| Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, November 18, 2001 |
First Athletic Gold of National Games Goes to Host |
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Xu Zizhou, a former world youth champion, won on Saturday the first gold medalof the athletics competition in the men's 400 meters final after China's national games officially opened last Sunday.
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Xu Zizhou, a former world youth champion, won on Saturday the first gold medalof the athletics competition in the men's 400 meters final after China's national games officially opened last Sunday.
Representing hosting province of Guangdong, the 20-year-old Xu pulled away from the leading group when approaching the straight and he never looked back to finish first in 45.72 seconds, 47 hundredths of a second shy of China's national record.
Prior to the opening of the Games, Liaoning's Gong Ke and Liu Min respectively won men's and women's marathon titles at an advance match.
Xu won the 400m and 4x400m relay gold medals at the 1998 world youth championships and he had won both 200m and 400m national titles several times.
Jiangbo of Hubei Province finished second in 46.54, followed byFujian's You Hanshan in 46.98. Asian record holder Li Xuemei of Sichuan Province, together with three of her Sichuan teammates, qualified for women's 100 meters dash final on Sunday.
The Sichuan delegation has so far gained only 2.5 gold medals, and is gold-hopeful in the coming women's 100, 200, and 4x100 meters events. The Ma's Army from Liaoning showed their strength in women's middle and long distance events, as three of its four members, LinNa, Dai Yanyan, and Dong Yanmei qualified for the 1,500m final. The 28-year-old Liu Dong, champion of the event at the 1993 Stuttgart World Athletics Championships, was eliminated as she finished the last in heat one.
Liaoning's Lan Lixin, another member of Ma's Army and strong challenger in women's 1,500, 5,000, and 10,000 meters events, quitthe Games earlier on Thursday due to a blood test failure.
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