Chinese gymnasts continued their gold haul with two more gold medals on men's rings and women's uneven bars at the Beijing Olympics on Monday.
Host China earned a historic seven gold medals at the Beijing Games after Chen Yibing's victory on rings and He Kexin's on uneven bars.
Chen's rings title is also the country's second in the event, after its gymnastics legend Li Ning snatched the first rings gold at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984.
Chen's winning performance included several strength elements and a solidly landed dismount. The 24-year-old, who was making his Olympic debut, was greeted with deafening cheers from home fans.
"I have desired to capture the gold for long. It is not an easy job to reach the goal and I have made lots of efforts. I am very glad. " said Chen, a rings gold medallist for two consecutive world championships.
He expressed admiration for three-time Olympican Jordan Jovtchev from Bulgaria. "I should learn from him as it is not easy for him to compete at the age of over 30."
China's three-time Olympian Yang Wei, who won his first Olympic all-around title days ago, joined Chen on the podium, winning a silver medal.
Oleksandr Vorobiov of Ukraine maintained his third-place ranking from qualifications and took the Bronze. He is the only Ukrainian gymnast to qualify for any of the men's apparatus finals at the Beijing Games.
He Kexin added to the host's medal tally with an uneven bars gold medal. She scored the same 16.725 points with runner-up Nastia Liukin from the United States but claimed the title under a tie-break rule.
He and Liukin started with the same difficulty value of 7.7 points, the second highest in the competition.
Under the tie-break rule, if two gymnasts earn the same score on a same difficulty value, then the average of the three lowest of the 4 counting B-jury deductions will be applied, instead of the average of 4 B-jury deductions.
"I know nothing about the tie-break rule. I had thought I tied with Liukin," said a happy He.
The 16-year-old, who was making her Olympic debut, said she was nervous being the first one to take to the floor.
"My hands even shaked. But I tried to focus on my movements instead of thinking about whether I can win a medal," she said.
In the qualifications, she almost failed to make the final when she fell from the bar in qualifications. But she did not let her second chance slip. He impressed the judges with difficult connections and dazzling tumbling.
Liukin, the all-around Olympic gold medallist at the Beijing Games, picked her third silver medal at the Games, following one for floor exercise and the other for team event.
He's compatriot Yang Yilin, who entered the final in the first place, won the bronze with the same difficulty score as He and Liukin, but lower execution mark.
"It's He Kexin's first Olympics. She did a wonderful job as she had the best composition of maneuvers, a very high difficulty score," said Lu Shanzhen, coach of the Chinese women's team.
"She (He) was great. She won the gold medal and she did an excellent job," said Liukin, who said the competition was a close one as she and the two Chinese girls all had the difficulty value of 7.7 points.
In men's vault competition, Leszek Blanik became the first Polish gymnast to win an Olympic Gold medal when he won with an average of 16.537 for his two attempts. The reigning world champion on vault demonstrated great height and distance on both of his vaults.
France's Thomas Bouhail, second in qualifications, maintained his rank and took silver. He performed second of the eight finalists, and landed both attempts solidly.
Anton Golotsutskov from Russia, who won the bronze medal in the men's floor exercise final a day before, settled for bronze.
Top qualifier Marian Dragulescu from Romania, the Athens 2004 Olympic Games Bronze medallist on vault, fell on his second attempt and was fourth.
So far, China has swept the titles for men's team, women's team, men's all-around, pommel horse, men's floor exercise, rings and uneven bars.
Another three remaining gymnastics gold medals will be up for grab on Tuesday.
(Xinhua News Agency August 19, 2008)