Sporting highlights of 2018

One of the first major sporting events in the calendar is the Super Bowl, and the 52nd edition, played in Minneapolis, was a good one, as the Philadelphia Eagles beat the New England Patriots 41-33 to win their first Vince Lombardi Trophy. Here we see Zach Ertz (86) diving into the Pats' endzone for an 11-yard touchdown.

Less than a week later, the 23rd Winter Olympic Games opened in Pyeongchang, South Korea. Although they lost every game they played, the women's ice hockey team made up of South and North Koreans proved to be a fan favorite. Here, the Korean players salute their fans after having been beaten 8-0 by Sweden in the preliminary round of the women's tournament.

For 280 seconds, Aljona Savchenko and Bruno Massot made time stand still at the Gangneung Ice Arena. Skating to "La terre vue du ciel" (The world seen from above), the 34-year-old Ukrainian and 29-year-old Frenchman won Olympic gold for Germany, setting a new free-program world record in the process.

The National Hockey League refused to allow its players to take part in the men's Olympic ice hockey tournament for the first time since 1994. Under coach Marco Sturm, underdogs Germany went on a run that took them all the way to the gold-medal game, where they lost in overtime to the "Olympic Athletes from Russia." The silver medal was Germany's best-ever performance in the Olympic tournament.

...on a weekend in London, when Germany players Ilkay Gündogan (left) and Mesut Özil (second from left) met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (second from right). This sparked a rift between Özil and the DFB and rekindled a nationwide debate about integration. This didn't help Germany's performances in Russia - as the defending World Cup champions failed to get beyond the group stage.

While Germany crashed out at the group stage, France rode their high-pressure, attacking brand of football all the way to the World Cup final in Moscow, where they faced Croatia, the surprise team of the tournament. There, Didier Deschamps' men left no doubt that they were the best team in Russia in the summer of 2918, winning the final 4-2.

Also in Russia, a number of Iranian women seized the opportunity to attend Iran's World Cup match against Spain, something they would not have been allowed to do in their own country. In October, women were allowed into an Iranian stadium to watch a match, but a day later, the country's chief prosecutor described this as a "sin" and the ban on women attending football games was back on.

Prior to the summer of 2018 everybody in the world of cycling knew that Geraint Thomas was an excellent athlete but few could have imagined him actually winning the Tour de France. This year, though, the domestique took advantage of Chris Froome's problems on the Tour to emerge from the captain's shadow. What their respective roles will be in 2019 remains to be seen.

Angelique Kerber beat Serena Williams in the women's final at Wimbledon in June, thus becoming the first German to win a singles event at the world's most prestigious Grand Slam since Steffi Graf did so in 1996. For the top-ranked German player on the women's side, this marked the end of a long dry spell. Will she be able to add to her total of three Grand Slam titles in 2019?

This was a record that Eliud Kipchoge really wanted. The Kenyan looked like a runner from another planet, crossing the finish line at this year's Berlin Marathon with an extraordinary time of 2:01:39 – beating the world record set by compatriot Dennis Kimetto at the 2014 Berlin Marathon by one minute and 18 seconds.

You could argue that Lewis Hamilton is both a blessing and a curse for the Formula One motor racing circuit. On the one hand, the eccentric Brit brings some glamor to the F1 circuit. On the other, though, the Mercedes driver's dominance on the track threatens to hurt the business by making it boring. In 2018 Hamilton won the drivers' championship by 88 points over Ferrari rival Sebastian Vettel.

The 2018 World Chess Championship was one of the most difficult Magnus Carlsen has ever faced. First,Fabiano Caruana held him to a long series of draws, then Carlsen even suffered a black eye while playing football. Prior to the "rapid games," a form of sudden-death overtime, Carlsen felt the need to remove his jacket. Then it was all over quickly as Carlsen swept Caruana 3-0.