BRASILIA, Aug. 30 (Xinhuanet) -- The President of the Brazilian Olympic Committee (COB), Carlos Nuzman, highlighted Monday the sports growth of Asia, whose athletes got a considerable number of medals in the Olympic Games of Athens 2004.

    In the recent competitions, there was a greater distribution of medals and Asia, for instance, had three countries among the top nine in the medal-table: China, Japan and South Korea, Nuzman said in a COB communiqu

    "There was a great sports growth in those countries, mostly in Japan. Countries which in the past only dominated some disciplines,now are managing to impose their hegemony," he added.

    "The US and Cuban athletes were astonished trying to understand how a Chinese took away the gold medal from them in the 110m hurdles," he said. Additionally, in that race, the Chinese runner set an Olympic record.

    With respect to the participation of Brazil, the leader considered himself satisfied and affirmed that Athens represents a historical landmark to the Olympic sports of his country.

    "For the first time the country ended among the top 20. Sports are evolving all over the world, and Brazil is included in this context," Nuzman said.

    "From Atlanta 1996 to this date, Brazil obtained about 50 percent of the 76 medals it had conquered in the history of its Olympic participation. This proves that we're evolving, but this sort of work only evolves after ten or twelve years, so long as there is money and conditions for this," he added.

    The Brazilian delegation got a total of 10 medals in the Athens 2004 Olympiad: four gold, three silver and three bronze, ending 18th in the final medal table. This was the largest number of gold medals for the South American country.

    Nuzman informed that COB prepares a first inspection visit to Beijing.

    "Those will be different games because of the time-difference and there will also be a need to adapt the participants in a different way as it was done in Athens," said the President of the Brazilian Olympic Committee (COB), Carlos A. Nuzman. Enditem