Emotions run high as China stays on top

Beijing: China erupted on Wednesday when its women won their first team gymnastics Olympic gold medal, with swimmer Pang Jiaying adding to the elation by claiming an unexpected swimming bronze.

Emotions also spilled over on the badminton courts with defending women's champion Zhang Ning breaking down in tears after coming through a mammoth quarter-final against Chinese-born Pi Hongyan of France 21-8, 19-21, 21-19.

China's gymnasts capitalised on a mistake-ridden US performance before an enthralled audience at Beijing's National Indoor Stadium who roared their approval when the medal was won.

The win avenged their narrow loss to the United States at last year's world championships and added to the team gold claimed by China's men on Tuesday.

Defending Olympic champion Romania won bronze.

"I feel very excited because we sacrificed a lot to win this gold medal and this is a direct competition between the Chinese team and the USA team and we are very proud that we won," said Chinese gymnastics coach Lu Shanzhen.

Pang stunned the field to finish third behind winner Federica Pellegrini of Italy in the women's 200 metres freestyle, in which a new world record time of one minute 54.82 seconds was set.

"I didn't expect this medal, my coach told me that even eighth place would be okay," said a delighted Pang, who touched in more than two seconds faster than her previous personal best.

"Other swimmers have endurance but my advantage is speed. I gave it all that I had. Hopefully, the bronze medal will encourage our team."

China's other big medal hope in the pool, Wu Peng, came fourth in the men's 200m butterfly with unstoppable American Michael Phelps first in a new world record time.

Pang's swim boasted China's medal tally to 14 golds, three silvers and five bronzes in the battle to be the most dominant sporting nation on earth.

Thanks to Phelps, the Americans now have 10 gold, eight silver and nine bronze medals.

China gave themselves another chance of swimming success after Liu Zige qualified fastest for the final of the women's 200m butterfly with team-mate Jiao Liuyang third quickest.

Only world record-holder Jessicah Schipper of Australia separated them.

China has won five weightlifting golds so far in Beijing and 23-year-old Liu Chunhong is aiming to add another Wednesday in the women's 69kg category.

Liu is Asia's top lifter in the weight but faces a tough challenger in Russia's Oxana Slivenko, who holds the world record of 276kg.

Li Hongli, the 2006 Asian Games champion, is the home nation's key hope in the men's 77kg division with his main opponent defending champion Taner Sagir from Turkey.

China has won two of the eight shooting golds contested till now and has a chance to add to the tally in the women's 25m Pistol.

Chen Ying, who has been shooting since she was 10, is the world champion but has a history of choking, finishing fourth at the Athens Games in 2004 .

With three out three diving gold medals in the bag, China's dream team look set for a fourth in the men's three-metre springboard final.

World champion Qin Kai's biggest threat comes from Canada's Olympic silver medallist Alexandre Despatie.

The country's top-ranked badminton players were back in action with Zhang booking a semi-final against Indonesia's Maria Kristin Yulianti.

The match against Pi was tense and on the winning shot Zhang's smile quickly dissolved into tears of relief.

Top seed Xie Xingfang and third seed Lu Lan play later.