Team China now seek winter gold rush

• Source: The Global Times
• [00:06 June 09 2009]
• Comments

By Liu Xin

Zhang Dan (R) and Zhang Hao, the runners-up in Turin 2006, are widely regarded as the gold medal contenders of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic Games. Photo: AFP

China’s Olympic medal odyssey is set to continue at the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games with the nation’s winter sports athletes setting their sights on podium finishes in snowboarding, skiing and ski-jumping.

And though it is widely thought impossible to copy the powerhouse achievements at the Beijing Olympic Games, China’s winter athletes hope they can at least modestly emulate their summer peers by nabbing a handful of historic firsts on the ice and snow next year in Canada.

The State General Administration of Sport (SGAS)’s Working Conference for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, which concluded Sunday at the Capital Gymnasium in Beijing, officially kicked off the last preparation stage of the nation’s Vancouver campaign.

With eight months to go before the opening ceremony, Liu Peng, the director of SGAS, applauded the results gained by Team China at winter sports in recent years.

But he also upped the ante for the Chinese athletes, coaches and working staff heading to Canada by urging them to work hard for a medal podium finish.

It’s a tall order. China has only won four gold medals at the Winter Games since first joining the competition at the 1980 Lake Placid Games – and it took 22 years to win the first.

Winter sports have long propped up SGAS’ priority list as the 51 golds and 100 total medals at last year’s Beijing Olympics clearly show.

However, the plight of the country’s skiers and skaters has been significantly improved during the past decade.

The Chinese government and SGAS have been steadily devoting more efforts as more money than ever is being pumped into winter sports development, and this has seen improved training facilities, the hiring of experienced, foreign coaches and Chinese athletes traveling abroad to train and compete. And this push on the cold front has reaped rewards.

Han Xiaopeng, coached by Canadian Dustin Wilson, won the 2006 Turin Winter Games gold medal in men’s freestyle skiing – China’s first ever gold on snow.

Wang Beixing, coached by Canadian Kevin Crockett and who trained overseas for the past several years, scooped five gold medals at the 11th National Winter Games last year – and is rightly regarded as a solid prospector for gold in Vancouver.