A water sports contest kicks off at Xishanyang Lake in Huzhou's Wuxing district on June 3. [Photo/hz66.com]

A water sports contest, featuring over 500 contestants from 20 prestigious universities including Peking University, Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Fudan University, and Nanjing University, took place on June 3 at Xishanyang Lake in Huzhou's Wuxing district.

The two-day event included a lakeside race, a 200-meter dragon boat race, and a 200-meter kayak race.

Chen Lijing, a member of Nanjing University's dragon boat team, expressed her excitement at the opportunity to visit the city and participate in the event.

"I'm really excited about this great opportunity, coming to a beautiful city, and we want to do our best," said Chen.

In addition, a water sports training base funded by Zhejiang University was inaugurated at the lake, and plans are underway to build a standard water training ground measuring 2,000 meters in length, 100 meters in width, and 2 meters in depth.

Huzhou has a strong track record of hosting prestigious sports events such as the 16th Provincial Games of Zhejiang and the Chinese Super League football games. As a co-host city of the 19th Asian Games, the city is gearing up to deliver an exciting Asian sporting extravaganza, which is eagerly anticipated by fans worldwide.

According to Dai Ru, Party chief of the Wuxing Bureau of Culture, Tourism and Sports, hosting a national event such as this will boost the development of water sports in Wuxing and inject new momentum into the district's cultural and tourism sector.