China's 2010 Winter Olympians: Liu Jiayu, snowboarding
Thursday, 18th February 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (4)
UPDATE:Despite heading into the final in second place, Liu finished just out of the medals at 4th, behind Tora Bright of Australia, and Hannah Teeter and Kelly Clark of the USA. Sun Zhifeng came in 7th. Despite a medal-less day, China held steady at 9th in the medal standings.
Snowboarder Liu Jiayu (刘佳宇) started training in 2003, and shook up the snowboarding world order when she won the world championship in the halfpipe last year at the age of 17. Liu uses wushu (Chinese martial arts) in her training, according to this CCTV report. Like all of China's medalists to date in these Olympics, she was born in Harbin in far north Heilongjiang province. Liu's success in the sport doesn't reflect a snowboarding boom on the mainland, it is among several extreme sports that are growing in popularity. For videos of Chinese snowboarders, skateboarders, surfers and parkour runners, check out Niurenku.com.
The women's halfpipe competition takes place Feb. 18--qualifying round at 12:30 PST (4:30 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19), semifinals 4:00 p.m. PST (8:00 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19) and finals at 6:00 PST (10:00 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19).
China also has a sliver of a medal hope in women's speedskating Thursday, as 500-meter bronze medalist Wang Beixing takes to the ice again. She is not as strong in the 1,000-meter event; her best ever finish was sixth at the Nagano World Championships in 2008, and she dropped to 10th at worlds last year. Also skating for China are Yu Jing, Ren Hui, Jin Peiyu.
Video:
CCTV report on Liu Jiayu
Metacafe.com on Liu's world cup win
Liu Jiayu on NBCOlympics.com
Liu Jiayu image: Sports.sina.com
Tags: China's 2010 Winter Olympians, Liu Jiayu, snowboarding, speedskating, Wang Beixin
China's 2010 Winter Olympians: Wang Meng and Zhou Yang, short track speedskating
Thursday, 18th February 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
UPDATE: Wang Meng won gold, making her China's most decorated Winter Olympian, with two golds, one silver and one bronze. Zhou Yang finished 5th. Medal number 4 for China puts it in 9th place in the medal count. Wang competes next in the 1,500, with heats at 9:45 a.m. Beijing time, on Sunday Feb. 21, and finals two hours later.
Wang (right) celebrates a 1-2 finish in the 3,000 meters in Turin, with gold medallist Yang Yang
Wang Meng (王濛) is the most dominant athlete in China's 2010 Olympic delegation. The 24-year-old won three medals in Torino in 2006--gold in the 500m event, silver in the 1,000 and bronze in the 1,500. She is also the reigning world champion in the 500 and 1,000, with back-to-back 500 titles. In the preliminaries at Vancouver, she skated to an Olympic record of 43.926 seconds. Wang is more outspoken and outwardly competitive than many Chinese athletes. She has had a rocky history with her sport's officials in China, and left the national team for part of 2007 over a training dispute.
Chasing Wang and her first Olympic medal is 18-year-old Zhou Yang (周洋), who also moved on to the next stage, posting the second fastest qualifying time at 44.115 seconds.
Short track speedskating is China's top source of Winter Olympics medals, accounting for five of its 11 medals in Turin. China's first gold medalist in the winter games was Yang Yang (pictured above), in the 2002 games. The Chinese women won last year's world team championship in the Netherlands, and 2008 world championships in Harbin.
As China's program rapidly improves, its rivalry with Korea is heating up. Korea's head coach, Choi Gong-Bok, threw water bottles at a Chinese official who was taping a Korean training session, according to this report
The 500m short track final takes place Wednesday, Feb. 17 at 7:07 p.m. PST, or Thursday, Feb. 18 at 11:00 a.m. Beijing time.
The top threats to Wang and Zhou (Saturday heat times in parentheses) are Katherine Reutter, USA (44.187); Park Seung-Hi, Korea (44.221); Kalyna Roberge, Canada (44.254); and Cho Ha-Ri, Korea (44.313).
Related: Chinese speed skaters will medal at Vancouver Olympics, Canadian team coach says
Wang/Yang image: Baidu
Tags: China's 2010 Winter Olympians, speedskating, Wang Meng, Winter Olympics, Zhou Yang