Sport
Zhu Qinan ready to defend Olympic shooting title

WUHAN (Xinhua): Athens Olympic champion Zhu Qinan, who smashed the world record of men's 10m air rifle with 703.7 points at the Chinese City Games, was gearing up to defend his Olympic title in Beijing.

"My aim is the gold medal of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games," said Zhu. "If the Olympic Games open tomorrow, I am ready now." Men's 10-meter air rifle champion in Athens, the sharpshooter from Wenzhou of east China's Zhejiang Province admitted that his goal in the ongoing City Games was not to break the world record, but the national one.

In fact, the national record of men's 10-meter air rifle, set by Zhu's teammate Li Jie in 2000, stood at 703.4 points, 0.3 points higher than the world record by Austrian Thomas Farnik.

"He has matured in competitions," said Chang Jingchun, Zhu's coach in the national shooting squad. Chang could still recall Zhu's nadir in the World Cup and World Championship last year. "He has ambition and strict requirement for himself, but lacks patience."

He took bronze in both events, scoring only 595 points in qualification rounds.

This time the marksman showed his calmness both in the qualification round and the final.

In the qualification round, he was one of the last ten shooters out of 47 to finish firing. Looking at Chang, the boy made a grimace.

In the ten-point final, he was always the last to open fire among the eight finalists.

"I slowed down to relax myself and stay calm," he said. Wang Yifu, head coach of the national shooting team, was impressed by his performance. "I had predicted that Zhu would stun us with a good show," Wang said. "But I didn't expect such an excellent result."

However, the Chinese ace athlete was not really satisfied today.

For one thing, his heroic solo performance was not enough to lift his team to the top of the podium as the team event was contested fiercely among a strong field including Chengdu and Nanjing.

Succumbed to the Chengdu team with one point less, Zhu and his Wenzhou teammates had to settle for the silver medal at 1,778 points.

"This (the team gold) is the only title that eludes me. It's a pity as it will be my last City Games."

He felt regretted for his own performance as well. Talking about his 599 points in the qualification round, he rubbed his head. "I have always achieved 600 points in practices."

"It's not really a bad thing to leave some regrets for the Olympic Games," said Zhu Xiaobo, Zhu Qinan's coach in the Zhejiang provincial shooting team.

Zhu took off the gold medal dangling on his neck the sooner the medal ceremony was over.

"I would stow this one and prepare myself for the next," he said.

Sport

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