BEIJING, Aug 17: China on Sunday ensured their home Olympics will go down as their greatest ever after the hosts’ eclipsed their previous best tally of 32 gold medals at Athens in 2004, ending the day with 35.

The powerhouse country has progressively improved its medal standing over the past 20 years and is determined to beat the United States and end the Beijing showpiece as the world’s dominant sporting nation.

Publicly, China’s leadership have played down the country’s sporting ambitions but in reality its athletes have been under extreme pressure to perform well with nationalistic pride at stake.

In the drive to beat the previous mark, they are fielding 639 competitors in Beijing — up from the 407 sent to Greece.

The 33rd medal came when their women’s table tennis team beat Singapore 3-0 in the team final, with Guo Yue and Zhang Yining clinching the decisive doubles rubber.

The significance of the achievement was highlighted by President Hu Jintao being in the VIP box alongside International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge.

They also have 13 silver and 13 bronze, to the United States’ 19 gold, 21 silver and 25 bronze.

Sixteen of their gold have come in judo, shooting, and weightlifting, which has pleased Chinese officials.

“Most of the Chinese competitors fully displayed their abilities to realize the goal of achieving good results on home soil,” said Cui Dalin, deputy chef de mission of the Chinese delegation.

“We are especially pleased by our athletes in judo, shooting and weightlifting. But every single medal is meaningful in its own way and won through painstaking efforts by our athletes.”

But he cautioned that the goldrush would ease in the final week of the Olympics.

“Generally speaking, Chinese athletes are not strong contenders in many events in the second half of the Games,” said Cui. “With events like track and field, China’s pace in winning gold medals will slow down.”

Eight golds were won by China on Sunday.

Gymnast Xiao Qin equalled the Athens landmark when he won the men’s pommel horse competition.

Xiao, the reigning world champion on the apparatus won on 15.875 ahead of Croatian Filip Ude on 15.725 and Britain’s Louis Smith who also scored 15.725 but was relegated to bronze due to Ude’s superior execution.

It maintained the Chinese men’s team’s 100 percent record at the Beijing Games, with four gold out of four gymnastics events so far contested.

Fellow gymnast Zou Kai earlier won the men’s floor exercise while world junior champion Wang Jiao took gold by beating two-time world senior champion Stanka Zlateva of Bulgaria to win the women’s freestyle wrestling 72kg event.

Guo Jingjing became the most successful female diver in Olympic history when she leapt away from a top-class field to win the women’s three-metre springboard gold.

Her triumph meant she broke the record set by legendary Chinese diver Fu Minxia, who won five Olympic medals in her career.

And Guo, who has said she will retire after the Beijing Games, also became the first diver to sweep both individual and synchro gold in two consecutive Olympic Games.

World No 1 badminton player Lin Dan, a superstar in China, clinched gold in the men’s singles final, outclassing Malaysia’s Lee Chong Wei. Lin produced a silky smooth performance that left second seed Lee hopelessly outgunned, winning 21-12, 21-8 and sparking wild celebrations.

For the first time, the world’s most populous nation won a rowing title when the quartet of Tang Bin, Jin Ziwei, Xi Aihua and Zhang Yangyang upset world champions Great Britain in the women’s quadruple sculls.

Qiu Jian, meanwhile, was gifted the men’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions when American Matthew Emmons cracked under pressure, managing only a miserable 4.4 on his last shot.—AFP