SOCHI, Feb. 18 -- China earned three spots for Friday's quarterfinals of men's 500m short track speed skating on Tuesday at Sochi 2014 Winter Games.

All three Chinese, Liang Wenhao, Han Tianyu and Wu Dajing, beat the odds and advanced as the top finishers of their own groups.

World champion of the discipline in 2010 and 2013, Liang Wenhao, clocked 41.647 seconds in heat 3, beating South Korea's Lee Han-Bin to the second place.

Teenage sensation Han Tianyu, the 1,500m silver medalist of Sochi 2014, made through on 41.592, ahead of local favorite and the Olympic men's 1000m runner-up Vladimir Grigorev in heat 4.

Wu Dajing came out winner of heat 6 with a time of 41.712, while Hungary's Viktor Knoch was the distance second on 42.261.

Other hot hits of the discipline Victor An of Russia, Jean Olivier and J. R. Celski of the United States also made the quarters, while Charles Hamelin of Canada, who fell in the 1,000m quarterfinals, was again caught by accident before finishing the last in heat 8 on 1:18.871.