DOHA, 11 December 2006 — Saudi Arabia sustained their prodigious display in athletics when Hamdan Awdah Al-Bishi won the gold medal in the men’s 400 meters final and Sultan Mubarak Al-Dawodi the bronze in men’s discus throw at the Khalifa Stadium yesterday.
The Saudi pair’s feats brought the Kingdom’s Asian Games medal tally to five golds and four bronzes.
With two more days of competition in athletics and the equestrian team expected to prominently figure in the medal chase, Saudi Arabia are likely to match or surpass their haul of seven gold, one silver and one bronze medals from the 2002 Busan Games.
A day after a golden double by Hassan Yahya Habeeb in the men’s 100 meters and Hussain Taher Al-Saba in the men’s long jump, the 25-year old Al-Bishi added another gold with a powerful burst in the final bend to win his event in 45.64 seconds that was 1.08 shy of the Asian record of Omani Mohamed Al-Malky set in Budapest in 1988.
“I was looking forward to the gold medal and expect that I could win it,” Al-Bishi told Arab News yesterday. “The competition was strong today, but I made it.”
Of his teammates performance, Al-Bishi said that the Saudi athletes have proved themselves in athletics and brought a good number of medals.
“Although the record holder Hadi Soaan was ranked fifth today in the 400m hurdles final, being part of the Saudi athletics team in the Asian Games 2006 is an honor for us all.” Sultan Al-Dawodi, 29, threw the disc to a distance of 60.82 for the bronze, the second for the Saudi athletics team after Ahmed Faez Bin Marzouq in the men’s long jump.
The Saudis were shut out of the medals in the 400m hurdles after Soaan limped home in fifth position with a time of 50.69 and Bander Sharhaeli, 19, in seventh after he stumbled on the track.
While Mohammed Shaween, 20, also bowed out with a sixth-place finish at 3:42.92 in the men’s 1,500 meters Hamed Al-Bishi, Hamdan’s cousin, qualified for the men’s 200m final with a second fastest time of 21.25 in the 1st round heat. His teammate teenager Adel Asseri, 16, also posted the second best time in his heat at 21.75.
Saudi decathlete Saad Al-Bishi, 19, was pulled out on doctor’s orders of the men’s decathlon yesterday in the eleventh hour due to injury to follow teammate Mohammed Al-Qaree, 20, out of the 10-event competition. They both are receiving treatment.
In show jumping individual first qualifier, the two riders, Khaled Al-Eid, and Prince Abdullah ibn Miteb were ranked 1st in their respective rounds. Abdullah Al-Sharbatly finished sixth and Kamal Bahamdan 20th.
The four-rider Saudi equestrian team topped round 1.
Bader Al-Sheikh and his brother Hassan failed to win another medal in the men’s Masters event. Hassan carded a 16-game series of 3,586 and Bader had 3,462 to miss the stepladder final with their rankings of 9th and 14th respectively.
The Al-Sheikh brothers, however, produced the Kingdom’s first gold medal with a victory in the doubles. Bader added the all events gold and the bowling team also claimed the bronze medals in the trios and team of five events. The Saudi water polo team suffered a 14-2 drubbing from China and failed to advance past the preliminary rounds at Al-Sadd Aquatic Center with a 1-4 record.
The other Saudi losses on the day were in 9-ball pool singles round of 32 where Yousef Al-Wadi, 22, took an 11-5 defeat from Japanese Satoshi Kawabata at Al-Sadd Multi-Purpose Hall and in Greco-Roman wrestling 55kg preliminary round where Ali Alagzam dropped his match against Filipino Margarito Angana 4-1 and Maher Al-Barqawi received a 4-0 thrashing from Turkmenistan’s Termirlan Abishev in the 66kg category.
• World champion 1500m runner Rashid Ramzi failed in his quest to defend his Asian Games crown yesterday as drugs reared their ugly head again with two Uzbeki weightlifters disqualified for failing dope tests.
Chinese tennis star Li Na, meanwhile, got her drive to end her breakthrough season on a high off to a winning start, shrugging off an ankle injury to beat Indonesia’s Sandy Gumulya 6-1, 6-3 and move into the quarterfinals. At the end of day nine, China had 110 gold medals to Japan’s 38, with South Korea rapidly closing the gap after success on the wrestling and taekwondo mats.
Bahrain’s Ramzi became the first major casualty of the games as Qatar’s Daham Najm Bashair caused an upset, edging former Kenyan compatriot Belal Mansoor Belal on the line to leave Ramzi in third.Mubarak Hassan Shami, like Bashair a Qatari but Kenyan-born, added to the hosts glory with gold in the marathon. China won two gold while Japan collected three. But for the second day running drugs overshadowed the action.
Elmira Ramileva, just 16, was found to be taking anabolic steroids, while the experienced Alexander Urinov, 33, tested positive to cannabis.
Ramileva finished fifth in the women’s 69kg category, while Urinov finished seventh in the men’s 105kg heavyweight division. It followed a positive dope test by Myanmar weightlifter Kyi Kyi Than, who was disqualified on Saturday. The men’s and women’s tennis singles got under way with drawcard Li, ranked 21 in the world, off to a winning start. “I’m taking one match at a time rather than thinking about the final, but China is my main competition,” she said, brushing off the threat of India’s Sania Mirza, who also won easily yesterday. The men’s tournament has lost its top drawcard, defending champion Paradorn Srichaphan of Thailand, who withdrew last week with an injured wrist, leaving the door open for South Korea’s Lee Hyung-Taik to relieve him of his title. Meanwhile, India crashed out of the men’s field hockey, leaving the former champions facing an uncertain future in a sport they once ruled. India drew 1-1 with South Korea in a match they had to win to qualify for the semifinals and now face a real threat of missing the Olympics for the first time.
— With input from agencies
