Hidilyn Diaz's Chinese coach admits mixed feelings after Olympic gold

Hidilyn Diaz's Chinese coach, Gao Kaiwen, admitted that he has mixed feelings over his ward's historic gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

Hidilyn beat his compatriot, Liao Qiuyun, to rule the women's weightlifting 55-kg category on Monday.

In an interview with Xinhua News, the coach lauded Hidilyn's efforts while preparing for the Olympiad but spared some thoughts for Liao.

"It is not an easy job for a girl coming from a poor family of Zamboanga City, the Philippines, to keep up intense training at the age of 30," said Gao.

"It was a great pity to watch the athlete from my country take a silver," he added.

Hidilyn and Liao were neck and neck in the snatch with identical 97 kg lifts, but the Filipina went to a higher gear in the clean and jerk.

Liao answered Hidilyn's 124 kg second lift with 126 kg in her final attempt, but the 2016 Rio silver medalist accepted the challenge and successfully lifted 127 kg to take the gold.

It was the Philippines' first ever gold medal at the Olympic Games.

—MGP, GMA News