Davis Cup Finals: Italy beat Spain to win historic third successive title - BBC Sport

Davis Cup Finals: Italy beat Spain to win historic third successive title - BBC Sport

'Brotherhood' inspires Italy to third Davis Cup title

Image source,Getty Images

Image caption,

Flavio Cobolli won the the sixth-longest tie-break in Davis Cup history to beat Belgium's Zizou Bergs on Friday

ByHarry Poole

BBC Sport journalist

Published
23 November 2025

"At the end, I looked at my bench and found something in my heart."

For Flavio Cobolli, the faces cheering for him from the sidelines provided the extra impetus he needed as he fought to realise his dream of becoming a world champion.

The 23-year-old secured a historic third successive Davis Cup title for Italy by battling back from a set and a break down against Spain's Jaume Munar to seal a 2-0 triumph in front of an jubilant home crowd in Bologna.

Cobolli's gritty 1-6 7-6 (7-5) 7-5 victory, achieved two days after he confirmed Italy's place in Sunday's showpiece by winning an epic 32-point tie-break, followed Matteo Berrettini's 6-3 6-4 win over Pablo Carreno Busta.

It was an Italian double act long in the making.

Berrettini worked with Cobolli's father, former player Stefano, as a youngster. He would often be called upon to babysit Cobolli - six years his junior - and kept him occupied by playing tennis with him.

A video shared on social media by Italian outlet Spazio Tennis, external shows Berrettini towering above Cobolli as they walk off a tennis court after practising together in 2011.

Fourteen years later, Cobolli and the team-mate he describes as being "like a brother" to me were walking off the court in Italy as Davis Cup champions, having gone unbeaten in singles in the tournament.

"It's impossible to describe this feeling. I dreamed a lot for this night," Cobolli said.

"We cannot lose for our country. Sometimes you learn, but you never lose.

"I don't know what I did today. I don't know where I am. The only thing I know is that I am a world champion."

How 'brotherhood' inspired Italy to victory

It was a fourth Davis Cup title overall for Italy, who are the first nation to win three straight titles since defending champions stopped receiving automatic qualification to the final 53 years ago.

Both Italy and Spain reached the final despite missing key players. Spain were without the injured world number one Carlos Alcaraz, while second-ranked Jannik Sinner and 10th-ranked Lorenzo Musetti were missing for Italy.

But Cobolli and Berrettini owned their moments in the spotlight with three wins from three singles matches apiece.

The vast majority of the sell-out, 10,000-strong crowd chanted Cobolli's name as he kept his composure to serve out his comeback victory to love, having forced the breakthrough in the 11th game of a tense deciding set.

That was no mean feat, given the emotional and physical fatigue from his heroics in the semi-finals two days earlier.

World number 22 Cobolli paid the price for a slow start as he conceded a one-sided opening set.

But he launched a necessary, immediate response after falling a break down at the start of the second, before once again delivering in a crucial tie-break and then finding the inspiration to complete his memorable win.

"We tried to recreate the spirit of the Italy team that won the [football] World Cup in 2006," Cobolli said.

"Our brilliant fans are also part of this team. I've been repeating for three days but it's the best day of my life."

Image source,Getty Images

Image caption,

Italy are the first nation to win three straight Davis Cup titles since the United States in 1972

Berrettini, who had earlier taken his Davis Cup singles winning streak to 11 matches with an excellent performance against Carreno Busta, has been there for Cobolli ever since they first met when he was 14 and Flavio eight.

When Cobolli was struggling for form earlier this season, Berrettini advised him against entering the lower-tier challenger tournaments and instead return to a training block to rediscover his form.

"I just told him, 'Don't you worry, child'," Berrettini said in an interview with the International Tennis Federation.

Cobolli then won his next ATP tournament in Hamburg.

"It's actually crazy that we're in the same team now. It gives me chills to think about this relationship over the years," said Berrettini.

Berrettini lost his voice cheering Cobolli on during Friday's dramatic semi-final against Belgium, and backed his childhood friend all the way on Sunday after getting the team off to a winning start.

"All the guys of the team are special for me," Cobolli added.

"But Matteo is special for me because he's like a brother. He's very important for me.

"He helped me a lot during the match, like the brotherhood."

Image source,Getty Images

A giant leap for Canada: B.C. town honours ski jumping pioneer | Oak Bay News

A giant leap for Canada: B.C. town honours ski jumping pioneer | Oak Bay News

A giant leap for Canada: B.C. town honours ski jumping pioneer Published 6:20 am Wednesday, October 29, 2025  By Evert Lindquist   Ski jumper Bob Lynburne takes a leap in Revelstoke during 1933. (Revelstoke Museum and Archives)  Revelstoke’s newest road has opened an avenue for recognizing one of the town’s most celebrated, world-class ski jumpers.  City council voted unanimously in favour on Tuesday, Oct. 28, of naming a new strata road — being forged to accommodate development and construction access in Mackenzie Village – “Lynburne Avenue.”  Robert “Bob” Lynburne was born in Fort William, Ont., near Thunder Bay. Moving to Revelstoke as a toddler, he grew up enjoying Nordic skiing but primarily became a prolific ski jumper.  Lynburne went on to represent Canada at the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, N.Y. In 1933, he set a world record on Revelstoke’s own ski jump hill with a 287-foot spring.  Today, Lynburne “carries historical and cultural significance to the town,” city staff wrote in their report to council.  “I think that is an appropriate name,” Mayor Gary Sulz said Tuesday, in approval of Lynburne Avenue.  Though a desirable choice to name a local street after a famed Revelstoke athlete, and in line with the city’s Street Naming and Addressing Policy, “there was contention whether the man’s name was Bob Lynburne or Bob Lymburne,” the report notes.  Consulting with Revelstoke Museum and Archives, as well as Lynburne’s surviving family, staff managed to confirm via a marriage certificate from 1939 that the ski jumper was officially known as Robert Samuel Lynburne.  Going forward with council’s approval, Lynburne Avenue will be built intersecting Nels Nelsen Crescent and immediately north of Coursier Avenue — quite fitting as all three names commemorate phenomenal ski jumpers in the community’s history.  As recounted by the museum, a 17-year-old Lynburne set a junior world record of 165 feet at the 1928 Revelstoke Winter Sports Carnival.  By 1932, he’d already beaten Nels Nelsen’s landmark 240-foot jump from 1925 by soaring 269 feet, setting a world record for the adult division that he would ultimately also surpass.  Unfortunately, while competing locally in 1935, Lynburne seriously injured his head and retired from ski jumping.  After transitioning to the tracks as a fireman for the Canadian Pacific Railway, Lynburne served in France during the Second World War with the No. 1 Railway Operating Company of the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers, according to the Canadian Military Engineers Association.  His cohort departed from North Bay and Stratford, Ont., for the U.K. in July 1943, repairing British railway equipment before landing in Normandy during September 1944. As the Allied forces fought through France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, Lynburne played a critical role fixing, maintaining and running railway equipment, eventually returning the lines to civilian operators safe behind the front lines.  After Germany surrendered in 1945, Lynburne returned to Revelstoke and continued working on the railway. Still suffering from his injury and exhibiting unusual behaviour, however, he wandered into the woods in 1957 and was never seen again.  Now, some 68 years later, thanks to the selection of Lynburne Avenue, his name is here to stay, nestled into Arrow Heights alongside the leaping legacies of Nels Nelsen and Isabel Coursier.

Read more at: https://oakbaynews.com/2025/10/29/a-giant-leap-for-canada-b-c-town-honours-ski-jumping-pioneer/

Prospector’s ‘Doomsday’ Mansion

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Prospector’s ‘Doomsday’ Mansion
Vernon Pick was an American millionaire who left behind a unique property in Lillooet, BC.

Tyler Olsen TodayThe Tyee

Tyler Olsen is a senior editor at The Tyee.Our journalism is supported by readers like you. Click here to support The Tyee.







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Vernon Pick struck it rich after discovering a uranium deposit in Colorado in the 1950s. The self-taught engineer and inventor later created a unique home powered by its own dam near Lillooet, BC. Photo illustration by The Tyee. Images via Newspapers.com.


“To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity, and trust. It is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically.” — Henry Thoreau, Walden

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Word gets around fast when a uranium tycoon moves to a small town and starts building his own dam to power an off-the-grid high-tech research facility.

Was Vernon Pick building a nuclear base? Or seeking his own Armageddon hideout? Surely, some thought, there was something nefarious going on at a property with a home accessible only by an electric-powered railway.

North America’s “Uranium King” has been gone from Lillooet for decades now, but his dream-fuelled canyon estate continues to energize hikers, historians — and maybe even your own home. In recent years, the legend of Vernon Pick has inspired a mini-industry of YouTube videographers, many of whom have caricaturized him as an eccentric prospector trying to hide away from a potential nuclear holocaust.

The real Pick was much more interesting. His story is one of curiosity, boredom, ambition, fear, optimism and hope. Uranium might have made Pick rich. But it was Henry David Thoreau, in part, who made him a legend.

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‘Where’s a good area to look for uranium?’

“They have got to live a man’s life, pushing all these things before them, and get on as well as they can.” — Henry Thoreau, Walden

Vernon Pick was 51 years old when he became famous. But he had already packed several lifetimes into his first half-century on this planet.A portrait of Vernon Pick from the 1950s. Photo public domain.

Born in 1903 in Wisconsin, Pick grew up in the U.S. Midwest, joined the Marines, was discharged for being of “bad” character, worked in a Manitoba mine, learned to fly airplanes and became a self-taught electrical engineer. He ran an electric company for 17 years, then a printing press. He built his wife her own loom, repaired electric motors and took all sorts of university courses, including a writing class apparently taught by Sinclair Lewis.

And he dreamed of the type of personal independence that his idol, Henry Thoreau, wrote about in Walden, his enduring memoir about self-sufficient living.

By 1940, Pick had made enough money to buy a large plot of land in Minnesota where he imagined he could create something of a self-sustaining community. Crucially, the land had its own rundown hydro dam that could power the site. Pick rebuilt the dam, fixed up one of three houses and moved in with his wife in 1946.

But five years later, the mill burned down. Pick received $13,500 in insurance money, but it wasn’t enough to rebuild. And in a sign of restlessness to come, Pick seemed ready to move on. So he and his wife bought a truck and a trailer and headed south, toward the sunnier skies of Mexico.

They got only as far as Colorado Springs, where everyone seemed to be talking about the search for uranium. Between the nuclear arms race and the growing potential for atomic energy, a resource with a previously niche set of uses was suddenly in high demand. Pick bought a book about uranium prospecting, decided Mexico could wait and instead drove to Grand Junction, Colorado, a hub of uranium refining. According to a 1954 article published in the Buffalo Evening News Magazine, Pick walked into the offices of the Atomic Energy Commission, met its mining head and asked him: “Where’s a good area to look for uranium?”

Pick was told to head west, to a remote area in nearby Utah. And it was there, instead of lounging on a beach in Mexico, that the 48-year-old Pick went exploring. He would drive into a promising area as far as possible, load a backpack with 55 pounds of gear and start hiking. Pick would carry a heavy “scintillometer,” a device that can pick up radioactive material from a hundred metres or so away.

For months, he found little of value.

“He would drag himself in, hungry and dehydrated and tired,” his wife Ruth told a reporter. “For a couple days he just ate and slept, and then he was ready to go out again.”

Having started his prospecting with around $6,000, he was down to about $300 when he walked four days into the wilderness, stopped to rest under a cottonwood tree, spotted a promising strata of rocks on a cliff face and started climbing. When he got to the site, he turned on his scintillometer and watched its needle go wild.

Elon Musk’s Grokipedia contains copied/ripped Wikipedia pages

 Elon Musk’s Grokipedia contains copied Wikipedia pages | The Verge

Elon Musk’s Grokipedia contains copied Wikipedia pages


Some of Grokipedia’s pages say that content is ‘adapted’ from Wikipedia.
by Jay Peters


Oct 27, 2025, 5:46 PM PDT


6464Comments (All New)


Image: Grokipedia

Jay Peters


is a senior reporter covering technology, gaming, and more. He joined The Verge in 2019 after nearly two years at Techmeme.


xAI’s Grokipedia, its Wikipedia-like online encyclopedia, is now live. The similarities go deeper than expected.


Grokipedia’s design is pretty basic right now; like Wikipedia, the homepage is mostly just a big search bar, and entries resemble very basic Wikipedia entries, with headings, subheadings, and citations. I haven’t seen any photos on the site yet. Wikipedia lets users edit pages, but it doesn’t appear that users can currently do that on Grokipedia; a big edit button at the top only appeared on a few pages for me, and when I clicked the button, it only showed edits that had already been completed without specifying who is actually suggested or made the changes, and I wasn’t able to suggest changes of my own.


Entries also claim that Grok has fact-checked them — a controversial idea, given how large language models tend to make up false “facts” — and how long ago the “fact check” happened.

Screenshot: Grokipedia


However, despite Elon Musk promising that Grokipedia would be a “massive improvement” over Wikipedia, some articles appear to be cribbing information from Wikipedia. At the bottom of the page for the MacBook Air, for example, you can see this message: “The content is adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.” In some cases, the cribbing goes farther than a rewrite: I’ve also seen that message on pages for the PlayStation 5 and the Lincoln Mark VIII, and both of those pages are almost identical — word-for-word, line-for-line — to their Wikipedia counterparts.


“Even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist,” Lauren Dickinson, a spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation, the non-profit that operates Wikipedia tells The Verge. You can read Dickinson’s full statement in full at the end of this article.

Image: Wikipedia (left), Grokipedia (right)

Image: Wikipedia (left), Grokipedia (right)


It’s not the first time xAI’s AI has been caught pointing to Wikipedia; last month, in response to an X user pointing out that Grok cites Wikipedia pages, Musk said that “we should have this fixed by end of year.”


Not all Grokipedia articles are based directly on Wikipedia ones, and some will be controversial.


While both sites have articles on climate change, for example, Wikipedia’s page points out that “There is a nearly unanimous scientific consensus that the climate is warming and that this is caused by human activities. No scientific body of national or international standing disagrees with this view.”


In Grokipedia’s entry, meanwhile, the word “unanimous” only appears in one paragraph: “Critics contend that claims of near-unanimous scientific consensus on anthropogenic causes dominating recent climate change overstate agreement due to selective categorization in literature reviews.” It suggests that the media and advocacy organizations like Greenpeace are “contributing to heightened public alarm,” and are part of “coordinated efforts to frame the issue as an existential imperative, influencing public discourse and policy without always grounding in proportionate empirical evidence.”


According to a ticker at the bottom of the homepage, Grokipedia has over 885,000 articles; Wikipedia currently maintains around 7 million English pages. However, this is an early version of Grokipedia — it has a v0.1 version number on the homepage.

RelatedWikipedia is under attack — and how it can survive


Here is Dickinson’s full statement:



We’re still in the process of understanding how Grokipedia works.

Since 2001, Wikipedia has been the backbone of knowledge on the internet. Hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, it remains the only top website in the world run by a nonprofit. Unlike newer projects, Wikipedia’s strengths are clear: it has transparent policies, rigorous volunteer oversight, and a strong culture of continuous improvement. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, written to inform billions of readers without promoting a particular point of view.

Wikipedia’s knowledge is – and always will be – human. Through open collaboration and consensus, people from all backgrounds build a neutral, living record of human understanding – one that reflects our diversity and collective curiosity. This human-created knowledge is what AI companies rely on to generate content; even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist.

Wikipedia’s nonprofit independence — with no ads and no data-selling — also sets it apart from for-profit alternatives. All of these strengths have kept Wikipedia a top trusted resource for more than two decades.

Many experiments to create alternative versions of Wikipedia have happened before; it doesn’t interfere with our work or mission. As we approach Wikipedia’s 25th anniversary, Wikipedia will continue focusing on providing free, trustworthy knowledge built by its dedicated volunteer community. For more information about how Wikipedia works, visit our website and new blog series.

Sao Paulo Grand Prix: Lewis Hamilton describes his first season at Ferrari as 'a nightmare' - BBC Sport

Sao Paulo Grand Prix: Lewis Hamilton describes his first season at Ferrari as 'a nightmare' - BBC Sport

Hamilton's first season at Ferrari 'a nightmare'

Image source,Getty Images

Image caption,

Lewis Hamilton is yet to finish on the podium for Ferrari

ByAlicia Turner

BBC Sport

Published
9 November 2025
611 Comments

Lewis Hamilton said his first season at Ferrari had been "a nightmare" after he retired from the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

The seven-time world champion was hit by the Williams of Carlos Sainz on the first lap, before misjudging an attempted overtake on Alpine's Franco Colapinto at the start of lap two.

That resulted in front wing damage which was quickly replaced during a pit stop, but he was left lacking pace with a damaged floor.

Hamilton was given a five-second penalty for the incident with Colapinto and eventually retired from last position on lap 39.

Briton Hamilton is yet to finish on the podium for Ferrari, although he had a dominant victory in the sprint race at the Chinese Grand Prix in March. He is sixth in the drivers' championship.

"This is a nightmare, and I have been living it for a while. The flip between the dream of driving for this amazing team and the nightmare of the results we have had, the ups and downs, it's challenging," Hamilton told Sky Sports.

Canada weighs F-35 and Gripen fleet, seeks industrial return

Canada weighs F-35 and Gripen fleet, seeks industrial return

Canada delays F-35 decision as Ottawa weighs Gripen option and industrial return

ByClement Charpentreau

October 19, 2025, 14:44 (UTC +3)

24 comments

Defense

Soos Jozsef / Shutterstock.com

Canada’s long-delayed F-35A fighter jet program is facing renewed uncertainty as Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government weighs whether to proceed with its planned fleet of 88 aircraft from Lockheed Martin or diversify toward a mixed fleet that could include Saab’s Gripen E.

The Liberal government first announced in March 2025 that it would “review” the purchase, citing heightened trade and diplomatic tensions with the United States. The move came as Canada was entering an election campaign.

Following his re-election, Carney has advocated for greater “diversification” in Ottawa’s defense and industrial partnerships. That stance was underscored by a new defense and trade cooperation framework signed with the European Union in June 2025.

Decision still pending

Canada’s F-35 saga dates back to July 2010, when then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government announced plans to buy 65 F-35As for CAD 9 billion ($6.5 billion), arguing the aircraft was essential for national defense and Arctic sovereignty.

The decision quickly drew controversy. During the 2015 election, Liberal leader Justin Trudeau vowed to cancel the sole-source deal, accusing the Conservatives of bypassing competition and committing to an “unnecessary and expensive fighter.” After taking office, Trudeau’s government confirmed it would seek alternatives.

That pledge led to the launch of the Future Fighter Capability Project (FFCP) in 2017, an open competition to replace the CF-18s. Several manufacturers initially participated, including Boeing with the F/A-18 Super Hornet, Dassault Aviation with the Rafale, and Airbus with the Eurofighter Typhoon.

Dassault withdrew in 2018, citing interoperability and security concerns linked to Canada’s participation in the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, while Airbus followed in 2019, arguing the competition’s terms favored Lockheed Martin. In 2021, Boeing’s Super Hornet bid was also disqualified for undisclosed reasons.

In 2022, the Department of National Defence selected the F-35A over Saab’s JAS 39 Gripen E/F, and Ottawa formally notified an initial order for 16 aircraft in January 2023. However, the remainder of the 88-jet fleet remains unconfirmed.

A final decision was initially expected by the end of the summer, yet Carney’s office has not announced any outcome. While the RCAF remains firmly in favor of the F-35, key cabinet figures, including Minister of Industry Mélanie Joly, have raised concerns about the contract’s economic balance.

RELATED

US warns Canada of ‘serious consequences’ if F-35 deal collapses

Military urges urgency

During a recent parliamentary hearing, Deputy Minister of National Defence Stefanie Beck defended the F-35 acquisition, arguing that fifth-generation capabilities are essential to maintain parity with adversaries.

“It is impossible to underestimate the importance of having fifth-generation aircraft because that is what our adversaries have,” Beck said, pointing to Russia’s Su-57 and China’s J-20 and J-35 fighters.

RCAF Commander General Jamie Speiser-Blanchet echoed that warning, noting that both countries field advanced aircraft and high-speed missile systems. “It is urgent to transition to a new fleet of fighters,” she said.

Economic pressures mount

Despite military backing, the F-35’s ballooning costs remain contentious. A 2024 report from the Office of the Auditor General of Canada (OAG) estimated that the total acquisition cost had increased by at least 46% since 2022, reaching CAD 27.7 billion ($20 billion).

Joly has since pressed Lockheed Martin to provide additional industrial benefits or risk seeing the order scaled down.

“Ottawa could obtain further commitments from Lockheed Martin in exchange for maintaining the 88-fighter contract,” Joly said in an interview on October 12, 2025. “Otherwise, the government could procure fewer F-35s and complement them with Gripen Es assembled in Canada.”

Joly added that her priority was ensuring taxpayers’ money “reduces dependence on the United States and creates jobs in Canada.”

Debate over a mixed fleet

The proposal to split procurement between the F-35 and Gripen faces strong resistance from defense officials. According to a study cited by Reuters in August 2025, the military warned that maintaining two fighter fleets would be “inefficient from an operational standpoint.”

Joly dismissed that view, arguing that “all G7 countries have mixed fleets” and that Canada should pursue a similar model.

“My objective is to obtain more industrial value from Lockheed Martin while continuing discussions with Saab,” Joly concluded.

Canada and Sweden signed a major aerospace and defence partnership in August 2025, with Ottawa and Stockholm pledging joint research, technology development, and industrial cooperation. The agreement emphasised Arctic security as a shared priority amid rising Russian activity and alliance realignments in the High North.