Yang Wei of China salutes on awarding ceremony after the men's parallel bars of Gymnastics Artistic at Doha Asiad in Doha, Qatar, yesterday. Yang shares the gold medal with Kim Dae Eun of South Korea in the event by a score of 16.300. -Xinhua

Chinese gymnast Yang Wei became the most titled athlete in the 15th Asian Games after taking his fourth gold medal from the parallel bars yesterday, when China won 16 more gold medals to make it 76 in total.

Yang, winner of three events at last October's world championships in Aarhus, Denmark, shared the parallel bars title with South Korean Kim Dae Eun with 16.300 points, adding to his three gold medals in the team, all-around and rings.

The 26-year-old, who made his Asian Games debut in the 1998 Bangkok Games, thus tied Chinese legend Li Ning's eight golds as the most prolific male gymnast in the Asiad history.

Yang said China's goal is to beat reigning Olympic team champion Japan in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.

"Japan is our target to beat in the 2008 Olympics," added Yang.

Cheng Fei, also a triple gold medal winner at the Aahus Worlds,claimed her third gold in Doha after winning the floor event with ease, following her top honors in the team and vault competitions.

China has much more to celebrate in gymnastics, winning three gold and three silver medals from the day's five apparatus finals.Veteran Zhang Nan continued her impressive form on the beam to grab the balance-oriented title.

Zhang's gold was China's ninth gymnastics title in Doha and also the 100th her team has won since they made an Asian Games debut in 1974.

Gao Jian, China's gymnastics chief, warned his students of complacency. "We cannot forget the humiliating defeats in the Athens Olympic Games, where we won only one gold medal. We have experienced a lot of difficulties and we should remember to win more honors in the Olympic Games."

DPR Korea captured a gymnastics gold through Ri Se Gwang, who proved victorious in the men's vault. Japanese Hisashi Mizutori went away with the men's horizontal title.

The swimming pool also witnessed a Chinese triple gold medalist.Xu Yanwei won the women's 100m freestyle to add her third gold to the 50m free and the 4x100m freestyle relay.

Arch rivals China and Japan kept racing head by head in the limelight when each seized three out of the six swimming gold medals on offer.

Chen Zuo powered to defend the men's 100m free in an Asian record time after he had to settle with two silver medals in 4x100m and 4x200m free relay while Japan claimed golds in both events.

In women's 200m breaststroke, former world record holder Qi Hui stormed to finish in 2:23.93 as the Athens Olympic Games sixth-place finisher took her second title in her favorite event to add to her 400m individual medley gold.

Japanese Hidemasa Sano overcame compatriot and Asian record holder Ken Takakuwa for the men's 200m individual medley gold and Reiko Nakamura triumphed in women's 100m backstroke.

In the last event of the night, Yurie Yano beat China's 400m free champion Yang Jieqiao for the 800m free title.

Weightlifters ended their Asian Games competitions on Wednesday,with China winning one of the last three golds through Mu Shuangshuang in the women's over 75kg category. The other two golds went to Iran's Hossein Reza Zadeh in the men's over 105kg and Syria's Ahed Joughili in the men's 105kg.

After the five-day competition, China captured 10 golds and four silvers to take the lead in the medal standings while Kazakhstan followed with two golds and one silver. Thailand took the third with one gold, three silvers and two bronzes.

Ma Wenguang, president of Chinese Weightlifting Association, was happy with the results but he has also set his sights on the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

"We came to Doha not just for winning gold medals, they need more practice especially in big international events like the Asian Games. These experience will help them, especially youngsters, to keep calm in the Beijing Olympics," Ma told Xinhua.

Chinese sharpshooters marched on by grabbing five gold medals in all five events they had competed on Wednesday. On the overall gold rankings, China is leading with 24. The shooting competition will conclude on Friday with 10 more gold medals at stake.

China qualified for the knock-out stage after beating Oman 2-1 in a bad-tempered men's soccer match. Oman, who could only qualify by beating China by a big margin, saw their chance evaporate after having two players sent off. Earlier in the day, Japan was shut out of the quarterfinals after losing 2-1 to DPR Korea.

China and Japan all reached the last eight in the men's basketball event. NBA prospect Yi Jianlian had 28 points and nine rebounds in less than 23 minutes to lift China over Chinese Taipei101-65. Japan claimed its third win in a row by defeating Uzbekistan 75-56 to share a 3-0 record with China in Group B.

The day saw two big names suffered heartbreaking blows. Thai tennis star Paradorn Srichaphan pulled out of the men's singles event due to a wrist injury and China's table tennis star Wang Nan was upset in her semifinal clash by Tie Yana of Hong Kong, China.

But Chinese table tennis coaches should get relieved as they took a gold medal in the women's doubles event. China also secured the men's singles title as Ma Lin and Wang Hao have set up an all-Chinese final.

After the fifth day's competition, a total of 19 countries and regions have won gold medals. China leads the medal table with 76 golds, followed by Japan with 22 and South Korea with 15. Kazakhstan is fourth with 10.