Liu Hong crosses the finish line to claim gold in the women’s 20km walk. Photo: AFP

Liu Hong defended her 20km title in style Tuesday to maintain China's gold medal monopoly in women's race walking since it was introduced to the Asian Games in 1986.

Local athlete Liu, who took bronze at the 2009 Berlin worlds a year after finishing fourth at the Beijing Olympics, clocked a season's best of 1 hour 30 minutes 06 seconds on the course outside the Aoti Main Stadium to win gold.

Japan's Masumi Fuchise took silver in 1:30.34, with Li Yanfei, also of China, claiming bronze in 1:32.34 in a race which featured just six competitors.

"We were well prepared," said Liu, who with her Chinese teammates have been training under the watchful eye of legendary Italian coach Sandro Damilano in northern Italy.

"We can predict all the conditions that might happen in the competition so I'm not surprised to get two yellow cards," she said of the warnings she received for failing to keep minimum contact with the track.

The Chinese pair, Fuchise and the second Japanese competitor Mayumi Kawasaki quickly built up a lead on the two other competitors in the race, South Korean Jeon Yeong-eun and Tun Kay Khing Myo Tun of Myanmar.

The quartet went through the 6km mark neck-and-neck, but by the halfway mark Kawasaki had fallen half a minute off the lead pace of 45 minutes 12 seconds.

Two kilometres further on and it was Li, fifth in this year's world race walking cup in Chihauhau, who fell out of gold medal contention, slipping 17 seconds back from the lead duo of Liu and Fuchise.

Fuchise, who was seventh at the Berlin worlds, stuck with the local favourite until the 16km mark.

But the 23-year-old Liu then moved up a gear and motored away from the Japanese walker, putting 15 seconds between the two of them in the space of 2km.

Liu's tactics mirrored exactly those of her teammate Wang Hao, whose spurt with 4km to go ensured him gold in the men's 20km race walking event on Sunday.

Meanwhile, China's Li Yanfeng won gold in the women's discus.

Li threw a season's best of 66.18 metres with teammate and defending champion Song Aimin taking silver (64.04) and India's Commonwealth Games champion Krishna Poonia (61.94) claiming bronze.

Agencies