GUANGZHOU, March 24 (Xinhua) -- Teenager Sheng Lihao continued to impress at the Chinese shooting Olympic qualification series, winning a berth in the 10m air rifle mixed team event here on Wednesday after qualifying for the men's individual a day earlier.
Guangzhou is the final stop of the qualification series for Tokyo 2020. The top two athletes in the men's and women's total tally will be able to compete on the Olympic stage as China won two mixed team places for Tokyo.
The 16-year-old Sheng breezed past Liu Yukun 16-2 in the final, which earned him enough qualification points to climb up second on the total tally after 2014 Youth Olympics champion Yang Haoran.
"I feel really honored to be able to compete at the Olympics; I'm very happy," said a timid Sheng in front of cameras.
Yang also secured an individual spot on Tuesday, finished fourth with zero qualification points in the competition. However, his excellence in the previous stops was enough for him to stand high on the tally with 242 points, 40 higher than Sheng.
In the women's final, Ma Yuting had three perfect shots, but the same number of sub-10 performances was unable to match a more steady Zhang Yu, who bagged the victory 17-11.
The win granted Zhang 41 qualification points that pushed her up to the second at 176 points, edging Wang Luyao by four points and World Cup champion Zhao Ruozhu by six points.
The other ticket goes to national champion Yang Qian, who did not make it to the last four on Wednesday but managed 200 points in the previous stops.
Although the four qualified athletes have been decided, how they will be paired up still needs consideration, team manager Wang Lian said.
The 10m air rifle mix team is a newly-introduced event at Tokyo 2020. Enditem
