Among all the stars of the Chinese women's short track speed skating team, Wang Meng is the most talked about. She has won four Olympic titles, won 77 gold medals in world events, and broke three consecutive world records in one day.
The strength is too strong, and the personality is too "flamboyant", so that the national team "loves and hates" her, expelling her 4 times and recalling her 4 times.
Wang Meng is simply Li Yunlong on the women's speed skating field. The outstanding feature is that it can do things and cause trouble.
After the third recall, Wang Meng, who was actively preparing for the 2014 Winter Olympics, was injured due to training and had to withdraw from the national team.
After returning to the life of ordinary people, Wang Meng founded his own sporting goods company and became the boss. A few years later, due to the lack of follow-up of the national team, Wang Meng returned to the training team as a coach. He stepped down as a coach in 2020.
The third generation of the women's short track speed skating team
In 1988, women's short track speed skating officially took root in China, and in the same year, at the Winter Olympics in Calgary, Canada, the first generation of speed skating women's li yan won the gold medal in the 1000 meters, breaking the world record.
This year, in the home of Wang Chunjiang, a coal miner in Qitaihe City, Heilongjiang, northeast China, his daughter Wang Mao was 5 years old and was running around on the ice in the ice and snow, and Wang Chunjiang could not stop it.
Wang Meng was lively and active by nature, and Wang Chunjiang simply sent her to an interest class to let her fly completely.
So Wang Meng, who ran around on the ice, met Ma Qingzhong, who stayed in Qitaihe after retiring, when it was already 1993 and she was 10 years old.
Ma Qingzhong is a veteran member of the Chinese short track speed skating team, and his men's short track speed skating national team did not have a good performance at that time. Ma Qingzhong has contributed most of his life to short track speed skating, and the five-star red flag has not been raised on the championship stage.
This situation has to wait until a young man in the 90s to change.
In the 1990s, Ma Qingzhong could only rely on his own pair of old eyes to find excellent seed players on the street.
He noticed Wang Meng, who was wandering on the ice and had no right way.
Wang Meng was born with a tomboy personality, and when she saw an amiable old man come to talk, she was not afraid, so she talked to him.
Ma Qingzhong observed her for a long time and concluded that this was a talent. So he invited her to join the team for speed skating training.
Wang Meng's heart was full of flowers, but she knew that her father Wang Chunjiang would not necessarily agree.
She told the truth that in order to cultivate a good seedling, Ma Qingzhong went straight to Wang Mao's home without saying a word, sincerely proposed that he wanted to include Wang Meng in the team and practice short track speed skating.
In order to persuade Wang Meng's father, Ma Qingzhong tried his best to show him that becoming a national athlete was not so painful, on the contrary, it was a job with no worries and no worries.
Wang Meng's father was reluctant to let his daughter suffer, but Wang Meng had been running wildly on the ice since he was a child, and he had long been moved by Ma Qingzhong's olive branch.
Therefore, she joined forces with her master, lian Sa Jiao, to sell Meng, and persuaded her father, who loved her daughter, to successfully enter Ma Qingzhong's youth training team.
The children in the training team are about the same age as Wang Meng, Ma Qingzhong is both a father and a mother, running around the world to find the right size of ice blade skates for these children, but also to face various emergencies, such as quarrels and cries, as well as parents who love their children.
Ma Qingzhong carried it with all his might. Not only that, but he also pays attention to the training of the children. As soon as Wang Meng joined the team, he felt a significant difference between professional speed skating and amateur speed skating.
But that didn't dampen her passion for speed skating at all. After growing up, Wang Meng told reporters with great confidence: She was born to be a speed skating material.
With professional ice blade skates, coupled with Ma Qingzhong's scientific and reasonable high-intensity training, Wang Meng suddenly emerged and became a unique presence in the team.
The reputation of the talented speed skater Wang Meng soon spread to the city speed skating team. For this good seedling, the city speed skating team ran to qitaihe and asked Ma Qingzhong to be a vip.
Ma Qingzhong gave.
He knew that Wang Meng belonged to the larger world stage.
After training under his beloved master for two years, Wang Meng left the junior speed skating training team and entered the speed skating training ground of the Qitaihe City Sports Center. She was 13 years old.
Wang Meng, 13, has been exposed to the latest news on the front line of China's short track speed skating. Li Yan, a god-like first-generation female general, has retired from the army and gone to Dongbei University of Finance and Economics to study finance.
This year, Wu Dajing, the future champion of Chinese men's short track speed skating, was born.
And Wang Meng was accumulating strength.
Although Li Yan withdrew from the world championship stage, the Chinese women's short track speed skating was not a big hit because she left.
The second generation of women's speed skating, Yang Yang and Xiao Yangyang, took over the expectations of their predecessors and stepped onto the world stage. While winning countless gold and silver medals, it also broke the world record.
The speed skating event of the Winter Olympics has been monopolized by East Asians, especially china, Japan and South Korea.
These three countries have struck each other hard in history, and they are as "harmonious" as ever in the speed skating arena of the Olympic Games.
Table tennis, badminton, women's football, women's volleyball, curling, short track speed skating and other fields, the three countries have always been incompatible with each other, beating the European and American countries that came to try to compete for the championship to the nose and face.
Many of the world records of these sports ended up in East Asia. Other countries can only sigh.
In order to win the championship, the three countries asked each other's champions to be the head coach of the national team. Li Yan once worked as the coach of the Korean team for a while, and then returned to China to take charge of the Chinese team portal.
Overall, throughout the 1990s, Wang Meng accumulated experience in large and small arenas.
During this period, Wang Meng relied on his innate endowment and hard training in the later stages, from the small Qitaihe City to the eyes of the world.
She won the 1998 speed skating competition Qitaihe City Champion, the 2000 Guangzhou National Games Speed Skating Competition third place, the 2002 World Youth Championships Women's 500 Meters Champion, the 2004 World Cup Women's Speed Skating 500 Meters Champion.
At this time, she had already met her predecessors on the field, but unfortunately, Wang Meng was inexperienced and her training years were not as good as her sisters, and she regrettably lost on the road to the championship charge.
But Wang Meng was not discouraged.
In an interview many years later, Wang Meng said that she loved skating.
She continued to gallop on the field, waiting for her moment.
Soon in 2006, the 20th Winter Olympics were held in Turin, Italy.
Ten years of grinding a sword, the third generation of speed skating women will sharp blade out of the sheath.
When the champion she is like a fish in the water, when Wang Meng she "provokes wrong"
In 2006, Wang Meng beat South Korean athletes at the Turin Winter Olympics and won the women's speed skating 500 meters championship, which was the only gold medal won by the Chinese team in the short track speed skating event.
Wang Meng attracted the attention of the whole world. She was 23 years old.
This year, the world also paid attention to the first generation of Chinese women's speed skating li Yan, who was the head coach of the American team at this Winter Olympics.
Under her leadership, american team speed skating star Apollo won the men's short track speed skating 500 meters championship, so that South Korean celebrity Ahn Hyun-so folded the halberd turin, and after returning home, he was scolded by South Korean netizens.
At this time, no one realized that the young Wang Meng would become the main player of the national team and open a unique demon king era that belonged to her - the Mao era.
In Chinese sports competitions, there are also a number of people known as the Devil King, such as Deng Yaping and Zhang Yining in the table tennis world, Lin Dan in the badminton world, and Guo Jingjing in the diving world.
Deng Yaping is known as the "first generation of demon kings" in the table tennis industry; Zhang Yining is talked about because of her "poor acting skills" when releasing water, and she can't find an opponent at her peak and has no choice but to retire; Lin Dan is known as the Jordan of badminton, and Guo Jingjing is the "diving queen".
And Wang Meng is a new era of speed skating queen.
Since the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics, Wang Meng began to exert her strength, in the past ten years of speed skating career, she has won 4 Olympic championships, the World Cup, championships and other events a total of 77 gold medals, the limelight is unique.
Wang Meng is most talked about is her gliding posture, in the eyes of many people, this low-key but helplessly "invincible" aura of the opponent is where her charm lies.
Women's short track speed skating is a speed of the ice sports, high-speed sports in the athletes in the corner of the body center of gravity becomes lower, in order to maintain body balance, many people will subconsciously choose to use their hands to support the ground.
Wang Meng no.
At the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, the tournament where she won the olympic gold medal for the first time, Wang Meng participated in both the women's short track speed skating 500 meters and the 1500 meters.
She easily picked up the 500m title, but she had some surprises on the 1500m track.
Of course, the problem is not with her, but with a South Korean opponent.
The female player saw that Wang Meng was about to sprint for the championship, and suddenly exerted force from the side and "touched" her arm, directly causing Wang Meng to miss the 1500-meter champion.
In the end, two other Players from South Korea won the gold and silver medals.
Although Wang Meng was very angry, the other party did it cleverly and could not determine whether it was a foul.
Later, at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, Wang Meng simply put his hands behind his back and slid all the way to the finish line, without giving anyone a chance to blackmail.
This pose is both cool and a little Chinese like the "arrogant" meaning, Wang Meng has become a topic figure in the speed skating world.
The audience liked her bravado and also liked her invincibility.
The race posture of overtaking with his hands bent behind his back is like an old man walking around the square at a high speed, and as a result, Wang Meng is jokingly called "Uncle Wang" by the audience.
Since then, Wang Meng has gone on the road of "Uncle" and won the championship happily.
Because her strength is too strong, she and the returned first king Li Yan often have times to talk.
Li Yan saw the rise of China's third generation of women's speed skating at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, and in an agitated mood, he resigned as the coach of the American team at the invitation of the national team and returned to China to take over this new team.
But not long after returning, Li Yan found that the ace young player of the national team was actually a violent temper, and he would be afraid of people without saying a word.
Li Yan has witnessed the history of Chinese women's speed skating from scratch, and she is worried about the future of speed skating, so as soon as she took office, she increased the intensity of training and set strict requirements on the team members.
At first, Wang Meng endured for the sake of the overall situation, and the more she endured the contradictions, Li Yan believed that all the players should accept her new training method, and Wang Meng believed that their previous achievements had proved the correctness of the old method.
When the contradictions were fierce, Wang Meng even refused to participate in the training plan formulated by Li Yan.
Both men felt they were right.
However, Wang Meng did not participate in the training, which directly affected the training of the entire team. After the last quarrel, Wang Meng applied to return to the provincial team for training in front of the media, avoiding Li Yan and the national team.
This led to Wang Meng's absence from that tournament.
This is the second time she has been expelled from the national team. The first time was a long time ago.
At that time, Xin Qingshan served as the head coach, Wang Meng was "young and crazy", happy to win the championship, and spent tens of thousands of yuan to invite the players to eat and celebrate.
After hearing about it, Xin Qingshan felt that she was too public and her heart was not mature enough, so he asked her to go back to the provincial team to calm down for two days.
Wang Meng changed it when he knew that he was wrong, and after he returned, he never did anything similar.
But this time she "calmed down" for half a year.
At the end of 2007, the Qiqihar Winter Games were about to be held, and the national team was in urgent need of manpower.
Two players of different eras have finally reached a consensus: everything is for the gold medal.
Wang Meng sincerely confessed his mistake to Li Yan, returned to the national team from the provincial team, participated in this Winter Games, and won 7 gold medals in one go, becoming the highest in the past.
Wang then fired at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, where she set a new world record in women's speed skating in the 500m.
What made Li Yan feel a lot of emotions was that after Wang Meng won the championship, he slid directly in the direction where she was, fell to his knees, and thanked her for her hard cultivation.
This picture has also been recorded by many media and has become a classic scene of the Vancouver Winter Olympics.
The Vancouver Winter Olympics is also the peak of the third generation of Chinese women's short track speed skating. Wang Meng and teammates Zhou Yang, Zhang Hui, Sun Linlin and others won four gold medals in the women's 500 meters, 1000 meters, 1500 meters and 3000 meters relay women's short track speed skating events, shocking the world.
From the first generation of Li Yan to the second generation of Yang Yang and Xiao Yangyang, and then to Wang Meng, the Chinese women's short track speed skating has completed the transformation from 0 to the peak. Among them, Wang Meng's credit cannot be underestimated.
Unfortunately, the good times did not last long, and Wang Meng was once again expelled from the national team for the third time because of "provoking wrongdoing".
Three in and three out, Wang Meng was almost out of temper.
In 2010, shortly after the end of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, the short-track speed skating team was exposed in Lijiang, and it was not long before Wang Meng was exposed to infighting with the team members in Qingdao.
The difference between the two events was less than four months, and the impact was bad, and Wang Meng was once again sent back to the provincial team.
In 2012, Wang Meng was allowed to return to the national training team. This time, she did not regenerate the accident, but seriously prepared for the Sochi Winter Olympics two years later.
But Wang Meng's fate with speed skating also seems to have ended in 2014.
Due to a mistake, Wang Meng accidentally fractured her bones on the training ground, and after the operation, she passed by the Sochi Winter Olympics. This year, Wang Meng was 28 years old.
After retiring, Wang Meng was not idle, she founded her own sporting goods company, and the regrets of her career made Wang Meng turn her attention to the next generation of speed skating newcomers. When she realized that there was no successor to short-track speed skating, a strong sense of responsibility came to her mind.
In 2018, Wang Meng applied to return to short track speed skating, and in the same year, he served as the coach of the national training team of speed skating. Benefactor Li Yan worked hard for many years and put this burden on her shoulders.
This is Wang Meng's fourth return to the national team.
After becoming a coach, the women's short track speed skating team led by Wang Meng still achieved good results, but it is also a fact that the national team lacks newcomers with bright results.
After the arrival of the epidemic era, Wang Meng's team was forced to stop pace, and her coaching level could not be shown.
In May 2020, Wang Meng stepped down as the head of the coaching team.
People are not in the jianghu, but the "jianghu" still has her legend
Of course, Wang Meng's achievements are inseparable from her outstanding talent, but only talent and hard training have finally achieved the glory of the Mao era.
At her peak, Wang Meng was an almost undefeated myth, and players from other countries saw her and felt that the championship was hopeless.
In more than ten years of speed skating career, Wang Meng has won countless gold and silver medals, most of which are gold medals. Catherine, the american team star who competed with her, was deeply touched by the ace player.
She said that people like them need to exercise to get the championship, and Wang Meng only needs to slide all the way down the way by feeling to get the championship.
When Wang Meng joined the Chinese women's short track speed skating, this team was in the ascending period, and Wang Meng quickly took over the past with his outstanding strength, achieving the third generation of legends of Chinese women's short track speed skating.
After she retired, this team is facing a fault situation in which the veteran is out of the blue and yellow, and the veteran is out of the horse.
If this situation continues, in the next ten years, China's short track speed skating will face challenges from other powers, like the women's volleyball team to break the crisis of thirty years, it is likely to repeat the women's short track speed skating.
It is somewhat gratifying that in 2003, when Wang Meng was born and trained in Qitaihe City from an early age, her enlightenment coach Ma Qingzhong finally applied to build an indoor ice rink, truly turning Qitaihe City into a paradise for skaters.
Due to the birth of short track speed skating champions such as Yang Yang, Wang Meng, sun Linlin, etc., Qitaihe is known as the "hometown of short track speed skating champions" and is famous throughout the country.
Ma Qingzhong still stays here, conscientiously training batches of short track speed skating talents.
In a wider area, there are people like Li Yan and Wang Meng who continue to stay in their posts and contribute to China's speed skating cause.
Resources
Wang Meng: Life Starts Again; In the Clouds; New Youth (Cherished Feelings); 2019 (10);