Chinese gold puts swimming in mainstream

Inspired by golden results at the Olympics, swimming is gaining momentum in China as a mainstream competitive sport as well as a popular exercise appealing to the public.

Chinese swimmers' triumph at the Rio Olympics on Monday, highlighted by men's freestyle specialist Sun Yang's 200m gold medal, has underlined the country's ascent to the elite echelon of the sport and ignited enthusiasm on social media in China.

After finishing his strongest event, the 400m, as runner-up on Saturday, Sun secured China's first swimming title in Rio by clocking 1 min 44.64 sec in the 200m final, 0.55 sec ahead of South Africa's Chad le Clos and 0.58 sec ahead of Conor Dwyer of the United States.