Roundup: China Piles up 35 Golds, Rogge Leaves Beijing

China tore off a chunk off US domain in track and field by winning three gold medals in the World University Games as IOC president Jacques Rogge concluded a 36-hour visit to Beijing on Tuesday.

China took 10 gold medals from athletics, swimming, diving, fencing and table tennis on day six of Universiade competition, raising its gold tally to 35, good enough for the host to top the medal standings till the end of the Games on September 1.

Dong Yanmei, a protege of Chinese guru coach Ma Junren, took the women's 10,000 meters title in a time of 32 minutes 45.14 seconds, ahead of Japanese duo Yoshiko Fujinaga and Yukiko Akaba.

Tactically hiding in the pack for most of the race, Dong kicked off to overtake the two Japanese front-runners with less than two laps to go, crossing the finish line more than eight seconds clear.

"I felt very tired after the World Championships and I am very happy to win the gold medal," said Dong, who finished fourth over 10,000 meters in the Edmonton Worlds.

China hit a hurdles double on the second day of athletics competitions as Liu Xiang clocked a winning time of 13.33 seconds in the men's 110m hurdles and Su Yiping won the women's 100m hurdles in 12.95.

American sprinter Marcus Brunson won the blue ribbon men's 100m final Tuesday, beating Gennadiy Chernoval of Kazakstan and Britain's Chris Lambert.

With the race held up twice for fault starts, the American bolted off at the blocks and stormed home in 10.15 seconds.

"My start is my advantage, so I knew I had to utilize that, get out in front and then hold on - and I did," said Brunson.

The women's 100m gold went to Britain's Abiodun Oyepitan, who clocked 11.42 seconds to beat second-placed Chinese Zeng Xiujun by 0.16 seconds.

Italian Nicola Vizzoni won the men's hammer with a throw of 78. 41 meters and Brazilian Higa Maurren Maggi flew 6.83 meters to take the women's long jump title.

The Chinese women's swimmers, anchored by newly-crowned 50m freestyle champion Han Xue, out-touched the United States to snatch the women's 4x100m medley relay final.

The Chinese clocked four minutes 7.41 seconds, beating the Americans by 0.70 seconds. Russia came third in 4:10.20.

The United States emerged the biggest winner in the swimming pool, pocketing three golds out of seven at stake.

Americans Raymond Hunt, Andrew Mahaney and Kevan Clements won the men's 200m backstroke, 200m butterfly and 400m individual medley respectively.

Japanese Sachiko Yamada won the women's 1,500m freestyle gold in 16:19.44.

China swept both the men's and women's team foil finals after beating their Italian rivals.

Meng Jie edged world No. 1 fencer Valentina Vezzali to lead China to a closely-fought 44-43 victory over Italy.

Wang Haibin beat Salvatore Sanzo to nail a 45-39 win over Italy in the men's foil final.

China walked away with two diving golds as Guo Jingjing and Cai Yuyan won the women's synchronized platform title and Peng Bo and Wang Kenan got the men's 3m synchronized springboard event.

In table tennis, Chinese Liu Guozheng and Zhang Yong beat South Korean pair Joo Se-Hyuk and Park Sang-Joon in the men's doubles final, and Tie Yanan downed Niu Jianfeng in the all-Chinese women's singles final.

China remains a runner-away overall leader with 35 golds, 19 silvers and 15 bronzes. The United States places second with a 10- 11-7 record, followed by Japan at 8-12-19, Russia 8-9-15, Ukraine 6-6-5 and Italy 6-4-4.

IOC president Rogge left Beijing Tuesday afternoon after a 36- hour whistlestop visit to Beijing, the host of the 2008 Olympic Games.

Despite a busy schedule, Rogge had "an excellent stay" and was impressed by "a complete package" offered by the Chinese capital.

"It is the quality of people, the expertise, the support of the government, the geography of the city, the strength of the Chinese sports and Chinese tradition," said the president. "All of this makes that you have everything to stage the best possible Games."

"Yesterday I had a visit to the Universiade, which is absolutely well organized. The Board of Directors of FISU are absolutely delighted about the preparation and organization of the Universiade," added Rogge.

While giving thumbs-up to Beijing, he said that the Olympic organizers should not slacken their build-up to the 2008 Games.

"You should not be complacent, you should work very hard to the last day," he said.

Rogge said the IOC would rather throw their weight behind the organizers than frustrate them with criticism.

"With time, we might see difficulties, but it is not the role of the IOC to criticize," he said.

"IOC is here to help, to support, we are here as partners."

Rogge was elected to succeed Juan Antonio Samaranch as IOC president in Moscow on July 16.

When asked how he felt as president, Rogge said: "I have no time to reflect on that, only the duties of the IOC."

He added he is a man who only "focuses on the present and future" instead of the past.

"Maybe one day I will say, well, happy, unhappy...I don't know, I will tell you later," he said.

Before taking over the IOC presidency, Rogge had chaired the Co- ordination Commissions of the Sydney and Athens Games and headed the European Olympic Committee and Belgian Olympic Committee.

"(Before) I could still combine these with my job as a surgeon, but today it is impossible, so I gave up my job as a surgeon, now I am full-time IOC president," he said.

Rogge added that the presidency is not a job as the IOC members are volunteers.

"It is a passion, I love to fulfill my passion," he said.






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