China's Olympic champion Han Xiaopeng claimed the men's freestyle aerials while woman biathlete Liu Xianying won the 15km individual race.

    The 24-year-old Han, who is still recovering from an ankle injury sustained ahead of the competition, scored 223.89 points in a field of eight athletes from four countries and regions to claim his first Asian gold medal.

    It is the second gold medal for China in the freestyle skiing after Olympic silver medallist Li Nina won the women's aerials on Wednesday.

    In biathlon, Chinese women biathletes seemed invincible at the ongoing Asian Winter Games by sweeping all gold medals.

    Liu Xianying and Kong Yingchao finished the top two positions in the 15km individual race, splitting the gold and silver medals between themselves for the third time in a row at the Games.

    China will make a clean sweep of the women's events if it takes the 4x6km relay on Friday.

    "We are good enough to win, but we can not take anything for granted," said Siebert, head coach of the Chinese biathlon squad. " We have to fight for the gold."

    Chinese women biathletes have done a good job at international stage this season, but they have to work very hard to enhance their hope for a medal at the Vancouver Olympics in 2010, according to Siebert.

    "This season, our athletes were good at shooting most of the time, and their running is OK," Siebert said. "But we have to improve stability, because shooting is so important in biathlon," the 52-year-old German added.

    Freestyle aerials turned out to be another arena where Chinese skiers rule the roost on the Asian level as they had no trouble in sweeping both men's and women's titles.

    Han pulled out two superb jumps in a field of eight athletes to claim his first Asiad gold medal on Thursday.

    "Chinese skiers are too good for the opponents and we have a handful of top athletes for aerials," said Rao Gang, team leader of the Chinese freestyle squad. "The youngsters are also catching up."

    Han's teammates Qiu Sen, Liu Zhongqing and Li Ke finished second to fourth respectively on the scoreboard. Fifth-ranked Japanese Kotaro Kurata shared the bronze medal with Liu according to the OCA rules that one team can not sweep all medals in freestyle skiing.

    "The Chinese skiers are great, it is hard to beat them now," said Kurata, the number one aerials skier in Japan.

    Han came to spotlight in the Turin Winter Olympics by claiming the men's aerials title, but he did not hit the top gear in last year's World Cup series due to injury, finishing in second place at Beidahu and Spindleruv, the Czech Republic, respectively.

    "I did not ski my best and the strong wind also affected my performance. I am very happy with the result and I think it was a little bit luck as my teammates all had chance to win," said Han, now ranked fifth in the world.

    "My leg still hurt a lot when I was landing, so I have to treat my injury seriously. Many other important competitions are waiting ahead."

    "My next goal will be the World Championships, I have been preparing for the world title," added Han, who started the 2007 campaign with a second place finish at the Deer Valley World Cup series, the United States on Jan. 12.

    Kazakhstan registered the third gold medal as Alexandr Chervyakov beat Chinese Zhang Qing to win the men's 20km individual biathlon event.

    Japan demonstrated their supremacy in Alpine skiing again when veteran Yasuhiro Ikuta won the men's giant slalom title.

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