(Beijing Winter Olympics) Hong Kong short track speed skater Zhu Dingwen: Looking forward to the first Winter Olympics show

　　China News Agency, Hong Kong, January 19th: Hong Kong short track speed skater Zhu Dingwen: Looking forward to the first Winter Olympics show

　　China News Agency reporter Han Xingtong

　　When learning that he had qualified for the Beijing Winter Olympics, Hong Kong short track speed skater Zhu Dingwen had just finished his competition in the Netherlands and was quarantined in a hotel.

Recently, when he was interviewed by a reporter from China News Agency, he mentioned this moment again. The first word that Zhu Dingwen said with a grin was "excited". "After so many years of blood and sweat, I finally got a very perfect recognition." First Time to call and share the good news with friends and family.

　　But after a round of celebration, he slowly calmed down in the room alone, and an invisible pressure only caught him in hindsight.

"The Hong Kong team of China has achieved very good results in the Tokyo Olympics and won many medals, so now the sports atmosphere in Hong Kong seems to be completely different, and Hong Kong people have higher expectations for athletes."

　　He became attached to this sport at the age of 5. At that time, many Canadian students in the international school liked ice sports, and his mother sent him to learn ice hockey.

By the time he was 11 or 12 years old, his smaller physique had clearly lost his advantage in this collision-heavy sport.

One day, he came across a short track speed skating video of the Winter Olympics on the Internet. Driven by curiosity, he immediately searched for relevant information and signed up for an interest class.

　　Zhu Dingwen still remembers that he put on his rented fancy shoes and stood on the ice rink in a shopping mall in Hong Kong. He couldn't wait to use the fastest speed to walk around the arena, and he was unbelievably happy.

Later, when he recalled the feeling, he realized that it was the feeling of a person who finally found the thing he really loved after going around for many years. It was natural and smooth, and everything was just right.

　　In the past four or five years, or even longer, Zhu Dingwen has been running tirelessly on the road to prepare for the Olympic Games.

Since there is no international standard short track speed skating training venue in Hong Kong, Zhu Dingwen and his team went north and traveled to Changchun, Beijing, Dongguan and other places for training camps all the year round. "Our team is really not easy. All the hard work is done to one day be in the Winter Olympics and compete with the world's top athletes."

　　Initially, Zhu Dingwen's goal was the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics.

One day during the training camp in Xinjiang, Zhu Dingwen fell and broke his right ankle in three places. After the operation, the doctor told him that it would take at least 4 months to recover, but at that time there were only two and a half months left before the Olympic qualifying.

　　Failing to get a ticket to the PyeongChang Winter Olympics made him confused, and the head skating coach of the Hong Kong Sports Institute, Sun Dandan, took the initiative to tell him about his illness.

"In a competition two and a half months before the Nagano Winter Olympics, she suffered a fracture in the same part as mine, and even with insufficient recovery time, she still won a silver medal at the Winter Olympics." This kind of "she can "I can too" was so powerful that it supported Zhu Dingwen, who immediately devoted himself to preparing for the Beijing Winter Olympics.

　　Looking back now, Zhu Dingwen would instead regard this injury as a turning point, optimistically calling it a learning process.

"After the injury, the Olympic dream means more to me." As a new player who is about to set foot on the Olympic arena for the first time, Zhu Dingwen is very humble: "I am not the best and fastest athlete, I can represent Hong Kong, China. It has been the greatest honor of my life for the team to participate in the Winter Olympics held in my own country. I hope to use the best training state in my life to achieve a good result.”

　　"Although Hong Kong athletes have made great progress in the past two years, we still can't compare with the Chinese national team and the South Korean team." Only the "stupid bird" flew first.

Over the years, in order to take care of his studies, Zhu Dingwen often "goes to the ice" at 4:30 in the morning, training until 8:30 to go to school, and after school at 5:00 in the afternoon, at 9:00 in the evening, it is training again.

This monotonous cycle, he has become accustomed to.

　　Despite the pain, fatigue, and anxiety chasing behind him, he never thought of giving up, Zhu Dingwen said: "I like the feeling of flying on ice, it's a bit like riding a roller coaster, but you can control the track at any time, at high speed. In the process of skating, constantly surpassing your opponent and yourself.” (End)