Chinese athletes off to a good start at 9th Asian Winter Games

Chinese athletes finished the first day of competitions at the 9th Asian Winter Games in Harbin, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, on Saturday, with eight gold medals in the speed skating, short track speed skating, freestyle skiing and snowboard events.

Li Fanghui secured the first top spot on the podium for the hosts in the women's freeski halfpipe final in Yabuli with 95.25 points she scored in the third run. Her compatriot Zhang Kexin came in second with 89.25 points, followed by Jang Yu-jin of South Korea and her 85 points.

Zhang Xiaonan added a gold for China in the women's snowboard slopestyle final which she won with a dominant 95.25 points, 20 more than the runner-up, her compatriot Xiong Shirui. The bronze went to Japan's Ishii Himari.

Chinese athletes claimed another four titles on the day on the skating track. Gao Tingyu beat both Yevgeniy Koshkin of Kazakhstan and the speed skating men's 100-meter Games record to win the event in 9.35 seconds.

Ning Zhongyang broke the men's 1,500-meter Games record and won the final in 1:45.85, 1.7 seconds faster than the runner-up Kazuya Yamada and 2.62 seconds ahead of No. 3 Ryota Kojima, both from Japan.

Han Mei, Yang Binyu and Yin Qi dominated the women's 1,500-meter speed skating final, finishing in top three. Han pocketed the gold in 1:57.58. Yang had the silver in 1:58.06. Yin got the bronze in 1:58.09.

Lin Xiaojun clinched China's only short track speed skating title in the men's 500-meter final in 41.150, beating two South Korean opponents, Park Ji-won and Jang Sung-woo.

Li Lei and Wang Qiang of China won the cross-country skiing women's and men's sprint classic finals respectively.