Taiwan on Friday beat China to win the gold medal in the 200m open on the first day of the Asian Dragon Boat Championships in Hong Kong, before going on to pick up four silvers and four bronzes by the end of the competition yesterday.
Hosted by Hong Kong for the first time in 28 years, the three-day championship opened this year with teams from 13 countries and regions comprising about 800 athletes.
The championship features races over four distances — 100m, 200m, 500m and 2,000m. The competitions are also split into open, mixed and women’s groups and by boat size — standard 12.49m long boats known as DB22 and small 9m long boats known as DB12.
In the 200m dash, Taiwanese rowers competing in the DB12 open group finished first in 47.514 seconds, ahead of China’s 47.66 seconds and Thailand’s 48 seconds.
Taiwan’s coach Hou Hung-chang told reporters after the race that the gold medal win did not come easily, especially against strong teams from China and Thailand.
Hou said he was proud of his rowers, who gave their all and persevered to the end.
Taiwanese also clinched two silver medals in the open 2,000m DB22 and women’s 200m DB22, along with two bronze medals in the women’s 2,000 DB22 and open 200m DB22.
On Saturday, Taiwan won silver in the open 100m DB12 and bronze in the women’s 100m DB12, while they yesterday bested China by just two seconds to grab the silver medal in the open 500m DB12 and held on to pick up the bronze medal in the open 500m DB22.
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