China nearing 100-gold mark

Shooters and a record-breaking weightlifter gave China seven more gold medals on Sunday, allowing the sports power to claim nearly half of the golds decided midway through the Asian Games.

Liu Chunhong broke world records in the snatch, clean and jerk and total in women's 69-kilogram division weightlifting, and the Chinese also tied a world mark in shooting.

With 198 gold medals decided so far, the score was China 92, rest of Asia 106, with eight days left in the 16-day Games.

But the Chinese, long dominant in table tennis, suffered their second loss in three events.

Both its mixed doubles pairs lost in the semi-finals, and Hong Kong's Cheung Yuk and Tie Ya Na came back from the verge of defeat to beat South Korea's Ryu Seung-min and Ryu Ji-hae for the gold.

China lost the gold medal women's team match to North Korea earlier.

Rain forced postponements in cycling, baseball, sailing and tennis, and cancellation of two softball games.

Japan was awarded the gold medal in softball based on its unbeaten record in preliminary games, where it yielded no runs.

China and Taiwan shared the silver. Those two were to have played to decide who would meet Japan in the gold-medal match.

But golf went ahead in the rain. Japan's Ai Miyazato won the women's title, finishing with a 2-under-par 70 for a 2-under 286 total, five shots better than South Korea's Kim Joo-mi, who slumped to a closing 78.

India's top amateur golfer Shiv Kapur brought some cheer to his country by winning the gold medal in the men's individual event with a three-stroke victory over his nearest opponent.

The 20-year-old Kapur, in joint lead with Sri Lanka's Rohan Anura after the penultimate round yesterday, carded a two-under 70 in the fourth and final round today to finish with a total of four-under 284.

Anura finished second with a total of 287 to bag the silver. South Korea's 17-year-old Hyun Woo Kim (292) took the bronze.

South Korea gained golds from its women's golf team, which edged Japan 577-579; bodybuilder Kang Kyung-won in the 85-kilogram division, and a trio of women bowlers, who scored 3,805 and beat Taiwan by nine pins.

The South Koreans stood second in golds with 32, and Japan had 28.

Singapore won three golds on Sunday. Abdul Halim bin Haron and Simon Chua were judged best in 65- and 75-kilogram division bodybuilding, and Remy Ong, Lee Yu Wen, Goh Heng Soon outscored 30 other teams in men's trios bowling.

Lebanon won its first gold when bodybuilder Mohammed Anouti was awarded top place in the over-90-kilogram class.

Thailand won both the men's and women's team golds in the acrobatic Southeast Asian sport of sepak takraw, with 2-0 victories over Malaysia in the men's competition and over Vietnam in the women's.

Chinese weightlifter Liu lifted 115.5 kilograms in the snatch and 148 in the clean and jerk - a total of 263.5. She had set the old clean and jerk mark of 147.5 in June. Russia's Valentina set the former marks of 115 in the snatch and 257.5 in total last November.

"It's wonderful," the 17-year-old Liu said. "My parents, who watched the match on TV in China, said they were very happy for me. Next, I want to become an Olympic champion in 2004."

Du Li, Shan Hong and Wang Xian tied the four-year-old world record of 1,754, also set by Chinese, in winning the women's team 50-metre rifle three-position competition. Du Li won the individual event.