Top Ten Athletes of China for Year 2001

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, December 30, 2001

Top Ten Athletes of China for Year 2001

Following are the top ten athletes of China for the year of 2001 selected by Xinhua News Agency:

1. Wang Nan

The table tennis player notched up titles in women's team, singles and doubles events at the 46th World Table Tennis Championships in April and grabbed both women's singles and doubles titles in November's Ninth National Games.

2. Zhu Chen

The 25-year-old beat Russian Alexandra Kosteniuk 3-1 to claim the women's world chess title in December, becoming the first Chinese to win the honor since Xie Jun was crowned at the world championships in 1991.

3. Wang Liqin

The young paddler fared well this year when he bagged all three golds in men's team, singles and doubles events at the 46th World Table Tennis Championships in April.

He shone again at the 21st World Summer University Games in Beijing by claiming another three titles in men's team, singles and mixed events. He also won men's singles and doubles crowns at January's Pro Tour Grand Finals in Yokohama, Japan.

4. Luo Xuejuan

Luo Xuejuan became China's first ever world champion in breaststroke after winning the 50m and 100m events at the 9th FINA world championships held in Fukuoka, Japan, in July.

The 17-year-old also claimed the 100m breaststroke gold in the Ninth National Games. Later she clocked 30.56 seconds to beat the short-course world record for the women's 50m breaststroke at the Shanghai leg of the FINA World Cup series.

5. Yuan Hua

Olympic champion Yuan snatched the gold medal of the women's over 78-kg category at the 29th World Judo Championships in Munich, Germany. She was also the title winner in the same division at the East Asian Games and the 21st World Summer University Games. In the ninth national games, the judoka snatched the title of women's open-weight category.

6. Dong Yanmei

The runner set an Asian record in the women's 3,000m event at the world indoor athletics championships in Lisbon, Portugal, clocking a time of eight minutes 41.34 seconds. A star runner in the "Ma's Army" coached by Ma Junren, she swept all titles of the 5,000m and 10,000m events in East Asian Games, World University Games and Ninth National Games.

7. Sun Wen

Sun joined the Atlanta Beat club of the inaugural Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA) league in February. She came back to help her hometown team retain its title at the November's ninth national games.

As an Asian representative, she attended the drawing ceremony for next year's World Cup finals. She was also nominated as one of the three finalists for the first-ever "World Female Player of the Year" by FIFA, and finished runner-up to American Mia Hamm.

8. Yang Yang (A)

2001 was a golden year for the ace woman skater from Heilongjiang province, northeast of China. She was impressive in ISU World Cup short track speedskating series, notching up the 500m gold in the opening stage in Changchun, northeast of China, in September, the title in 1,500m at the third stop of World Cup in Calgary, Canada and four golds at the fifth stop in women's 500m, 1,500m, individual all-round and 3,000m relay events in Sofia, Bulgaria. At November's ninth national games, she won women's individual all-round title.

Early this year she also helped China win the World Short Track Speedskating Team Championships held in Nagano, Japan.

9. Wang Zhizhi

Wang, one of the most popular and promising basketball players in China, joined Dallas Mavericks in April to become the first Asian in NBA, the world's top basketball league. He came back in November to help Chinese Army team to claim the title at the ninth national games.

10. Chen Ying

She beat Olympic and world champion Tao Luna twice in the women's 10m air pistol and 25m sports pistol 60 shots rapid-fire events, producing the biggest upset in the shooting events of the ninth national games.

Top Ten China and World Sports News of 2001