Qi Hui beats Zhou Yafei to win women's 200m medley at Chinese City Games ( 2003-10-23 01:22) (Xinhua)
With her improved backstroke technique, breaststroker Qi Hui edged out Zhou
Yafei to take the women's 200 meters individual medley title at the fifth
Chinese City Games here Wednesday.
Zhou, bronze medalist at the Barcelona World Championships, led in the first
half before Qi came back in her speciality breaststroke and dominated the rest
of the distance, clocking in two minutes 14.01 seconds.
Zhou, who suffered a bad cold and coryza, had to concede a silver in 2:14.93,
2.01 seconds slower than her performance at the worlds. Zhang Dan from Shenzhen
came to third in 2"The 18-year-old Qi, fourth place finisher in the event at the
worlds, said,"I was one second shy of my personal best set two years ago. I
worked very hard on backstroke after the worlds. It showed that I was not bad in
the stroke tonight."
"As Zhou was sick, I did not try my best in the last 50 meters. I want to
save some energy for my 200m breaststroke tomorrow," said Qi, who won her first
title in the 400m medley earlier on Monday.
Zhou, 19, commented, "I felt headache and breathless for the coryza. I will
have an operation on my nose in my hometown Qingdao after I come back home. I
will pull out of tomorrow's 200m backstroke and return home on Friday."
Wu Peng from Hangzhou claimed two titles in a row on Wednesday night as he
took the victory in the men's 200m butterfly in 1 Wu, 16, later anchored the
winning quartet in the men's 4x200m freestyle relay in a time of 7"Women's 200m
freestyle title was taken by Yang Yu from Hangzhou, bronze medalist at the
worlds, in 1:59.73. Yang's teammate Tang Jingzhi came to second in 2:00.37 and
Pang Jiaying from Shanghai third in 2:00.62.
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