Chinese swimmers break two short course Asian records at World Cup

Tang Qianting of China won the women's 100-meter breaststroke gold medal at the World Aquatics Swimming World Cup in east China's Shanghai Municipality on Saturday after setting the short course Asian record of the event in 1:02.53.

"I believe records are meant to be broken," Tang told reporters after the victory. "I want to become the world record holder in the future." Her performance was less than 0.2 seconds behind the world record set by Alia Atkinson of Jamaica (1:02.36).

"It's a little pity because I was going after the world record," Tang added. "I fell short of breaking that because I didn't have systematic training recently. I only had two weeks for break and recovery after finishing competing in Wuhan and starting over in Shanghai. After I finish the events here, I will go back to practice. I hope I can perform my best and break the world record in Budapest."

The 20-year-old wants this win to be a start, not an end to a more glorious journey.

The silver medal went to Alina Zmushka of Belarus. Rebecca Meder of South Africa earned the bronze. Home swimmer Yang Chang came in fourth.

Qin Haiyang of China broke the men's 50-meter short course breaststroke Asian record by winning the final of the event in 25.38 seconds. He beat silver medalist Ilya Shymanovich of Belarus by 0.13 seconds and bronze medalist Sun Jiajun by 0.41 seconds.

Home favorite Pan Zhanle fell short to Thomas Ceccon of Italy in the men's 100-meter freestyle final. Ceccon touched the wall first in 46.32 seconds and Pan finished second in 46.35 seconds. Pieter Coetze of South Africa finished in third place in 46.59 seconds.

Zhang Yufei and Yu Yiting added one silver and one bronze respectively for China in the women's 50-meter butterfly final. Zhang finished the race in 24.94 seconds and Yu in 25.07 seconds. Kate Douglass of the U.S. won the gold in 24.54 seconds.