Mark Webber made $9 million this year. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Webber Overtaken As Highest-Earning Australian: Mark Webber has been overtaken as Australia's highest-earning sportsman. Business Review Weekly's annual analysis of the country's rich and powerful found that the Red Bull driver made $9 million this year. But that was reportedly half a million short of Honda's 2011 MotoGP champion Casey Stoner, the 26-year-old who — like 35-year-old Webber — is from New South Wales. However, both Webber and Stoner have been left in the wheel tracks of Andrew Bogut, whose new Milwaukee Bucks contract saw him collect a cool $13.5 million by playing NBA basketball. Motocross rider Chad Reed, meanwhile, reportedly made $8.5m, followed by Tour de France winner Cadel Evans, with $5m in 2011. But for the country's new F1 star Daniel Ricciardo, the road ahead to high earnings is long, as the online WA Today newspaper expects the 22-year-old to make less than $200,000 racing with Toro Rosso next season. And until this week, he wasn't sure he would even have that job. "I can honestly say that I didn't know it (the announcement) was coming and it had been playing on my mind a fair bit," said Ricciardo. "It was a fair bit of a relief actually."

Vettel, Red Bull In Running For Laureus Prizes: Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull Racing are among the nominees to win prestigious 2012 Laureus World Sports awards following their successes this year. In the running alongside German Vettel to be hailed Sportsman of the Year are sprinter Usain Bolt, tennis' Novak Djokovic, Tour de France winner Cadel Evans, football's Lionel Messi and basketballer Kirk Nowitzki. And fighting it out with Red Bull for the team prize are New Zealand's All Blacks, England's cricket team, basketball's Dallas Mavericks, FC Barcelona and Japan's female football team. The nominees are selected by the world's media by ballot, and the winners by a jury made up of 47 of the greatest sportsmen and women of all time. The winners will be crowned in London in February. "This has been a great year for sport and the academy are going to find it extremely difficult to decide who to vote for as winners," said chairman Edwin Moses.