Russian Elena crowned fastest woman in MWG

Hyderabad, Oct 15 (UNI) Russian Elena Bolsun became the fastest women athlete by winning the 100m sprint while her countrymates reigned the pool bagging six gold, besides setting a new record in the 4th Military Worlds Games here today.

China, the strong competitors to Russia for top spot in medal tally, bagged five gold on the first day-- to Russia's seven-- including two from the pool, with Zhou Yafei stealing the limelight by rewriting her own Council of International Military Sports (CISM) record in women's 100m butterfly.

Russian Darya then shared the limelight by entering her name in the record boooks of CISM in women's 200m individual medley. Her effort of 2 min 15.92 sec erased earlier record of 2 min 17.40 sec jointly shared by Chinese Qi Hui and Pu Yiqi.

Elena's 11.45 sec effort in women's 100m race though missed the Games record of 11.41s by a whisker, set by another Russian Ekaterina Leshcheva in Rome in 1999.

Bettina Moller Weissina (11.51s) of Austria and Daria Rorcrynska (11.54s) of Poland finished second and third respectively.

Russians won six gold from the pool with Evgeny Lagunov, Falko Grigory and Nikolay Skvortsov coming first in men's 100m freestyle, 100m breast stroke and 100m butterfly respectively while Daniela Samulski, Darya and Elena Bogomazova bagged the fourth, fifth and sixth gold in swimming by winning women's 100m freestyle, 200m individual medley and 100m breast stroke.

Earlier, China opened their account with Zhide Cui winning men's 20 km walk competition, clocking 1::23: 43.

But, it was Zhou Yafei who stole the limelight by breaking her own Games record of 59.32s set in the last edition in Catania (Italy) by clocking 59.05s in 100m butterfly at the Gachibowli Swimming Pool.

Russians made it two three with Irina Bespalova and Natalia Sutyagina clocking one minute 0.18 secs and 1 min 0.19 secs.

Zhao Tao added another gold for China by coming first in 200m individual medley. He clocked 2 minutes and 3.70 secs, ahead of compatriot Qu Jingyu (2 mins and 5.20 secs) and Russian Andrey Krylov (2 mins and 5.74 s).

China's fourth gold came from Li Shixin who came first in men's one metre springboard diving. She scored 134.50 points while compatriot Zhang Xinhua secured 132.00 to collect silver.

India's Kunja Kishor and W Yogesh finished 14th and 15th in the event totalling dismal 81.50 and 68.00 points respectively.

Zhang Wenxiu gave China the fifth gold by winning the women's hammer throw after clearing 72.25m.

UNI