Ramming speed! Chinese kayak brawls are the best kind of brawls

For my money, all kayak races should feature at least one ramming attempt. Two four-man kayak crews in the men’s 2,000-meter finals of the 7th Chinese City Games in Nanchang literally came to blows on Wednesday, as one boat intentionally rammed another boat, whose crew fought back by hitting their opponents with paddles.

Action photo here. China Daily:

Liao Zhensheng’s face was covered with blood when he was rushed to the hospital.

The referee disqualified the Nanchang team spearheaded by Ma Beilong. Another host team led by Li Kun took the gold medal in a time of 7:15.693.

The ugly brawl is set to irk Chinese sports officials, who had warned against doping, age cheating and unsportsmanship behaviors in China’s last games ahead of the 2012 Olympics.

To be fair, though, Chinese officials never really seem to be happy unless they’re irked.