World swimming champ Ye earns 4th gold at Chinese City Games

Xinhua, October 22, 2011

Ye Shiwen, China's youngest ever (long-course) swimming world champion, claimed her fourth gold medal at the 7th National City Games after helping Hangzhou to victory in the women's 4x200m freestle relay on Thursday.

The 15-year-old girl, arguably the biggest name in pool events at the City Games, swam the third leg as Hangzhou led throughout the race to clock a winning time of 8 minutes 01.04 seconds. Ye has won gold medals in 200m IM, 400m IM and 4x100m freestyle relay.

"I just tried my best and every one of us made a contribution," said Ye.

Shao Yiwen, who took the anchor leg for Hangzhou, joined Ye as the most decorated athletes so far at the City Games. "I hadn't thought I could win that much," said the 16-year-old Shao.

Dalian finished second in the relay in 8:04.14 and Shanghai Minhang was third in 8:06.19.

He Jianbin of Guangzhou become the most successful male swimmer after winning the blue-ribbon 100m freestyle in 49.69. The 18-year-old had won the 100m backstroke and 4x100m crowns earlier at this meet.

Zeng Xianliang, also from Guangzhou, took silver in 49.94 and Liu Zhaochen of Nanchang had bronze in 50.15.

In the men's 200m breaststroke, Li Xiang of Tianjin Binhai pulled off one of the great comebacks in the meet, hitting the wall just ahead of Huang Chaosheng in 2:12.34.

Huang led for most of the race but was overtaken by Li on the very last stroke. He was 0.12 seconds behind. Sun Chenwei of Guangzhou came third in 2:16.33.

Li Tingting of Hangzhou topped the women's 200m butterfly finale in 2:09.79, while Li Shuang of Zhengzhou captured silver in 2:11.00 and Sun Lulu of Dalian had bronze in 2:12.26.