China's Wang Kun joins elite club after winning Mizuno Half-Marathon
Wang Kun added his name to the illustrious list of winners of the Mizuno Hong Kong Half-Marathon shield after the 23-year-old native of Jiangsu province destroyed an impressive line-up of local distance runners at Tai Mei Tuk on Sunday.
Wang's name will be engraved alongside that of former world and Olympic marathon champion Gezahegne Abera, who competed in the 10th anniversary event 12 years ago and who described the demanding Bride's Pool Road course as one of the toughest he had ever run.
Like many of Sunday's 3,000-strong field, Wang was using the race as a final warm-up for the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon, which takes place in three weeks' time.
This was a good warm-up race for me as the Hong Kong marathon course is also quite hilly, and of course I'm delighted to have won the race today
"I'll be defending the half-marathon title I won last year," said Wang, who has been studying physical education in Macau for the past four years, and who won Sunday's race in one hour, 12 minutes and 29 seconds.
"This was a good warm-up race for me as the Hong Kong marathon course is also quite hilly, and of course I'm delighted to have won the race today."
Baptist University student Tang Man-wa was hoping to line up for the full marathon next month with a victory under his belt, however he had no answer to the increase in pace that Wang set on the final five kilometres over Plover Cove dam.
"It would have been good to win the race today, but I'm not too disappointed as I ran much better today than I did in the 15km championships two weeks ago at Sheung Shui," said Tang, 21, who finished in 1:14:52. "I'm still young so I have plenty of time to win races."
Ngai Kang, winner of last week's SPT 30km pre-marathon, was overall third place in 1:15:12, after a sprint finish saw him cross the line three seconds ahead of the in-form Wong Wang-keung.
Teacher Kong Lai-ming, 28, won a depleted women's race in 1:27:03, which was 11 seconds slower than her personal best.
Kong, whose winning time was the slowest since the inaugural event in 1994, beat Lam Ka-yan (1:28:54) and Fan Ka-king (1:29:29).
