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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, November 21, 2001

Day 9 roundup: Day of Records and Upsets for National Games

Chinese strongmen starred in the ninth-day competition of the ninth national games by surpassing a string of world records and Asian marks on Tuesday in Guangzhou.


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Zhang Guozheng Breaks Asian Record in 69kg category weight lifting
Chinese strongmen starred in the ninth-day competition of the ninth national games by surpassing a string of world records and Asian marks on Tuesday in Guangzhou.

And the day was also dramatic as sports stars including Olympic champion and Asian recordholder fell as victims of upsets.

Two-time Olympic weightlifting champion Zhan Xugang of Zhejiang lost to Li Hongli from hosts Guangdong in the men's 77kg division, having to settle for a silver medal with a total weight of 365 kg.

Li pulled off the upset by snatching a weight of 170kg in his second attempt, beating Zhan by a margin of 5kg and breaking the national record of 168kg he held.

Both Li and Zhan jerked up 200kg but Li took the title with a total of 370kg, beating the national record of 367.5kg set by Zhan in Sydney Olympics last year.

Earlier in the men's 69kg category, Zhang Guozheng, from Yunnan, beat Asian record holder Wan Jianhui with a total of 352.5kg to shatter the national mark of 350kg and surpassed the Asian record of 342.5kg. Wan finished second with a total weight of 340kg, including a snatch of 157.5kg, but both weights were lower than the Asian records set by himself. Zhang snatched a weight of 160kg, which was better than the Asian mark of 158kg, before he followed the third-placed Liu Huayong to pull out a jerk of 192.5kg.

Liu was the first to jerk up the weight to beat the national record of 190.5kg and surpassed the mark of world junior championships. His total weight of 337.5kg also bettered the record of the world junior championships.

In the diving competition, Zhang Jing and Zhang Zhiye from the Chinese Army took away the title of the women's synchronized three- meter springboard after Li Rongjuan had her head injured in the final round.

Li and her partner Wu Shunqun had led the 12-pair-strong final field through the first four rounds, scoring an aggregated score of 255.00 points.

But when executing their fifth and last dive, reverse two and a half somersaults in pike position with a day-high degrees of difficulty of 3.0, Li had the back of her head rapped by the front edge of the springboard, which spoiled her efforts to complete the mid-air movement.

Li and Wu were awarded 27.90 points for the dive, which snuffed out their title hopes.

Li, 21, won the silver medal in synchronized three-meter springboard event in the 1998 world champions and she teamed with Wu to take the event at the national diving championships the following year.

In tennis, Li Si from Beijing beat Wang Yu of Tianjin 6-4, 6-3 to claim the men's singles title of the quadrennial games. The women's singles title fell to Li Na of Hubei, who defeat Liu Nannan of Tianjin 7-5, 6-2. On Wednesday, there will be 11 golds on offer with more action in such sports including athletics, cycling, weightlifting, men's handball and freestyle wrestling.




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Day 6 Roundup: Ma's Army Comes to Stage at National Games

Day 7 Round-up: More Golds for Ma's Runners, Guangdong Swimmers 

Day-8 Roundup: Record Shattering on Track, Weightlifting Bout





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