Hong Kong rower Chiu Hin-chun claimed the special administrative region’s fourth gold medal at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games in Japan on Thursday, winning the men’s lightweight single sculls event, as the city added more medals in rowing, swimming, fencing and wushu.
On the fifth day of competition, the city delegation also secured four silver medals and two bronze medals, raising its medal tally to 23 — four gold, 10 silver and nine bronze — and ranking eighth overall.
In the 2,000-meter final, 32-year-old Chiu maintained second place through the first half of the race before surging into the lead in the second half and holding on to the end. He crossed the finish line in 6 minutes and 50.32 seconds — beating silver medalist Amirhossein Mahmoodpour Shahrestani of Iran by 2.27 seconds.
Chiu expressed his excitement after the competition and thanked the public for their support. This victory earned him a HK$1 million ($127,510) prize under the Jockey Club Athlete Incentive Awards Scheme.
The veteran rower previously won silver at the 2018 Asian Games and bronze in 2023.
Hong Kong’s rowing team also earned a silver in the women’s lightweight single sculls through Winne Hung Wing-yan, and another in the women’s lightweight double sculls through Cheung Yuen-shan and Leung Wing-wun. Additionally, a bronze was secured in the men’s lightweight double sculls event by Lam San-tung and Chan Tik-lun.
Olympic champion swimmer Siobhan Haughey added a silver in the women’s 50-meter freestyle, finishing in 24.32 seconds — 0.34 seconds behind the national team’s Wu Qingfeng. Haughey has pocketed two gold medals — in the women’s 100m and 200m freestyle events — and two silver medals at the Games.
Wushu athlete Leung Yu-hong claimed another silver for Hong Kong in the men’s Sanda 60-kilogram category, while the gold went to national team athlete Tang Sishuo.
Epee fencer Fong Hoi-sun took bronze in the men’s individual epee after losing to Kazakhstan’s Kirill Prokhodov 13-15 in the semifinals. No bronze medal match was held for the event.
Contact the writers at atlasshao@chinadailyhk.com
