Taiwan’s men’s 4x100m relay team were outgunned by Japan and Hong Kong at the Asian Track and Field Championships on Sunday, clocking 39.30 seconds to win a bronze medal.
Japan took the gold in 39.18 seconds, while Hong Kong darted past Taiwan’s final runner to win silver in 39.26 seconds.
Taiwan’s athletes won one gold and two bronzes at the championships in Kobe, Japan.
Wang Wen-tang surged ahead of the field in the first leg of the relay, but he said his running was not smooth as he would have liked as he was taking special care not to cross into his competitors’ lanes. Second and third leg sprinters Liu Yuan-kai and Tsai Meng-lin managed to give final leg runner Yi Wei-chen an advantage at the changeover, but Yi admitted that he did run the final leg well, “or else, we would have beaten Japan and Hong Kong,” he said.
In other events, long jumper Lin Ching-hsuan, who broke a university games record with an 8m leap in Taiwan last year, jumped only 7.32m to place 10th.
China’s Su Xiongfeng survived a tough battle against Supanara Sukhasvasti Na Ayudhaya of Thailand and Rikiya Saruyama of Japan to win the with a leap of 8.19m.
Javelin thrower Cheng Chao-tsun ranked 11th after a 67.86m throw and shot putter Lin Chia-ying came in fifth after throwing 16.17m.
World bronze medalist Yukifumi Murakami of Japan also set a new championship record and a personal best of 83.27m to win the competition, beating Park Jaem-young of South Korea and Ivan Zaitcev of Uzbekistan.
On Saturday, Chang Ming-huang threw a record-setting 20.14m shot put to win gold for Taiwan, the first in 16 years, while Chen Chieh won bronze in the 400m hurdles with a time of 50.39 seconds.
China’s star hurdler Liu Xiang set a new championship record in the 110m hurdles on Sunday to successfully defend his title with something to spare.
The former world record holder, who turns 28 tomorrow, clocked a new championship best time of 13.22 seconds to beat his compatriot Shi Dongpeng, who came home in 13.56 seconds, and Park Taek-yong of South Korea, who clocked 13.66 seconds.
It was a repeat performance of last year’s Asian Games, when the three finished in the same places.
In the women’s 200m, Japan’s Chisato Fukushima added another continental title to her Asian Games gold medal when she finished first in 23.49 seconds. Gretta Taslakian of Lebanon was second in 24.01 seconds and Saori Imai of Japan third in 24.06 seconds.
The men’s 200m title went to Femi Seun Ogunode of Qatar, who clocked 20.41 seconds to beat Japan’s Hitoshi Saito (20.75 seconds) and Omar Juma Bilal Alsalfa of the United Arab Emirates (20.97 seconds).
In other action, Mohammad Alazemi of Kuwait became the only athlete to win both the 800m and 1,500m at the same Asian championships when he won the men’s 800m in 1 minute, 46.14 seconds.
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