Gymnastic gold and Phelps spur on U.S.

The United States fought back against China in gymnastics on Friday and won handsomely in the pool to restore some of the might of the traditional sporting superpower.

Nastia Liukin led a one-two U.S. victory in women's all-round individual gymnastics, relegating the Chinese to third place and denying them a four out of four sweep of golds in gym events.

"My dad is the reason why I became Olympic champion today," said Liukin, 18, after they became the first daughter-father act to win golds in artistic gymnastics. Father and coach Valery won two golds for the Soviet Union at the 1988 Seoul Olympics.

On the first day of track and field events in the Bird's Nest stadium world record holder Jamaica's Usain Bolt went through to the semi-finals of the men's 100m in ominous ease.

He sauntered through his quarter-final race in 9.92 seconds to qualify fastest, ahead of his big rivals, American world champion Tyson Gay and compatriot Asafa Powell.

The semi-finals and final of the showcase event of the Games are in Saturday's evening session of athletics.

American Michael Phelps scorched to his sixth gold and his sixth world record in the Water Cube pool, closing in on Mark Spitz's 1972 record of seven golds in a Games.

The 23-year-old now has 12 career Olympic golds, three more than anyone else. Like Spitz in 1972, all of his golds at these Games have come in world record times.




Courtesy : reuters