"Am I number one?" Am I number one? I won! We won! After the game, Xu Mengtao showed the most original and authentic state in front of people, and her perfect performance made all the audiences and opponents admired. On February 14, in the freestyle ski women's aerial skills final, China's Xu Mengtao won the gold medal in the Chinese freestyle ski women's aerial skills event with impeccable performance, and the four dynasties of the Winter Olympics finally fulfilled his Olympic gold medal dream.
The highest difficulty is to fight for the Winter Olympic champion
According to the rules of the freestyle ski women's aerial skills competition, the qualification round is divided into two rounds, the top six players in the first round will directly advance to the final, the remaining players will participate in the second round of the qualification round, and then take the best two rounds of the top six players to advance to the final, and there are three players in China.
In the first round, Xu Mengtao jumped 101.10 points, with the third place to directly advance to the final, and then the bronze medalist Kong Fanyu, who appeared in the last Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, landed slightly flawed in the first round and scored 83.78 points, but in the end, there was still a thrill with the results of this round to rank fourth in the second round of the qualification round and successfully advanced. The third Chinese player, Shao Qi, made a mistake in the competition and regretted not to qualify for the final.
For the first time in history, the qualifying round and final were combined to take place on one day due to weather conditions, which also meant that the finalists had little time to rest.
At 7 p.m. in Zhangjiakou Genting Ski Park, the temperature is minus 22 degrees, and in the final, china's double sisters have to face the challenge of low temperatures in addition to facing top masters. Kong Fanyu ranked third in the game, she very well completed the difficulty coefficient of 4.028 moves, got 102.71 points, and then came out of the highest difficulty coefficient of 4.293 actions, gliding, raising arms, taking off, completing the air flip, landing steadily and sliding out, the quality of the action is perfect, scoring 103.89 points, the two ranked second and third respectively into the final round.
In the final round, 6 players jumped to determine the winner. Xu Mengtao swooped, took off, rotated in the air, the action was perfect and smooth, and the landing was crisp and clean, 108.61 points! This result finally made her wait for the winter Olympic gold medal that she was thinking about. Another Chinese player, Kong Fanyu, accidentally fell and missed the medal.
The grill came out of the world championship
If you ask what this girl loves to eat, Xu Mengtao's answer every time is - barbecue.
Barbecue not only satisfies the tip of Xu Mengtao's tongue, but it is also the fulcrum of her long career - outside the south wall of the Golden Pomegranate Supermarket on Hunan Street in Anshan, Liaoning Province, there was once an "old Xu meat skewer", which was a barbecue shop run by Xu Mengtao's father, Xu Xuejun. Relying on more than 20 years of kebab career, Xu Mengtao's parents supported their daughter's dream of championing, and his father Xu Xuejun said: "My daughter began to practice gymnastics at the age of 4, began to practice skiing at the age of 12, and she was 32 years old this year. As long as she returns home from vacation every time, Xu Mengtao will personally go to the store to help, busy in front of the stove, and skillfully show the barbecue skills she learned since childhood.
After being seriously injured, he returned to the arena
In Xu Mengtao's career, the champions of major events are basically won by three weeks, and because only by taking out this level of high difficulty can you have the opportunity to compete for gold medals in the Olympic arena, but do you know how high the risk of this difficulty is? "The height of the three-week platform is about nine stories high, and it has to be flipped 7 or 8 times in the air." Xu Mengtao said.
Just admiring it is enough to be frightened, and even feel suffocated, but for Xu Mengtao, such a high risk is with him every day, and every action is full of huge uncertainties.
On January 21, 2016, at the National 13th Winter Games, Xu Mengtao failed to flip for three weeks after a challenge, fell heavily to the ground, and ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in her left leg, which was the worst injury of her career. During that operation, the lateral meniscus of her left leg was removed by 70%, and in the early days after the operation, she sat in a wheelchair for nearly half a year, and the process of recovery from treatment was unimaginable. But even so, only 10 months after the injury, Xu Mengtao stood up strongly and miraculously stood in the final of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics as a favorite to win the championship.
For athletes with only 30% of the meniscus left, barely cushioned knee joints, and air skill sports known for their high risks, the challenge is not just courage, but amazing perseverance and endurance. In the past 10 years, Xu Mengtao's two leg ligaments have been broken twice, and she has undergone four major surgeries, but she always stubbornly gets up after each fall, "It's not difficult to give up, but it's cool to persist." Xu Mengtao always said so.
Never give up the dream of finally fulfilling the gold medal
At the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Xu Mengtao won the silver medal in the project. At the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, she competed with a steel nail bracket, but there was a major mistake and did not qualify for the final, Xu Mengtao's mother more than once "begged" her daughter to retire and recuperate, but she was rejected by her daughter. The Chinese women's freestyle skiing aerial skills team has never won a gold medal at the Winter Olympics, and Xu Mengtao does not want to leave with regret like this: "Fighting for gold medals for the motherland is a mission and an honor." ”
Xu Mengtao believes that her most attractive appearance is when she puts on the snow equipment, in the Beijing Olympic cycle, she took out the steel nails to return again, and returned to the peak again. At the Air Skills World Cup in Ruka, Finland, last December, she won 27 gold medals in the Freestyle Skiing Aerial Skills World Cup, becoming the first person in the history of the World Cup.
The Aerial Skills project is the most thrilling and difficult of all snow sports, and because of this particularity, scars are commonplace. In the Chinese freestyle skiing aerial skill team, it is difficult for everyone to find a part that has not been invaded by injuries and diseases, and they have long been "single loops" in injuries, rehabilitation, competitions and injuries.
Since 1998, freestyle skiing aerial skills have always been the dominant sport of the Chinese sports delegation at the Winter Olympic Games, and a large number of outstanding athletes such as Guo Dandan, Xu Yuanyuan, Li Nina, Xu Mengtao, Zhang Xin, Guo Xinxin and so on have emerged. In the past 20 years, the Chinese aerial skills women's team has won 5 silver medals in the Winter Olympics and 2 bronze medals in the Winter Olympics, and a few days ago in the mixed team competition, Xu Mengtao's Team in China once again regretted losing gold. But finally tonight, the gold medal dream came true in Xu Mengtao's body, and she used 20 years of hard work to exchange for a perfect result that everyone expected.
Text/Hubei Daily reporter Tong Junpeng Guo Xiaoming sent from Zhangjiakou
Photo: Xinhua News Agency