Olympics - China's Xing will not defend 10,000m title in Beijing

BEIJING (Reuters) - Olympic champion Xing Huina will not defend her women's 10,000 metres title on home soil at the Beijing Olympics in August because of a leg injury, the Chinese Athletics Association confirmed on Monday.

The 24-year-old Shandong native would not take part in this week's China Open Athletics meeting at Beijing's "Bird's Nest" National Stadium, her last chance of qualifying for the Aug. 8-24 Olympics, a CAA spokeswoman said.

"A persistent leg muscle injury has been affecting her training... therefore she has had to pull out of the test event, and definitely the Olympics too," Wu Yong, director of the Shandong Provincial Athletics Centre, told Hebei newspaper Yanzhao Metropolis Daily on Sunday.

Xing, who runs with a distinctive shuffling gait, surprised even herself by sprinting past Ethiopians Ejegayehu Dibaba and Derartu Tulu down the home straight to win the 10,000 metres in Athens.

After missing last year's world championships in Osaka because of a long-standing knee injury, Xing moved to the U.S. in January to train with Bernard Lagat's Chinese-born coach James Li.

Xing lost her former coach Wang Dexian when he was banned for life after another of his charges, Sun Yingjie, failed a drugs test in 2005.

Former 10,000m world championship bronze medallist Sun, who finished fifth behind Xing in Athens, has served her two-year drug ban and will be on the track at the Bird's Nest this week.

Outside the women's marathon and men's 110 metres, where world champion and world record holder Liu Xiang is expected to defend his title, China have few athletics medal hopes for the Beijing Olympics.

Despite the blow, Xing planned to continue her career and had targeted an appearance at the 11th National Games in her home province next year, the paper said.