Liu Xiang, who tied the world record of 12.91 seconds in 110m hurdles to win the first-ever Olympic gold in men's athletics for China in Athens, eased to National Games champion here on Thursday in 13.10.

As nobody in China or even in Asia has the strength to challenge the world ace hurdler, Liu's arch rival here was himself but today he failed to beat the remarkable time he achieved outside Asia.

Liu, 22, finished the runner-up in 13.06 at the Helsinki worldsin August. In Asia, he was crowned in the Asian championships a month ago in Inchon with a dissatisfactory time of 13.30. Four years ago, Liu, a rising star, had set a National Games record of 13.36 in Guangdong to win his first Games title the 9th edition ofthe mini-Olympics for China.

After the Athens Olympics, Liu has claimed five golds, three silvers and two bronzes in 10 tournaments he has attended so far this year while timing in 13.05,13.06, 13.08 each for twice.

In Thursday night's sprint here in drizzle, Shi Dongpeng, the only other hurdler of China having made name to world athletics, finished second in a distant 13.44 behind Liu, while Chen Ming of Tianjin took the bronze medal with a much further time of 13.70.

It's a victory in expectation for Liu, since none of the Chinese hurdlers besides Liu have run within 13.20.

"To win is the most important. I knew that I could make it, butI didn't expect such a time," said Liu at a post-match news conference.

"The track has been slippery with the drizzle, and that did make it a little bit hard for me to run out a good result."

Liu's coach Sun Haiping echoed his trainee that "if only Liu avoids fault start and errors, he can definitely win in any domestic tournament."

In Wednesday's qualifying round for the 110m hurdles, Liu breezily earned a berth with a sluggish time of 13.74 due to an energy reserved tactics. However, the super star to China's athletics, had drawn over 40,000 spectators to the stadium in the Olympic Complex in two days.

The other shinning point in Thursday's National Games arena came from weightlifting in which veteran Cui Wenhua claimed his fourth consecutive gold medal in men's 105kg division by hoisting 392.5kg.

Cui, starting his monopoly from the 7th National Games in 105kgdivision, met no challenge both in the snatch and jerk. He was the last one in the snatch to lift the barbell at 182.5kg, 7.5kg more than the best results of others.

Cui, 31-year-old, set the national record of the snatch, jerk and total in 1998 and no one can beat the marks since then.

"I would like to thank all the people who have supported me these years. For a lifter, it is quite hard to win four gold medals in a row," Cui told the press.

Cui studied in Nanjing University since 1999, majoring in journalism. He has decided to retire after the 10th National Games and continue his study.

The weightlifting competition which attracted a total of 226 lifters across China in the National Games ended here on Thursday.     

The swimming competitions at the National Games also concluded here on Thursday. Chinese swimmers had impressive results in the eight-day tournament just as most insiders expected.

Most results of the women's individual events could be ranked within this year's top ten. The accumulated time from top four in the women's 200m free was better than the best of 4x200m free relay since last year. Qi Hui's results in the women's 200m and 400m individual medley and 200m backstroke could enable her to stand on the podiums of the three events at Montreal worlds.

As for male swimmer Ouyang Kunpeng and Chen Zuo, both of whom had renewed the Asian records three times in the men's 100m backstroke, 200m backstroke and 100m freestyle respectively. Ouyang had remarkable scores in 100m and 200m backstroke, reaching the top three of this year's world rankings.

However, China didn't win a gold in Montreal and managed to grab only five medals overall, while powerhouses the United States won 15 golds and total 32 medals.

Editor: Donald