India garnered the women's 4x400m relay gold in 3 minutes and 30.84 seconds at the Busan Asian Gameson Sunday morning, beating China, which used to be the winner in Asia, to the third place in 3:32.43.

Kazakhstan finished second in 3:31.72. At the 1998 Bangkok Asian Games, China took the gold of the event, followed by India and Kazakhstan.

Qin Wangping, the final sprinter of the Chinese women's 4x100m relay team who also ran first in the 4x400m relay final, said, "I felt really tired as I attended two competitions today."

"India is our arch rival as expected. We had to be in 5-meter lead over them after the baton three if we try to beat their last runner KM Beenamol, who took the gold of women's 800m race in 2:04.17 on Tuesday afternoon and finished second in 400m race." Luo Chaoyi, the Chinese athletics team manager, said.

"However, instead of taking the lead, we trailed five meters when the fourth runner dashed out," Luo added.

Feng Shuyong, a Chinese team official, told Xinhua, "The women's 4x400m relay used to be our strong event. But our strength is going downward now, which was the main reason for losing the titletoday."

"Additionally, our athletes failed to keep calm when they trailed India in the first lap, and the second and third Chinese runners made mistakes in tactics as they ran too fast in their first 200 meters." he said.

"Although they caught up with their opponents at the half, theylagged behind again in the end as their power allocation was poor," he added.

"There were nearly 40 minutes between the women's 4x100m and 4x400m relay races, which is enough for an outstanding runner, whocompetes in both, to recover. Qin's poor form in the first lap also indicated that we are not that strong as before." Feng admitted.

(Xinhua News Agency October 13, 2002)