Chinese Yang Yang Wins Women's 500m at World Cup

Chinese Yang Yang (A) beat Choi Min-Kyung of South Korea to win the women's 500 meters and Canada's Francois-Louis Tremblay claimed his second consecutive 500m title in the World Cup short track speed skating competition at the Changchun Five-Circle Gymnasium on Saturday, December 9.

Yang, top title favorite in the absence of Olympic champion Annie Perreault of Canada and Bulgarian world record-holder Evgenia Radanova, surpassed the only non-Chinese skater in the four-athlete final in the third lap and went on to win the 4.5-lap race with 44.908 seconds.

Choi registered a second time of 42.167 and Chinese Sun Dandan,a 500m winner on Friday, took home the bronze medal ahead of compatriot Wang Chunlu.

South Korean budding star Park Hye-Rim, who had recorded five wins in her first World Cup season this year, was ousted in the semi-finals.

Tremblay, a fresh champion of the men's 500m at Nobeyama, Japan one week ago, stormed to the front from the gun and never relinquished the lead. He completed the distance in 41.938 seconds, followed by Chinese Feng Kai and An Yulong at 42.167 and 42.392 respectively.

Apolo Anton Ohno, who captured his eighth World Cup victories this season in Friday's 1,500m, was disqualified because of impeding after Canadian world champion Eric Bedard's elimination in the semi-finals.

Takafumi Nishitani, the Olympic champion from Japan, surprisingly crashed out of the quarter-finals.

The three-day tournament goes into the final day on Sunday, with eight golds medals on offer.






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