Xu Mengtao won the gold medal at the Beijing Winter Olympics.
At the age of 31, the fourth Olympic Games, once a young general "Peach", has been the experience of the Chinese Winter Olympic delegation.
Of course, she is even more powerful - in the freestyle ski women's aerial skills final on the evening of the 14th, Xu Mengtao scored 108.61 points, and finally waited for the winter Olympic gold medal she was dreaming of.
On Valentine's Day, she finally embraced her dream sweetly.
After the game, Xu Mengtao shouted heartlessly - "I finally won at the door!" Happy Lantern Festival! Happy Valentine's Day! ”
Team competition, regret missing out on the championship
Xu Mengtao's winter Olympic gold medal could have arrived early.
On the evening of the 10th, the Beijing Winter Olympics added a freestyle skiing aerial skill mixed team final, as the first team member to appear, Xu Mengtao withstood the pressure to jump out of the high score of 106.03, making a good start for the team. Unfortunately, Jia Zongyang made the last mistake, and the Chinese team regretted that he only won the silver medal.
Silver medal, another silver medal, Xu Mengtao shed tears at the award ceremony after the game, but when she saw her teammates make mistakes, she was the first to rush forward to hug.
"I saw it and thought, 'It's over.'" My heart was cold for two seconds, but I recovered quickly and went up and hugged him, because I felt that no one was more uncomfortable than him at that time—I wanted to comfort him. Xu Mengtao said.
"I understand and affirm the performance of my teammates very well. In the circumstances at the time, my teammates did the most correct handling in the air. Aerial skills This project is very contingencious, and we need to settle down immediately, summarize the lessons of this competition, and play the best level of competition in individual projects. ”
27 World Cup winners, the first man in history
Affected by the weather, the qualifying round and final of the freestyle ski women's aerial skills competition are scheduled to take place on the same day, which is a challenge for 31-year-old Xu Mengtao.
Xu Mengtao also said after the qualifying match that he just lost one game and started from scratch.
Indeed, she is already a veteran and has experienced many battles.
Entering the preparation sprint stage of the Beijing Winter Olympics, Xu Mengtao is in good shape - on December 4, 2021, at the Air Skills World Cup in Ruka, Finland, Xu Mengtao won the first personal championship of the new season.
Xu Mengtao previously won the silver medal in the mixed group.
At the same time, this is also Xu Mengtao's 26th World Cup champion, and she became the first person in the history of the World Cup, and her name was recorded in the history of the sport.
After making history, she and her teammates won the gold medal in the mixed men's and women's team competition, expanding the record to 27 crowns.
As early as 2009, Xu Mengtao won her first World Cup title at the Moscow World Cup – in 13 years, she raised the number of World Cup titles to a record 27 times, during which time she won the World Cup championship title for two consecutive years in the 2011 and 2012 seasons.
During this period in the Sochi Olympic cycle, Xu Mengtao reached the peak of her sports and performance - she won her first world championship, won 14 World Cup titles in four years, and also had the world's first difficult move.
If you don't win the championship, you retire
However, the Winter Olympic champion is like a hurdle - xu Mengtao participated in the Vancouver Winter Olympics for the first time in 2010 and finished sixth. At the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, Xu Mengtao missed the gold medal as the favorite to win the championship and won an Olympic silver medal.
At the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, Xu Mengtao was still the biggest favorite to win the championship, and she made a vow to retire without winning the championship before the game, but in the second round of the final competition, she made a mistake and fell, and was out early...
After the game, she wiped her tears and said, "I gave my all, but I was too slow. I don't know if there will be a second chance in the future. I had surgery first, recovered first, and took the nails out. My leg still hurts very much. ”
But even if the performance is abnormal, injured and sick, but after calming down, Xu Mengtao posted on social media and decided to insist on pursuing her dream: "I am the girl who 'fights' the gold medal for the three Winter Olympics, and it is a mission and an honor to fight for the gold medal for the motherland!" ”
"No matter how much sweat and tears you pay, it is worth it, there is no bold words, only the determination to go out!" I don't want to retire, my dream is still there, and I don't want to give up. ”
"I talked to myself, Xu Mengtao, do you want to come back to practice, if you choose to come back to practice, there is no way back, it is impossible to encounter difficulties and then go back." The trough of the state before the injury is still there, and the next difficulty to face is more than before, do you want to insist? In the end, my heart was more insistent, I want to go on. That was her promise to herself.
In this way, for the Beijing Winter Olympics, Xu Mengtao underwent the most serious surgery in her career - meniscal removal, and then re-invested in the long recovery period of injury...
14 years of battling injuries
This is not the first time Xu Mengtao has experienced a terrible injury - injury, accompanied by Xu Mengtao's career of more than a decade.
At the National Championships on January 10, 2008, she broke the anterior cruciate ligament in her right knee when she landed. According to past experience, athletes who have had this injury have basically said goodbye to the field.
"It was the ascent stage of my career and there was no security team around. Fortunately, the leadership and the school supported me, helped me find the hospital, and gave me certain rehabilitation conditions. I decided to make an effort to see if I could recover. ”
During the preparation for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, in early 2016 in Xinjiang, When Xu Mengtao chose the three-week platform action with a difficulty coefficient of 3.8, but her state was not good, she fell down when she landed, instantly lost her center of gravity and rolled forward, Xu Mengtao hugged her left leg tightly, lying motionless on the ground...
On February 3, 2016, Xu Mengtao was treated at the Third Hospital of Beijing Medical University - the results on the diagnostic sheet showed that the anterior cruciate ligament of the left knee was ruptured, the medial collateral ligament sprain, the medial meniscus posterior angle degeneration, multiple bone contusions, joint effusions...
"I asked myself, Xu Mengtao, you only have two paths, practice or not practice." If you choose to continue practicing, then the bottleneck period, the trough, the dare not jump, and the fear of injury will still exist. I knew I had no way back and had to let go of everything to get stronger. ”
Xu Mengtao did not choose to give up, she only took 7 months to get out of the injury - when talking about the "partner" of her sports career, Xu Mengtao said:
"For athletes, since you're going to compete, no matter what state you're in, you want to have a good performance. Training began 7 months after the operation, and the process has been fighting with myself in order to prove that I am okay. ”
Indeed, Xu Mengtao has been proving herself that she has made history, and she really can.