Harbin, 28 Jan (Xinhua) -- Qitaihe City, a small city with a population of less than one million in Heilongjiang Province, has now become a representative city of short-track speed skating in China and has the reputation of "Champion City". Yang Yang, Wang Meng, Sun Linlin and other 10 short track speed skating world champions slid from here to the world.
Walking into the Qitaihe Short Track Speed Skating Champion Hall, the first thing that catches your eye is the "gold medal list" above the hall on the first floor - 535 national gold medals, 176 world-class gold medals, and 16 world records... These are the achievements of the athletes trained by Qitaihe. The 8-story tower opened in February 2019 with six main exhibition halls, including "The Founder of the Champion City – Meng Qingyu and Past Coaches" and "The First Champion of the Chinese Winter Olympics – Yang Yang". Visiting the Champion Hall, the audience can understand the history of Qitaihe's skating career for more than 40 years, and at the same time, they can also feel the hard-won reputation of "Champion City".
In the 1970s, Qitaihe City's short-track speed skating business began in a humble stadium in the city. Since there was no indoor ice rink at the time, qitaihe's early ice athletes lived under the stadium's stands in the winter and practiced ice in the open space outside the stadium during the day. Because there was no ice pouring machine, the late coach Meng Qingyu could only put a large iron bucket on the climbing plough as a water tank, and the person pulled a ton of climbing plough away. In the extremely cold weather of minus 30 or 40 degrees Celsius, an ice poured down and froze to the point of shivering. From here, Meng Qingyu pushed short track speed skating from the hobby of Qitaihe people to the competitive sports road, laying the foundation for the city's short track speed skating career. Meng Qingyu's spirit of not being afraid of difficulties and fighting hard in the process of starting a business has also been passed down from generation to generation among his disciples.
In 1991, Zhang Jie, who was selected for the national team, and his teammates won the championship in the women's 3000-meter relay competition of short track speed skating at the World Winter Games that year, becoming the first world champion in Qitaihe. At the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Yang Yang won the gold medal in the women's short track speed skating 500 meters, achieving a "breakthrough of zero" for gold medals at the Chinese Winter Olympics. Wang Won Gold and Silver at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin and three more gold medals at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver... Of the 13 Winter Olympic gold medals China has won so far, the short track speed skating team has contributed 10 and 6 from athletes trained by Qitaihe. Many of the students trained by Meng Qingyu in those years have now become world champions, and many have become professional coaches, continuing the champion blood of Qitaihe".
As the athletes trained by Qitaihe continue to achieve excellent results in domestic and foreign competitions, local governments are paying more and more attention to ice and snow sports. In 2013, the indoor ice rink of Qitaihe Sports Center was put into use, ending the history of Qitaihe City without indoor ice rink for decades; in 2017, Zhang Jie Ice Sports College of Qitaihe Vocational College was established, and the college opened a short track speed skating major to train short track speed skating coaches; in 2019, the Short Track Speed Skating Training Center of Qitaihe Vocational College was established...
In recent years, Qitaihe City has been rated by the State General Administration of Sports as "National Key High-level Sports Reserve Talent Base" and "National Short Track Speed Skating Qitaihe City Sports Training Base". Qitaihe City also lives up to expectations, through innovative talent training methods, increasing the number of short track speed skating characteristic schools, creating a "provincial team and city office" base, holding mass ice and snow sports activities, etc., so that the training of short track speed skating reserve talents has reached a new level, and it has undertaken the heavy responsibility of training and transporting outstanding short track speed skating athletes to the national team.
There are less than 10 days to go before the opening of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. Fan Kexin, a short-track speed skating world champion born in Qitaihe City, has been selected for the Chinese short track speed skating team and is preparing for the Competition as a member of the Chinese sports delegation at the Beijing Winter Olympics. At the same time, above the ice rink of the Short Track Speed Skating Training Center of Qitaihe Vocational College, three five-star red flags were hung high. A group of energetic figures stepping on the ice knives roared past the ice, and many of them dreamed of standing on the field of the Winter Olympics in the future to win glory for the country. Zhang Jie said that there are many good seedlings among these children, and there may be future Winter Olympic champions.
At night, the Champion Bridge in Taoshan District, Qitaihe City, is brightly lit, and the flame-like lights at the top of the short-track speed skating champions hall are flowing and rising. Starting from the ice surface, the ice and snow sports industry represented by short-track speed skating has injected the city spirit of dedication, hard work, hard work and innovation into the Qitaihe River, making this resource-depleted city once known for coal glow with different vitality. (End)