Canoe-kayak: Contenders safely through to finals

They may have been forced to race in the semifinal, but China's paddlers all made it safely through to the canoe-kayak finals in their respective events at West Bay Lagoon on Wednesday 13 December.

China, despite having defending champions and World Championship medallists in their ranks, had only managed one heat victory in the morning, although that could turn out to have been a tactical plan to avoid the windier centre lanes.

In the men's K1 500m semifinal Liu Haitao, the Doha 2006 champion over the longer 1000m distance, finished first in 1:53.650 to qualify for the final along with Masashi Saiki of Japan and Korea's Nam Sung Ho.

Liu's compatriot Yang Wenjun was far from convincing in his passage into the final of the men's C1 500m event, finishing fourth in 2:12.117 - three seconds behind winner Zhomart Satubaldin of Kazakhstan - to claim the last qualification spot.

The two other paddlers to qualify were Shahou Naseri of IR Iran and Korean Lee Seoung Woo, the latter keeping alive his nation's record of having won a medal in each of the four previous Asian Games to feature the event.

Wang then paired up with Wang Bing for the C2 500m semi, the reigning Asian Games and Olympic champions eventually finishing third behind Taito Ambo and Kosuke Fujii of Japan and Uzbekistan's Rustam Mirzadiyarov and Maksim Kiryanov.

This was enough to qualify for the final with Indonesians Asnawir Asnawir and Roinadi Roinadi claiming the fourth spot with all four qualifiers separated by just over a second.

China's Li Zhen and Lin Miao had already qualified for the men's K2 500m final by winning their heat, but will be joined by Momotaro Matsushita and Naoki Onoto of Japan, Iranians Yaser Hedayati and Mohsen Milad and Korea's Jo Hyun Goo and Lee Seoung Min - the first three in the semi.

In the women's K1 500m there was also positive news for China with their defending champion Zhong Hongyan winning the semifinal in 2:14.596 with another medal contender, Uzbekistan's Yulia Borzova, just behind in second.

The other qualifiers were Yumiko Suzuki of Japan and IR Iran's Elaheh Kharazmi, the latter pipping the oldest female competitor Elena Rybalova of Kyrgyzstan to fourth spot by only 0.044 seconds.

"It is possible for me to win a medal. It's difficult because I raced in lane five. Mentally I think I am the best. I have the confidence to become a champion. I was affected by the conditions over here but still I am the best," Zhong insisted.

The last semifinal was the women's K2 500m with Borzova and Ekaterina Shubina finishing first, nearly a second ahead of World Championship silver medallists Zhu Minyuan and Yu Lamei of China.

Japanese kayakers Shinobu Kitamoto and Mikiko Takeya finished third with Lee Sun Ja and Lee Ae Yeon of Korea claiming the fourth and last qualification spot for the final on Thursday 14 December.

"Tomorrow we will not be happy with anything less than the gold medal," Yu said.

15th Asian Games, Doha 2006