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Men can do it, too, as teen blitzes pool

By Yu Yilei (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-04-10 05:38

SHANGHAI: Like Olympic hurdles champion Liu Xiang, China's swimming sensation Wu Peng proved that Chinese men can scale the heights of the sporting world with a historic victory in the 200-metre butterfly at the World Short-course Championships here yesterday.

Wu Peng displays his medal at award ceremony. [sina]

The 19-year-old from Hangzhou of East China's Zhejiang Province clocked 1 minute 52.36 seconds, a championships record, beating Moss Burmester of New Zealand and Nikolay Skvortsov of Russia into second and third place.

His gold was one of three won by the host team last night; and one of five from the five-day tournament.

It was only the second time that Chinese men have triumphed in a swimming tournament since Wang Yiwu's 200m breaststroke victory 11 years ago during the 1995 edition in Brazil.

China's women have fared much better in international swimming events.

Wu's victory was all the more impressive because strong will power helped him overcome a toe bone fracture just before the race.

"We have definitely proved ourselves at the international stage," said a delighted Wu.

"Not only myself, my teammate Zhang Lin can also do it," added Wu, pointing to the swimmer who took a bronze in the men's 1,500m freestyle. Yury Prilukov of Russia won the arduous event in a championship record time of 14:23.92, followed by Park Tae-hwan of South Korea.

"I think Asian swimmers have a better chance in long-distance swims compared with European and American athletes," said Wu, a bronze medal winner in the event at the last tournament held two years ago in Indianapolis.

Wu, with Zhang and backstroke star Ouyang Kunpeng who settled for fourth place in the 200m last night, are seen as China's medal hopes for the men's team at the Beijing 2008 Games.