GUANGZHOU, China, November 16. WHILE the Chinese have had the most impressive overall team meet at the Asian Games, South Korea's Tae Hwan Park has battled China's Zhao Jing for to greatest individual meet of the long course racing taking place in Guangzhou.<\/p>\n
A day after downing the Asian record in the men's 200 free with a 1:44.80, Park nearly took down another standard with a blazing fast 3:41.53 in the men's 400 free. That effort just missed Zhang Lin's mark of 3:41.35 set at the 2009 World Championships in Rome, and demolished Park's 3:44.73 from Pan Pacs this summer as the top swim of the year. Park remained fifth in the all-time rankings, but improved upon his lifetime best of 3:41.86 set at the 2008 Olympics. <\/p>\n
China's Sun Yang made a serious move up the rankings with a second-place 3:42.47 as he chopped nearly three seconds from his previous personal best of 3:45.22. That swim skyrocketed him from 21st all time to sixth behind Park and ahead of Grant Hackett (3:42.51). The four swimmers ahead of Park and Sun on the list are Paul Biedermann (3:40.07), Ian Thorpe (3:40.08), Ous Mellouli (3:41.11) and Zhang (3:41.35). This evening, Zhang checked in with a distant third-place time of 3:49.15.<\/p>\n
China's Ji Liping topped the women's 100 breast finale in 1:06.91 to move to sixth in the world rankings this year. Her previous season best had been a 1:07.53 from Chinese Nationals in August. Japan's Satomi Suzuki touched second in 1:07.43, while China's Chen Huijia earned third in 1:07.98. Suzuki (1:06.94) and Chen (1:07.51) have both been faster this year.<\/p>\n
China's Zhou Jiawei put a bit of a scare into his Asian record in the men's 50 fly with a time of 23.66. That swim came up short of his continental standard of 23.43 set in April 2009, but moved him into a tie for 15th in the world rankings this year. Japan's Masayuki Kishida finished second in 24.13, while India's Virdhawal Khade gave his country its first swimming medal of the meet with a third-place 24.31.<\/p>\n
Another sprint event had its Asian record somewhat threatened when China's Li Zhesi clocked a 24.97 in the women's 50 free. She missed Le Jingyi's 1994 standard of 24.51 set in Rome. Li has been faster this year with a 24.92 from Chinese Nationals in August. China's Tang Yi placed second in 25.22, while Japan's Yayoi Matsumoto finished third in 25.67. <\/p>\n
Japan's Ryosuke Irie toughed out teammate Junya Koga, 53.61 to 53.88, in the men's 100 back with a monster final 50-meters of 27.19 against Koga's 27.70. China's Sun Xiaolei wound up third overall in 54.46.<\/p>\n
In relay action, China's Zhu Qianwei, Liu Jing, Wang Shijia and Tang Yi won the women's 800 free relay in 7:51.81. Zhu turned in a 1:57.04 lead 200 free led, short of her fourth-ranked season best of 1:56.65 from earlier in the meet. China claimed the men's 400 free relay as well with Shi Tengfei, Jiang Haiqi, Shi Runqiang and Lu Zhiwu posting a 3:16.34. Japan's Takuro Fujii, Rammaru Harada, Shunsuke Kuzuhara and Sho Uchida put up a fight with a second-place 3:16.78 with only Lu overtaking Uchida in the final stretch for the gold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
GUANGZHOU, China, November 16. WHILE the Chinese have had the most impressive overall team meet at the Asian Games, South Korea's Tae Hwan Park has battled China's Zhao Jing for<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n