Sunday, August 24, 2008

Our Wushu Exponents Get Olympic Medals

The following is extracted from 'Wushu exponents wrap up campaign with credible show' (The Star Online, 24/08/08). See also 'Wushu: Another silver for Malaysia' (NST Online, 23/08/08):

MALAYSIA wrapped up their campaign in the Wushu Tournament Beijing 2008 with two silvers and a bronze in the taolu (barehands and weapons) categories at the Olympic Sports Centre Gymnasium yesterday.

Chai Fong Ying handed Malaysia the first silver in the women’s taijiquan and taijijian combined events in the morning before Lim Yew Fai grabbed the second in the men’s jiangshu (sword) and qiangshu (spear) combined events in the evening.

The 22-year-old Fong Ying, who is also the Doha Asian Games gold medallist, was trailing Japan’s Miyaoka Ai in third spot by a marginal difference of 0.2 after the taijiquan discipline on Friday. But she put up a better performance in the taijijian (taijisword) discipline to earn 9.70 for a combined total of 19.34 points. She received the silver medal from action movie star Jet Li.

Yew Fai finished just 0.1 point ahead of Vietnam’s Nguyen Huy Thanh with his total of 19.32. Chai Fong Wei delivered a bronze in the women’s gunshu and daoshu combined events with 19.16 for Malaysia’s fifth medal of the world meet.

Note: There was not much fanfare or publicity given to the success of our wushu team. The medals are not counted in the Olympic tally. I wonder whether they will receive the cash rewards (like Lee Chong Wei) and the Datukship.

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