Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, October 12, 2002
Chinese Sun Wins Women's 5000 Run at Asian Games
Chinese female talent runner Sun Yingjie, 23, clinched the women's 5,000m race gold in 14 minutes and 40.41 seconds at the 14th Asian Games on Saturday afternoon, her second title in Busan.
Chinese female talent runner Sun Yingjie, 23, clinched the women's 5,000m race gold in 14 minutes and 40.41 seconds at the 14th Asian Games on Saturday afternoon, her second title in Busan.
Sun, who took the women's 10,000m gold Tuesday afternoon in an Asiad record of 30:28.26, earlier vowed to challenge the 5,000m world record of 14:28.09, made by her compatriot Jiang Bo in Shanghai in 1997, in today's race but failed.
After jogging around the field with a Chinese national flag, Sun told Xinhua that she was eager to break the world record and tried her best in the race.
"However, I did not make it mainly becasue there were no strongopponents in the race today. If there were, I could do better," she explained.
Sun dashed out of the low-speed runners field in an early period of the race when there were also 3,500 meters to go and ranalone in the lead, trailing the second runner nearly 60 meters.
She looked at her watch when she cleared every lap and sprintedas fast as possible to the finish.
Sun's coach Wang Dexian was satisfied with Sun's performance, saying that "Sun suffered a bit trouble in her leg before the race.So I think she has done a quite good job today."
However, Wang did not give more details about what the trouble is and how serious it is.
"I will attend the Athens Olympic Games, so I must improve my strength in the next two years," she said.
Kayoko Fukushi from Japan, who led the first 1,500 meters, finished the second in 14:55.19, while Sunita Rani from India camethird in 15:18.77.
Fukushi said after the race that "although I got the silver instead of the gold, I am still very happy as I have shattered theJapanese national record."
"I must express my thanks to the Chinese Sun who ran extremely fast and led me to my own best result," she said in smile.