China's Cheng Fei competes during the floor competition at the Olympic women's qualification on Sunday, August 10, 2008.
China took an overall lead and the United States finished second at the Olympic women's qualification on Sunday, kicking off the anticipated two-way battle between the two powerhouses.
Coming out in the first subdivision in the morning, the hosts overcame a crash fall off the uneven bars by He Kexin and stood the challenge from the United States, who competed later in the afternoon session.
They collected a total of 248.275 points to stay atop, outperforming the injury-hit United States by 1.475 while Russian were third in 244.400 with an average performance on each apparatus.
Chinese started with a solid performance although an unlucky draw put them first on the risky balance beam.
Cheng Fei contributed to the hosts in particular, giving the best in her two favorite exercises floor and vault.
Everything went fine for the Chinese until He, one of the favorites for the uneven bars title, lost her grip to the low bar after a fly from the high.
She remounted the bar to finish her routine, but burst into tears as soon as dismounting. Fortunately enough, she still managed 15.725 points to stay within the top eight for a final place, thanks to an amazing difficulty of 7.5 and some dazzling fly elements.
Jiang Yuyuan became the other upset of the Chinese team, sitting on the mat after her vault, but her execution of the other three exercises were more than enough to lift her into the all-around final.
Already hit by Chellsie Memmel's injury, the Americans were further more handicapped as Samantha Peszek sprained her left ankle in the warm-up right before the qualification.
The injured duo each competed on one event - uneven bars, and the U.S. could put up only four gymnasts on the other three apparatus, leaving no room for error.
However, it was exactly the mistakes on the uneven bars that cost the Americans' most of the points.
Memmel, who had to give up all-around due to her ankle's injury before the Games, crashed off the bar mid-routine and Nastia Liukin immediately added to the drama by an awkward dismount, rolling backwards to her bottom.
Memmel said of the fall after the qualification:"It was a surprise. I have not missed it in workout at all. I am not hurt due to the fall. It was just a mistake I need to fix and I will have to train harder."
Liukin, making mistakes on the same apparatus, also vowed that they will came back as a stronger team in the finals although injuries left the team short-handed.
"It was my dismount, so I have training tomorrow and I can fix it. I'm just concentrating on the finals.
"We have four in our team for the finals, and you only have to find three strong girls for each event. We're confident we can come away with a good score." she said.
Shawn Johnson maintained the stability that gave her the all-around world champion last year, accumulating 62.725 points after all four rotations to lead the qualification of women's all-around. Liukin was the second best despite her blunder, edging China's Yang Yilin by 0.025 points.
Both the United States and China clinched final berths in all six events but Chinese sat first on all the four individual apparatus with Yang topping uneven bars, Li Shanshan leading on beam and Cheng dominating vault and floor.
"I am happy with my work today," said Cheng Fei, the only member in the Chinese team with Olympic experience who is seen as the core of the Chinese team.
The 20-year-old admitted she felt the nerves when she took the floor after Jiang's flawed vaults. "I know I have to cheer myself up as I know I must set a model for my teammates after me. I am happy I managed it well." she said.
Lu Shanzhen, head coach of the Chinese women, said he would give his girls 70 points out of a total of 100 for their show, as He made a mistake which she should not have made on her speciality.
"It's a great pity that Kexin failed. We had hoped she could bring home a gold medal on uneven bars," Lu said.
Lu said she had a high difficulty and almost finished all her difficult manoeuvers before the fall. "She failed in a movement which is comparatively easy and that makes her failure even more regretful," Lu said.
But Lu said overall he is satisfied, in particular, with his team's first two apparatus of beam and floor exercise.
"I had been worried about our beam performance as it's our first apparatus and also one easy to make mistakes, but they did an excellent job," Lu said.
Defending champions Romania had placed third but were shoved down to the fourth by the Russians, who competed later in the evening subdivision.
The Russians were average on each apparatus with Ksenia Semenova, Anna Pavlova and Ksenia Afanasyeva sitting in sequence from fourth to sixth in all-around.
A fabulous routine on uneven bars gave the 15-year-old Semenova 16.475 points, a second highest score on the apparatus, making her a strong title contender in the finals.
She also showed her strength on all-around, placing fourth in 61.475.
Though there's a gap of almost 10 points between them and first-placed China, Romania's coach Nicolae Forminte said that they felt OK with a totally different lineup from the Olympic champion team four years ago.
"I'm satisfied and the team did not make big mistakes. They did not fall during their routines. It's not their best, they can do better. And I hope they do their best in the final."
"We only had one fall on the Beam (from Andreea Acatrinei). We have to accept it. There's no solution. I thought that would happen to her since she's a younger one on the team," he said.
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