Pulling for the home team: Vietnamese duo Pham Thi Thao and Pham Thi Hai received a ticket to compete in the Olympic rowing event after their bronze medal at the Asian Rowing Championships last week. — VNA/VNS Photo Ngoc Truong

HA NOI — Viet Nam grabbed three more Olympic tickets at recent weightlifting and rowing events.

Women's duo Pham Thi Thao and Pham Thi Hai finished third in the double sculls event with a time of 7min 18.72sec behind rivals from South Korea and Japan at the Asian Rowing Championships.

The tournament, which was the last Olympic qualifier for the discipline, wrapped up in Chungju City, South Korea, last Friday.

Asian Games silver medal winners Thao and Hai faced determined competition from Uzbekistan and Iran to win in the last metres.

The result was enough to ensure them a place at the London Games this summer. The women successfully fulfilled the target of one ticket set for the whole team before they departed.

It is the second time that Vietnamese rowers will compete at the Olympics, but the first time they take the top six would be given a ticket.

With a silver grabbed by Tran Le Quoc Toan in the men's 56kg category the Vietnamese males officially pocketed one while the women, although getting no medal, finished in fourth place to earn their own berth.

While Toan will be the representative in the men's event, Nguyen Thi Thuy (women's 53kg) and Pham Thuy Dung (women's 48kg) will compete for the women's. The final selection will be made based on their results during practise from now until the deadline later this month.

At present, Viet Nam have 14 tickets to London while at least two are to be announced soon.

"We have never won so many berths. In the past it would be only three to four official ones while the rest were wild-cards," said Hoang Vinh Giang, general secretary of the Viet Nam OlymViet Nam.

"We are proud that we have athletes competing in classic Olympic events while sportsmen such as runners Truong Thanh Hang and Vu Thi Huong and those from boxing also have chances to grab more spots," he added.

The general secretary predicted that this time Viet Nam had three hopes to win medals.

"We had a silver by taekwondo artist Tran Hieu Ngan in Sydney in 2000. We had another silver by weightlifter Hoang Anh Tuan in Beijing in 2008. In those years sport officials also said only these athlete could win. But this year, honestly we have three opportunities," Giang said.

"In taekwondo, not only Le Huynh Chau, but also Chu Hoang Dieu Linh can triumph. Gymnast Phan Ha Thanh is a great athlete. She is the third in the world, why can't she be third at the Olympics?

"Marksman Hoang Xuan Vinh can also surprise. In a moment this shooter could make history," Giang said. — VNS