Teng Haibin from Beijing took the crown at the men's gymnastics individual all-around finals at China's 11th National Games in Jinan on Friday.
The Athens Olympic pommel horse champion got 89.350 after he completed six events, including floor exercise, vault, pommel horse, parallel bars, horizontal bars and rings.
Teng was followed by Feng Zhe from southwest China's Sichuan Province, parallel bars gold medalist at the 2008 Stuttgart World Cup, who scored 89.100 points.
Lu Bo from Jiangsu, defending champion at the individual all-around of the 10th National Games, came third with 88.475 points.
Although the three medalists outperformed the other 21 competitors in the six events, they had faced a strong challenge from Zhang Chenglong of host Shandong. Zhang ranked first after all the 24 gymnasts completed the first five events.
Zhang did not do well in pommel horse and was surpassed by Feng Zhe, who presented a solid performance in his specialty horizontal bars with the highest score.
Teng came from behind and finally edged Feng Zhe with 0.25 points as he finished all the six events.
After triple Olympic gold medalist Yang Wei, one of the country's best performers at last year's Beijing Games, has retired, who will be his successor has been paid much attention to.
Beijing coach Bai Yuanshao said in the press conference that there was a long way ahead for Teng to reach the level of Yang Wei.
Teng agreed with his coach, saying he still had weakness in some events and had to take more exercise to catch up with the world top gymnasts.
The gymnastics events of the 11th National Games commenced on September 14 and will end on September 21, with 183 gymnasts from all over China competing for 14 gold medals.
(Xinhua News Agency September 19, 2009)
