Team Taiwan won two more gold medals on the final day of the World Games in Chengdu, China, yesterday, their best-ever performance at a World Games event outside Taiwan.
Taiwan sent 119 athletes to participate in 14 categories of the World Games this year.
The women’s tug-of-war team claimed their sixth consecutive championship in the 500kg event on Sunday last week, which also delivered Taiwan’s first gold of this year’s Games.
Photo courtesy of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee
Team Taiwan had a strong finish in the last two days by adding four golds to the tally.
Skater Liu Chiao-hsi (劉巧兮) took the crown in the women’s inline freestyle skating speed slalom on Saturday, while powerlifter Chiang Kai-chieh (江凱傑) secured gold in the men’s equipped middleweight the same day.
Powerlifter Yang Sen (楊森) outperformed his rivals in the men’s super-heavyweight event and scored a total of 108.9 points to claim the gold, Team Taiwan’s fifth gold medal in the Games this year.
Photo courtesy of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee
President William Lai (賴清德) sent the athletes a message commending them for their excellent performance after he received the news yesterday.
Yang’s performance yesterday also set a world record for equipped squat with a 453.5kg lift.
Yang, who is of indigenous Paiwan descent, won the gold medal in the men’s equipped super heavyweight category with a total of 1,118.5kg across the squat, bench press and deadlift. He pulled 332.5kg in each of the latter two. His squat broke his own world record by 0.5kg.
Photo courtesy of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee via CNA
He finished the event with 108.90 points in total, which put him ahead of the other seven competitors in the weight class.
Yang had qualified for the 12th edition of the quadrennial World Games after winning last year’s World Open Equipped Powerlifting Championships in Iceland, where he set a new equipped squat world record of 453kg.
Earlier yesterday, Taiwan clinched their fourth gold at the Games, after winning the beach team mixed korfball event 8-6 against the Netherlands in a dramatic finish, their first in the sport.
The Taiwan team comprised male players Huang Ying-ting (黃英庭), Chang Chia-chuan (張家銓), and Wang Ming-kai (王銘凱), and female athletes Chu Shu-ping (曲書平), Wu Jia-yi (巫佳宜) and Wang Yi-wen (王怡文). Beach team mixed korfball matches are typically played by four team members on each side — two males and two females — with substitutions being made at intervals.
Going into the final game against the Netherlands yesterday, Taiwan was down 0-4, but rallied to finish 3-5 by the end of the first half.
Nine seconds into the second half, Chang made a two-point shot to tie the score 5-5, but three minutes later the Netherlands took the lead again at 5-6.
With 1 minute, 40 seconds left on the clock, Wu tied the game again with a penalty shot, bringing the score to 6-6.
Just as it seemed that the game would go into overtime, Huang made a two-point far-shot for Taiwan, bringing the score to 8-6, with four seconds left on the clock.
It was Huang’s second star play of the day, as he had also scored during the golden goal period in a semi-final match against Belgium earlier in the day, to give Taiwan an 8-7 win that propelled the team into the finals.
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