In April 2022, the list of new winners of the National May Day Labor Medal was announced, and a person from the table tennis industry attracted attention inside and outside the circle. He was born in the same year as the famous Olympic champion Kong Linghui and is from Heilongjiang, but he has not achieved the same excellent results in his career.
After retiring, this person threw himself into a new battlefield, transformed into a coach, and successfully participated in the training of an Olympic champion and a world champion, that is, Wang Manyu, who recently defeated Chen Meng, Sun Yingsha, Liu Shiwen, Ito Mimachi and other famous players many times, and achieved a good story. It is also because of his excellent coaching achievements that he was commended by the National May Day Labor Medal.
His name, Wang Fei, do you know?
As we all know, China's table tennis talents are innumerable, it is very difficult to realize the dream of world championships and Olympic champions, and there are only a few players who can be famous in each age group, after all, the number of places in the national team and world competitions is also very limited, and some people are destined to become the object of elimination.
In 1975, Wang Fei and Kong Linghui were born in Heilongjiang, China's northernmost province, a veritable generation of the same generation. However, in the athlete period, Wang Fei's performance is far less conspicuous than that of this fellow, after all, Kong Linghui is the youngest world table tennis men's singles champion of the national table tennis championships, and he is also one of the nine Grand Slam athletes in the team.
Wang Fei's most glorious achievement in the athlete period is only the table tennis champion, which is several notches worse than Kong Linghui, of course, it cannot be compared.
In 2009, retired Wang Fei returned to Heilongjiang to coach and began the second important stage of his table tennis career, from being taught to play to teaching others to play, I did not expect that he was very suitable for this position, and as a result, he rose from assistant coach to men's team head coach and head coach of the whole team, guiding the development of the provincial table tennis team.
As a former strong province of table tennis, Heilongjiang had obviously declined when Wang Fei was at the helm, so Wang Fei set many rules at that time, strictly grasped the discipline within the team, and improved the ideological awareness of athletes:
"At night, I and the other assistant coaches would take turns checking to see if any athletes were sneaking out, and if I found out, I would definitely be expelled, and five or six athletes were punished like this."
It was also during Wang Fei's comprehensive guidance of the Heilongjiang Provincial Team that a young rising star from a poor background who was sold by his father to sell meat sandwich steamed buns for himself to learn ball was reused, appearing in such a competition as the National Games at the age of 14, becoming one of the main players of the whole team at the age of 15 and winning the women's team championship of the national championship.
The above experience will be a good exercise for this athlete, and she will also win the Olympic women's team gold medal in the future, become the women's team, women's singles, women's doubles champion of the World Table Tennis Championships and the women's singles champion of the National Games, and become the standard-bearer of Heilongjiang table tennis career to take off again.
Yes, she is Wang Manyu, who is now famous, and Coach Wang Fei has also provided a good environment and soil for the growth of these new stars, which has been recognized by everyone.
Life is such a fickle that all athletes hope to win more and more important championships before retiring, but there are bound to be a few who can climb to the top. However, just as the so-called "mountains and rivers are doubtful and there is no way, the willows are dark and the flowers are bright and another village", after bidding farewell to the identity of athletes, Wang Fei once again shined in the post of coach, so that the disciples realized their dreams of Olympic champions, which is really gratifying.
After receiving this commendation, Wang Fei very modestly attributed the honor to the collective, bluntly saying:
"This honor not only belongs to myself, but also belongs to the countless leaders and colleagues who are fighting on the heilongjiang sports front, and belongs to the generations of athletes, coaches and staff members who have selflessly dedicated themselves to the cause of table tennis in Heilongjiang."
So can Wang Fei help Wang Manyu achieve the Grand Slam honor of Kong Linghui that year? Can we cultivate more Olympic champions and world champions? Anything is possible in the future, let's wait and see: come on!