These Winter Olympics events, Chinese and foreign strong hands

[Global Times reporter Xu Yunfeng] China's ice and snow project has ushered in another "golden weekend" with the play of Nova Valley Ailing. The last leg of the 2021-2022 Freestyle Ski U-Track World Cup was closed on the 8th in mammoth Mountain, USA, and in the women's event final, Gu Ailing won the championship with a career high of 97.50 points. So far, Gu Ailing has achieved four consecutive championships in the season, and she has also won the best performance award of the season, and for the first time, she has lifted the "Crystal Ball" trophy that symbolizes the overall championship of the season. The highlights of China's ice and snow events are not only Gu Ailing, but also the performance of other "top athletes" in the advantages of freestyle skiing aerial skills, figure skating and short track speed skating. At the same time, strong rivals from other delegations should not be underestimated.

Snow skills: Gu Ailing sent a Winter Olympic gold medal

After Gu Ailing scored a rare high score of 97.50, the official website of the International Snow Federation praised it as "the best slide in the history of the freestyle skiing U-shaped field", and the other two Chinese players, Li Fanghui and Zhang Kexin, won fifth and seventh respectively. British media "Arena Insider" said that Gu Ailing, who has been on the top podium of the U-shaped world cup for four consecutive times, ended the season perfectly, which made her the biggest favorite to win the project at the Beijing Winter Olympics.

According to the official website of the International Snow Federation, Gu Ailing has rapidly risen to a dominant position in the freestyle skiing event. Gu Ailing's young career is just one Winter Olympic medal away, and she has the opportunity to achieve this wish next month.

Of course, Gu Ailing's road to the Winter Olympics will never be a smooth road - the 2019 World Championship U-shaped venue champion, Estonia's famous Hildaru, Pyeongchang Winter Olympics bronze medalist, the United States' Signonni have the strength to stand on the podium.

Another ace of the Chinese freestyle ski team is aerial skills, the recent air skills World Cup in Quebec, Canada, Xu Mengtao, the only one who scored more than 100 points, won the women's championship, and another Chinese player, Kong Fanyu, won the third place in the project. In the men's area, Sun Jiaxu and Yang Longxiao won the first and second places in the men's group of Quebec Station. According to the official website of the International Snow Federation, Xu Mengtao is undoubtedly the biggest gold medal favorite at the Beijing Winter Olympics.

Xu Mengtao's Winter Olympic rivals are Canadian rising star Marion Seno and Australian Danielle Scott, who is third in world cup points. The men's team's opponents are mainly from Europe: Russia's famous Bloff, Swiss double Noe Ross and Nicholas Gigax. In terms of mixed groups, the Chinese team needs to cross the two barriers of Russia and Switzerland.

Figure skating: The Chinese team won seats in all three events

On the 8th, Chen Wei, a three-time World Champion and a strong contender for the gold medal at the Beijing Winter Olympics, led the men's single skating short program with 115.39 points at the National Figure Skating Championships. Agence France-Presse said on the 9th that Chen Wei's short program score broke the figure skating all-American record he held, and the next day he will strive for the sixth consecutive national championship in the free skating competition held in Nashville, Tennessee. The 22-year-old Chen Wei finished fifth in the men's singles at the PyeongChang Winter Olympics and helped the U.S. team win the bronze medal in the team event.

After folding in Pyeongchang, Chen Wei won the 2018 World Championship and began to remain unbeaten in all competitions until he finished third in the Grand Prix in the United States last October. Agence France-Presse said that the U.S. Olympic Selection Committee will select the beijing winter olympics men's single skaters, combined with the performance of the figure skating national championships and other competitions to determine the shortlist, "but Chen Wei's Beijing Winter Olympics trip has been nailed down." In addition, the American Skating Association announced the Beijing Winter Olympics women's single skating lineup on the 9th, which includes two-time figure skating national champion Liu Meixian, as well as 2022 figure skating national champion Maria Bell and runner-up Chen Kaiwen.

Chen Wei's biggest rival at the Beijing Winter Olympics was none other than the defending champion, Japan's Yusei Yushin. Kyodo News Agency recently said that in the skating event with a neat lineup, figure skating men's famous Yu Yu is pointing to the Winter Olympics for three consecutive championships, and will challenge Axel's four-sided jump (4A) that has not yet been completed in the world.

Unlike the United States, Japan, Russia and other countries in the single skating to win three full winter Olympic seats, the Chinese figure skating team in the men's singles, women's singles, ice dance three events only won one seat, and the men's and women's singles winter Olympic list to be based on the results of 3 stations and 5 domestic selection matches, has now ended two stops. Jin Boyang, a Chinese who finished fourth in men's singles at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics and seventh in men's singles at this season's Figure Skating Grand Prix in Italy, will fight for a ticket to the Beijing Winter Olympics.

Short Track Speed Skating: The strength of the men's team has increased significantly

Short track speed skating has always been a key gold rush project of the Chinese Winter Olympic delegation, and the only gold medal of the Chinese delegation at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics came from Wu Dajing's men's 500 meters. Today, the rapid growth of Ren Ziwei (above) has led to a significant increase in the overall strength of the Chinese men's team. Ren Ziwei is the only Chinese athlete to have medals in multiple races in this season's short track speed skating World Cup, and he and South Korea's Huang Daxian became the male athlete who won the most single World Cup titles this season. Wu Dajing's form has also gradually picked up, and at the end of November last year, he swept away the haze of the season's failure to reach the podium in the first three World Cups, and finally won the Men's 500m championship in the Netherlands, breaking the doubts with his results before the opening of the Beijing Winter Olympics.

In the Beijing Winter Olympic cycle, the rise of European and American teams such as the Netherlands, Hungary, Canada and Russia is obvious, but as a traditional power in short-track speed skating, South Korea's Beijing Winter Olympics is still optimistic about foreign media. According to the Olympic official website, short track speed skating is a fiercely competitive and suspenseful sport, and players are constantly competing for the leading position. As a result, no skater has been able to defend their titles at the past two Winter Olympics (Sochi 2014 and Pyeongchang 2018) – with the exception of South Korea's 3,000m women's relay team.

The South Korean team's strength comes from the team's two-time Winter Olympics short track speed skating gold medalist and three-time year-end champion Choe Min-jing. Yonhap News Agency said That Choe Min-jing first had to deal with the dispute outside the ice rink - she collided with teammate Shin Seok-hee in the women's 1,000m final of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, who was accused of manipulating the game, and "the bridge between the two may have become irreparable." In this regard, Cui Minjing said that her focus is on the Beijing Winter Olympics, "I believe that my state will reach its peak."

Yonhap News Agency recently quoted the Statement of the Korean Olympic Committee as saying, "South Korea's goal is to win one or two gold medals at the Beijing Winter Olympics." This is undoubtedly a low-key goal, (after all) at any other Winter Olympics, [South Korea] can win two or three gold medals in short track speed skating alone. ”