Juan Soto, a baseball player from the Dominican Republic, has reportedly signed the biggest deal in sports history.

The 26-year-old will be paid $US765 million ($AU1.2 billion) over 15 years by the New York Mets. The deal, bigger than the annual GDP of 15 countries, includes a $US75 million ($AU117 million) signing bonus.

Soto will leave the New York Yankees after having helped them to this year’s World Series, which they ultimately lost.

108
The number of runs scored by 21-year-old Georgia Voll in just her second innings for the Australian cricket team. Voll’s first international century helped Australia defeat India in the second of three One-Day Internationals, sealing the series at 2-0. Veteran Ellyse Perry also produced a signature Player of the Match performance with 105 runs off 75 balls. Chasing 372 runs, India were bowled out for 249. The third match will be played in Perth on Wednesday.

"It definitely has been the best season yet, but I don't think it's going to be the best season of my career".
Alex de Minaur after capping off his breakout season with a victory at the Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS) in London over the weekend. The UTS is an eight-player tournament that features a shortened format. Matches are played over four eight-minute quarters and players only have one chance to serve.  The 26-year-old defeated Denmark’s Holger Rune in the final of the tournament. 

The first Olympic Games were held in Olympia, Greece in 776 B.C. The Games were then held every four years for the next 12 centuries. Then, around 393 AD the Olympics were banned by Roman Emperor Theodosius I, a Christian, who perceived the Olympics as a form of paganism. It wasn’t until 1896 that the Olympics resumed. 

🏏 Australia has levelled its series with India, winning the second Test in Adelaide by 10 wickets. Travis Head was named the Player of the Match for his superb 140-run score in Australia’s first innings. The Australian bowling attack also played a crucial role in the victory, with Mitchell Starc taking six wickets in the first innings and Pat Cummins picking up a five-wicket haul in the second. With the series tied at 1-1, the sides will head to the Gabba in Brisbane for the third test on Saturday. 

⚽ The Matildas capped off their year with a resounding 6-0 victory over Taiwan. The Aussies showed the depth of their squad, as coach Tom Sermanni was forced to make four changes to the starting lineup before kickoff. In the second half, goalkeeper Chloe Lincoln and midfielder Laura Hughes both made their Matildas debuts. Notably, it was veteran Clare Polkinghorne’s final appearance. She finished her 18-year career as the most capped Matilda of all time.  The Matildas’ next appearance is the SheBelieves Cup in the U.S. in February. 

⛳ American Scottie Scheffler won the Hero World Challenge, the annual 20-man golf tournament that raises money for the Tiger Woods Foundation. Scheffler’s ninth win of the season tops an incredible year for the world number one. This year alone, the 28-year-old won the Masters, an Olympic gold, and the Players and Tour Championships. The 2025 season begins in Hawai’i on 2 January.

🏉 The Aussie women’s rugby sevens team finished fourth in the Cape Town World Series event after losing to the U.S. in the semi-final. Australia then lost to France in the bronze medal match while New Zealand defeated the U.S. in the gold medal match. After winning the World Series event in Dubai last week, Australia now sit in second behind New Zealand on the overall standings. Australia’s men finished eighth overall.  

Lando Norris won the Abu Dhabi GP overnight, claiming the Constructors’ Championship for McLaren for the first time since 1998.

Norris held off Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc, who finished second and third respectively, to win by over five seconds in Abu Dhabi. Leclerc was particularly impressive, starting in P19 and finishing third.

Oscar Piastri’s hopes of ending the season on a high were dashed when world champion Max Verstappen collided with him on the opening lap of the race. Piastri finished the race in 10th while Verstappen, who was handed a 10-second penalty, finished in sixth.

Australian F1 driver Jack Doohan finished 15th in his first race. Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton finished fourth after starting in P16 for his final race with Mercedes. The Brit will join Ferrari next season.

Piastri told Sky Sports: "It was a pretty miserable race for myself. [Verstappen] came and apologised straight away and the stewards deemed it was a penalty, so, we go again next year."

Norris said: “To end the season like this is perfect, so just a congrats and big thank you to everyone in McLaren… For us to win a Constructors’ after 26 years is pretty special.”

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16-year-old Australian sprinter Gout Gout ran his way into history over the weekend, breaking the Australian record for the 200m set by Peter Norman at the 1968 Olympics.

At the All School Championships over the weekend Gout produced several impressive performances. The most notable was his time of 20.04 in the 200m. The run elevated him past Usain Bolt (20.13) as the fastest 16-year-old over the distance in history. It was also the second-fastest under-18 200m ever recorded. Gout surpassed the Australian record of 20.04 set by Peter Norman when he won a silver medal at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. The record had been Australia’s longest-standing athletics record at 56 years.

In the 100m on Friday, Gout ran 10.04. It is the fifth fastest 100m run by an Australian in any conditions. However, because of a 3.4 metre per second tailwind, the time will not be counted as an official record. In the final later in the weekend, Gout ran 10.17 to set the Australian u18 record.

Gout is a student at Ipswich Grammar School in Brisbane and still has Year 12 to complete next year. He is coached by Diane Sheppard, who has coached at the school since 2003.

After winning silver in the 200m at the u20 World Championships earlier this year, Gout signed a sponsorship deal with Adidas in October. He is headed to the U.S. in January with Sheppard to join Olympic champion Noah Lyles on a training camp.

Former Australian sprint star John Steffensen has warned of the dangers of making the leap from junior competition to senior ranks too soon.

He told CODE Sports: “What I would like to see with him is he gets wrapped up in cotton wool and doesn’t get exposed to senior running any time soon, I’m not knocking the kid because he is a beast but people forget that Usain had a tough few years post world juniors.”

Gout Gout’s father Bona told Channel 7 on the weekend that his name is actually Guot Guot (pronounced Gwot). The name was misspelled by immigration officials when his parents fled to Egypt before they settled in Brisbane.

He said: “His name is Guot… I don’t want my son to be called a disease name... it’s something that’s not acceptable.”

Usain Bolt said on social media: “He looks like young me”.

Gout said: "I've been chasing that record, but I didn't think it would come this year. I thought it'd come maybe next year".

ICYMI: TDA Sport has a new game on Instagram called Blurdle. IYKYK.
Today’s answer: Ellyse Perry
Useless clue: Has played in two kinds of World Cup (actually kind of useful)

How well do we understand the impact of heat on female athletes?

A recent study sheds light on a significant gap in sports science: the underrepresentation of women in research on heat adaptation. The authors reviewed existing studies and found that most focused on male athletes, leaving unanswered questions about how female physiology responds to extreme temperatures.

As global temperatures rise, this oversight could have serious implications for athletes’ performance and health. The research calls for a shift in focus to ensure that female athletes receive the same level of scientific support as their male counterparts. Read more here.