Incheon: The Chinese medal surge continued unabated but it was Qatar’s Femi Seun Ogunode who completed his sprint double with a second new Asian Games record on the fifth day of track and field at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games on Wednesday.
Ogunode, who took the 100m gold two days ago with a new Asian mark, once again ended with a strong finish in the 200m in a time of 20.14 seconds, erasing the old mark of 20.25 secs set by Japan’s Koji Ito at the 1998 Bangkok Games.
However, it was the disqualification of four athletes, including Asian Games recordholder Yousuf Saad Kamel, that took centre-stage as the top three medal winners in the men’s 800m were denied of their medals. With Asian Games record holder Yousuf Saad Kamel in the fray, the men’s 800m was once again expected to be a battle between Qatar and Bahrain.
It started that way until Kamel stumbled and fell on the second turn as the Saudi runner surged clear to challenge Abdul Rahman, while Bahrain’s Abraham Kipchirchir set the chase. Ladan came up with one last gasp to nip the Qatari at the post and win in a time of 1:46.28.
However, the results were later annulled and all three medal winners were suspended along with Asian record holder Kamel for violating track rules — handing the medals to the next three finishers.
A similar controversy had taken place on the opening day of track and field after Bahrain’s Ruth Jebet had been disqualified for stepping out of the track in the women’s 3,000m steeplechase. However, the following day the Bahraini runner was re-instated and her gold medal was presented to her.
The women’s 800m had no such drama as the top three went on to better the existing Asian mark of 1:59.85 set by China’s Qu Yunxia way back at the 1994 Hiroshima Games. It was India’s Tintu Lukka — protégé of former Indian champion PT Usha — and Kazakhstan’s Margarita Mukasheva battling on the final stretch with the Kazakh going home in a time of 1:59.02. Lukka went on to better her bronze medal in Guangzhou in a time of 1:59.19 leaving China’s Zhao Jing for the bronze in 1:59.48.
Through this all, it was defending champions China who continued with their medal surge with one-two finishes in two events to add another two gold, three silver and four bronze to their already swelling tally at these Games.
China had taken six of the 13 gold on the first two days only to go barren without any gold on the third day. But they bounced back strongly on Tuesday winning three of the four gold medals to take their tally to nine from the possible 24 golds.
