(Beijing, June 1) The Beijing marathon swimming tournament, an Olympic qualifying event, closed at Beijing's Shunyi Olympic Rowing-Canoeing Park today, bringing an end to all the "Good Luck Beijing" Sport Events ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games.

All together 72 athletes from 34 countries and regions competed in the two-day event with 11 men and 11 women swimmers qualifying for the upcoming Olympics.

On the men's side, Bulgaria's Petar Stoychev won the gold in 1:59:13.8, followed by Hungary's Csaba Gercsak and Czech Republic's Ristislav Vitek. "There's no secret of my victory. I just made good preparation and seized the opportunity," said a modest Stoychev after his win.

"I did my best to catch up with the others and fortunately the wind changed its direction before the end point. It was much favorable for my spurt and finally I got the second place," said Csaba Gercsak, the runner-up, obviously satisfied with his performance today.

Also qualified for the Olympics by placing fourth to seventh were South Africa's Chad Ho (1:59:35.5), Venezuela's Enwin Maldonado (1:59:37.9), Brazil's Allan Do Carmo (1:59:38.8) and Argentina's Damian Blaum (1:59:39.1).

Finishing eighth was another Czech swimmer Jakub Fichtl who, unfortunately, could not go to the Beijing Games as the only Olympic ticket for the Czech Republic had been given to his compatriot Ristislav Vitek, bronze medalist at the race.

Same thing happened to the teams of Venezuela, Spain and Israel, as Venezuela's Rolando Salas (No. 10), Spain's Diego Nogueira (No. 12) and Israel's Michael Dmitriev (No. 13) all had to give up the Olympic marathon swimming competition after their teammates had qualified with better results.

The remaining four Olympic berths went to Israel's Daniel Katzir (No. 9), Spain's Jose Francisco Hervas (No. 11) and Portugal's Arseniy Lavrentyev (No. 14) and Ukraine's Lgor Chervynskiy (No. 15).

In the women's qualification yesterday, American Chloe Sutton clocked 2:00:48.5 to finish first, ahead of Italian Martina Grimaldi and her compatriot Alice Franco, who were 2:01:19.7 and 2:01:36.5 respectively.

According to the International Swimming Federation (FINA), each NOC could dispatch two athletes with only one being eligible for the Olympics, and the silver medalist Martina Grimaldi turned out to be the lucky one getting a spot in the 2008 Olympic tournament.

"Until the last lap I was still behind her (Franco). It's such a pity that she did not qualify for the Olympic Games," Grimaldi was quoted as saying.

Greek Marianna Lymperta clocked 2:02:10.7 to be the fourth and Ukrainian Naraliya Samorodina (2:02:25.3) and Chilean Kristel Kobrich (2:02:47.8) sat in fifth and sixth tandem.

Mexico and Slovenia each had two swimmers in the top 11 with the tickets being awarded to No.7 Mexican Imelda Martinez and No.10 Teja Zupan of Slovenia.

The other four tickets belonged to No.9 Eva Berglund of Sweden, No.12 Argentine Antonella Bogarin, No.13 Olga Beresneva of Israel and No.14 Daniela Inacio of Portugal.

Host China did not take part in the competitions as it had earned one wild card in the men's event and qualified for the women's through Fang Yanqiao, who finished as a continental champion earlier in the World Championships.

The Shunyi Olympic Rowing-Canoeing Park, located in the north-eastern Beijing along the Chaobai River and covering an area of 32,000 square meters, is the venue for rowing, canoeing and marathon swimming of the Beijing Olympic Games as well as for rowing of the Paralympic Games. It is the world's only rowing-canoeing venue that boasts both flat water and slalom courses.

Commenting on the venue, men's gold medalist Petar Stoychev said, "I took part in the World Championships in Spain three weeks ago and the venue there can't match this one. The water here is very clean. The organizers and the volunteers did a brilliant job. Thanks to the Beijing Olympic Games Organizing Committee for providing us with such good facilities," he added.

As of today, all the 43 "Good Luck Beijing" sport events, customized for the 2008 Olympic Games, have been completed since August last year.