-Olympics
The People’s Republic of China secured women’s artistic gymnastics team gold in front of a home crowd at the 2023 Asian Games taking place at the Huanglong Sports Centre Gymnasium in Hangzhou on Monday (25 September).
With a mighty score of 161.896, the hosts emerged 4.667 ahead of second-placed Japan on 157.229, while Democratic People’s Republic of Korea in their first international competition back since the COVID-19 pandemic, bagged the final spot on the podium in third (156.829) just 0.4 marks back.
The team medals were secured courtesy of taking the three best scores from each nation’s gymnast on each apparatus in the qualifying competition, which decided the individual all-around and apparatus finalists. The top 18 compete in the all-around final and the top eight on each piece of apparatus.
Tokyo 2020 Olympian Zhang Jin was top scorer (54.266) to second-place compatriot Zuo Tong, the 2023 Asian Championships bars bronze medallist on 52.865. Zhang Xinyi, a beam silver medallist at the same competition, came third on 52.499 but missed out on the all-around event due to the two-per-country rule.
Okamura Mana of Japan was fifth, scoring 52.432, with a trio from Democratic People’s Republic of Korea securing the next three places courtesy of Kim Sujong (52.365), An Changok (52.265) and Kim Sonhyang (52.199).
Uzbekistan’s Oksana Chusovitina, an eight-time Olympian, has made the vault final, as has India’s Pranati Nayak, the 2019 Asian Championships bronze medallist on the apparatus.
The Chinese women join the men in clinching the team titles at the 19th Asian Games, with Japan and Chinese Taipei securing second and third places respectively in the men’s event.
Featured Image: Global Times