Chunxiu takes gold

The 28-year-old from Jiangsu became the seventh woman in history to go under 2:20 when she won March's Seoul marathon in 2:19.51 and was a class apart on a sunny but blowy morning in Doha.

"I was in good shape today," said Zhou. "The weather was not good, it was really windy but due to my training I was up to my usual standard and quite confident."

Japan is traditionally the Asian power in women's marathon but some of their best runners ran instead at last Sunday's Fukuoka marathon, a selection race for next year's World Championships.

Kiyoko Shimahara and Kayoko Obata kept the Japanese flag flying, however, by taking silver and bronze.

Shimahara pipped her 35-year-old compatriot by just four seconds in a time of 2:30.34, more than three minutes behind the Chinese.

"I could do better," said Zhou, who will be one of the favourites for the marathon title at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

"I once did two hours twenty so I could do better."

Maryam Yusuf Jamal became the second East African import to win an Asian Games track gold for Bahrain in two days with a dominant victory in the women's 800m.

The Ethiopian-born Jamal struck out on her own just before the bell to come home in a time of 2:01.81 on a cool evening at the Khalifa stadium.

Kenyan-born Tareq Mubarak Salem won the men's 3,000m steeplechase on Friday for Bahrain's first gold of the Games.

Santhi Soundarajan pipped Viktoriya Yalovtseva at the line to win a popular silver for India in 2.03.16, while the Kazakh took bronze in 2.03.19.

Saudi Arabia relied on home-grown talent to take gold in the men's long jump despite the absence of injured Asian record holder Mohamed Al Khuwalidi.

Hussain Taher Al Saba retained the title he won in Pusan four years ago with the only jump of the day over eight metres, leaping 8.02m at his third attempt.

Kuwaiti Saleh Al Hadad grabbed a personal best 7.88m on his final jump for silver while Al Saba's compatriot Ahmed Faez Bin Marzouq took bronze with 7.85m on his final attempt to leave China's Zhang Xiaoyi without a medal.

Kazakhstan's Olga Rypakova got her golden reward for two days of effort over seven events in the heptathlon, while Indians Soma Biswas and JJ Shobha took silver and bronze.