BUSAN (South Korea), Oct 7: A drug scandal involving a bronze medal-winning bodybuilder tarnished another world record-breaking day at the Asian Games here Monday.

Lebanese bodybuilder Youssef El Zein was ordered to hand over his bronze medal and left Busan in disgrace after it emerged that he refused to take a dope test following the men’s 90kg final on Sunday.

“I can confirm that the athlete Youssef El Zein has had his medal taken back. He refused to take a drugs test after the bodybuilding final so we had no option,” said sports committee chairman Wei Jizhong.

“Under the guidelines of the (IOC) International Olympic Committee and OCA, any refusal of an anti-doping test shall be considered a positive test,” a statement by the committee said later.

El Zein’s bronze medal will now go to South Korea’s Choi Jae-Duck, who finished fourth, the statement added.

Bodybuilding, a past-time with a notorious history of steroid abuse, is making its debut at these Asian Games. El Zein’s case is a devastating blow to officials who want to see it one day included in the Olympics.

News of El Zein’s case late Monday soured an otherwise entertaining day nine of the games which saw five world records broken in women’s weightlifting as well as the first athletics gold medals settled.

Centre-stage belonged to China’s Sun Ruiping.

Sun lifted 152.5kg, more than double her body weight, in the clean and jerk to gasps of amazement from spectators and organisers. World records are normally broken by a margin of 0.5kg to 2.5kg.

The 20-year-old, who took up weightlifting by accident, also broke the snatch world record with a lift of 118.5kg and the overall mark with a total of 271kg on her way to the gold medal in the womens 75kg class.

Tatyana Khromova of Kazakhstan had set a new world mark of 118kg in the snatch but held it for just a few minutes.

Khromova went on to take the silver medal with a total of 257.5kg. South Korea’s Kim Soon-Hee lifted the bronze on 242.5k.

The fall of five world records brought the total of world weightlifting marks broken at the games to a dozen.

On the opening day of athletics competition, little-fancied Saudi Arabian Makhld al-Otaiba rewrote the form book with a devastating sprint finish to win the men’s 10,000 metres and claim his country’s first ever track gold.

The unheralded 22-year-old produced a withering burst of speed as he broke away from a bunch of five in the final 200m, kissing his hand and punching his fist in the air as he crossed the line.

“This is the most beautiful success in my career,” the 22-year-old al-Otaibi said as he was mobbed by Saudi well-wishers.

Other medals on the opening day on the first day of athletics competion went to Valery Borissov from Kazakhstan and Wang Qingqing of China in the men’s and women’s 20km walk, Anju George from India in the women’s long jump and South Korea’s Lee Young-Sun in the women’s javelin.

In other events, Korean supporters were left disappointed in the men’s team tennis final as the home side slumped to a 2-0 defeat against rivals Japan.

Unheralded duo Michihisa Onoda and Takahiro Terachi stunned Korean fans as Japan avenged their final defeat at the hands of the same opponents at the last Games in Bangkok in 1998.

After Onoda had seen off Yoon Yong-Il, it was left to Terachi to finish the job beating leading Korean player Lee Hyun-Taik 6-4, 6-2 to continue Japan’s recent stranglehold over their rivals.—AFP