would have been to do the Commonwealths and plan for the next Olympics. “

However, there would be no other major championship outing, or any other race for Sarah.

Less than a year after hitting the heights in Atlanta, during a training run on her bike near Stonehaven in Aberdeenshire, she was hit by car “from behind at great speed and smashed up my lower leg”.

She admits: “I am incredibly lucky to be here, I know that. Somebody was looking down on me that day.

“If it had been an inch further over, I wouldn’t be here. I honestly don’t know how I survived it. “

Rowe says “deep down, I knew how bad the injury was” as she embarked on a gruelling recovery journey during which she was unable to walk for a year and endured “10 or 12 operations”.

“It was very difficult,” she says. “I was living with my parents at the time because I couldn’t do a lot for myself.

“My parents were very supportive, I swam in the outdoor pool in Stonehaven every day, I rode on a turbo trainer with a piece of skirting board as a pedal, all sorts of innovations I could.

“I just took it in my stride. It was a new challenge ahead and I took each day of physio and each day of learning to walk again – that was my goal. “

Having gone from the highest of highs, to the lowest of lows, did Rowe believe her cycling career was finished, or did she think she could complete a remarkable comeback by competing once again?

“I always hoped I would ride again,” she states. “I worked hard to ride again – I rode again, I never raced again.

“The Olympics was the last race I ever did. I was never able to get back to training because of the limitations in the movement of the ankle.

“I tell people now, ‘enjoy it while you are doing it because you never know what is round the corner’. I didn’t dwell on it – I just moved on.

Now 57, Rowe, who subsequently got involved with cycling coaching, still feels the effects of the injury in terms of her mobility.

Keen to accentuate the positive, she says: “I can do things in adapted form and I just thank my lucky stars I am here. “

While Sarah may have been lost to the sport, in a competitive sense at least, far too early, her two children are showing plenty of signs that they, like their mum, could be heading to the top.

Her son, Elliot, 19, has been signed by cycling giants Team Visma Lease a Bike, as part of their development team, and won a bronze medal in June’s British under-23 individual time trial.

Her daughter, Melanie, 16, recently finished first in the under-17s race in the prestigious Tour of Flanders event.

“I have to say my heart is in my mouth every time they go out on the roads, but that is part of life and they just have to get on and enjoy it and be careful and be safe as best they can,” Rowe says.

“It is lovely seeing what they are doing because I can relate to it. I just love to see them enjoying the journey – it is such a special thing what the bike can give you. “

Elliot and Melanie were not born when their mum was competing at Olympic level.

However, her knowledge and experience is clearly a huge help as they aim to make their own way in the sport, with Elliot suggesting: “My mum is really modest.

“She never bigs it up too much, but we get little stories here and there, which is pretty cool, because it is just a reminder that it did happen and it is something that you will always remember and something that me and my sister would both want to work towards in the future. “

Melanie adds: “I find it really helpful because she always knows exactly how I feel about everything because she has done it before. “