Yan Ziyi wins women's javelin gold with 70.46m, sets Asian Games record in Nagoya

China’s Yan Ziyi won the women’s javelin gold at the Asian Games on Sunday, September 27, throwing 70.46m at the Nagoya City Mizuho Park Athletic Stadium to set a new Asian Games record.

The 18-year-old produced the mark on her first attempt, a distance ranked as the sixth-best in women’s javelin history and comfortably ahead of the previous Asian Games record of 66.09m set by Liu Shiying at Jakarta-Palembang 2018. The competition took place under rainy conditions in Nagoya.

Yan later said she did not expect to move so far ahead with her opening throw. “My plan was to make my first two throws count. But I didn’t expect to reach that distance on my very first throw,” she said. “As an athlete who has competed in many meets and on the international stage, I think it’s very important to adapt to changing conditions.”

Japan’s Olympic champion Haruka Kitaguchi finished second with a best of 62.70m to take silver. Her compatriot Sae Takemoto claimed bronze with a season-best effort of 62.15m.

Yan’s Asian Games victory capped a season that featured multiple major results on the Diamond League circuit: she opened with 67.11m at the Bislett Games in Oslo, produced a 67.44m first-round throw to win the Meeting de Paris, and recorded 68.75m in the final round at the Herculis meet in Monaco in July.

She also registered a 68.42m throw to win the Diamond League Final in Brussels in September, where she bested Haruka Kitaguchi to claim her maiden Diamond League title.

Yan’s gold-winning outing at the Aichi-Nagoya Games capped off a wonderful season for the teenager. Earlier in the year she produced a 71.74m throw at the Diamond League meeting in Xiamen in May that stands as her personal best and is a World U20, Asian and national record; that 71.74m is the second-biggest throw of all time behind Barbora Špotáková’s world record of 72.28m.