Engaged in sports for many years, from disabled athletes to disabled coaches, Wang Yuqin feels that the biggest gain is not achievements and honors, but the sportsmanship integrated into the bone marrow. Her definition of sportsmanship is a positive, optimistic, tenacious fighting spirit. And she has always practiced sportsmanship with her actions. As a Para athlete, she trains hard and seizes every opportunity to succeed; As a coach of paralympic athletes, she worked tirelessly to personally screen athletes step by step and establish a talent pool of paralympic athletes; And she has also become a guide on the road to more people's dreams from a dreamer.
Choose because of love, seize the opportunity to chase your dreamsWang Yuqin was diagnosed with congenital small eyeballs shortly after birth, although her vision is limited, but Wang Yuqin has studied hard since she was a child, and she was often rated as a good student when she was studying in ordinary primary schools. In addition to reading, Wang Yuqin also likes sports very much, participating in school sports meetings every year, running is the first place. Therefore, when the Texas Paralympic Federation selected athletes to participate in the Shandong Provincial Games, the teacher recommended her, and she won the silver medal in the long jump and the bronze medal in the 1500-meter long distance running at the provincial games in her first competition.
Although she returned to school after the provincial games and did not officially become an athlete, the gears of fate have turned. In 2005, she was admitted to the high school of Qingdao Blind School, just in time for the provincial disabled federation to send coaches to the school to select disabled athletes, and directly selected Wang Yuqin to train with the provincial athletics team, and since then she has formed an indissoluble bond with sports. In her opinion, although she did not realize her college dream, she had a more exciting life in the process of devoting herself to sports.
When she first entered the track and field team, as the only new team member, Wang Yuqin had a poor foundation, a thin foundation, and a slow runner, and in the face of hard-won opportunities, Wang Yuqin felt that she must cherish it. So on the basis of carefully completing the tasks arranged by the coach, he took the initiative to make up the class, and got up early every morning to train against the cold wind. You can't wear long clothes and trousers during training, it is very cold when the wind blows, and after running a few laps, you start sweating again, and your hair is directly frozen to freeze. In Wang Yuqin's heart, that winter was the coldest winter she had ever spent in her life, but she never regretted her choice.
In the run, the light is chased, and the perseverant will eventually become a butterflyPersevering, Wang Yuqin has made great progress and stood in the middle of the podium twice.
In the Asian Games qualifiers, Wang Yuqin switched from long-distance running to not good at sprinting. She felt that the opportunity was rare and trained herself in the Devil's Style. Switching from long-distance running to sprinting requires a complete change in technology and thinking, and the speed, explosiveness and power that sprinting focuses on are all that middle and long-distance running does not have, and it is also what she lacks. In order to seize this opportunity, Wang Yuqin and the coach took the initiative to strengthen. If the strength is not enough, the strength is increased, and the half-squat is increased from the previous maximum of forty kilograms to fifty or sixty or even eighty kilograms; If the speed is not good, focus on practicing the start, some movements are not mastered well, Wang Yuqin will practice over and over again after class, and will also take the initiative to go to the gym or strength room for quality exercises. Wang Yuqin feels that she is already lacking more than others, and only by quickly making up for these aspects in a short period of time can her grades improve.
After 45 days of devil training, Wang Yuqin felt that she had gained a lot, not only received professional guidance from the coach on all aspects of sprinting techniques and movements, but also greatly improved her own strength. It was also at this time that Wang Yuqin realized that although she had achieved some results in long-distance running before, switching to sprinting would have more advantages. At the Asian Games, Wang Yuqin also won the gold medals in the 200m and 400m sprint events. The moment she stood on the highest podium, Wang Yuqin felt that her hard training and hard work for so many years were worth it.
The 2015 World Championships in Athletics in Doha was the most memorable competition in Wang Yuqin's athletic career, and her last trip for the country was also the final chapter of her racing career.
At that time, Wang Yuqin's body had serious problems, and the northerners' severe discomfort with the southern climate and the growing injury to her knee made her unable to complete all her events. Wang Yuqin and her teammates have been cooperating for more than half a year, forming a high degree of tacit understanding, and everyone agrees that their relay is very promising to win the championship, and if they win the championship, they can win a ticket for China to the 2016 Rio Olympics. No one is willing to give up, Wang Yuqin is not willing to drag everyone back, in order to maintain the best condition in the last day of the relay race, repeated choices, Wang Yuqin decided to abstain from the single event and go all out to run the relay. When she learned that she had won the gold medal at the finish line, Wang Yuqin hugged all the relay team members and burst into tears.
Seeking in the dull, the light-chaser becomes the lamplighterDue to injury and age, Wang Yuqin chose to retire, and after retiring, she entered the Yucheng Disabled Persons' Federation and began to engage in disabled sports. Wang Yuqin feels that after years of training, she has accumulated some experience in training and competition; In addition, the training of disabled people is actually not the same as that of able-bodied people, so Wang Yuqin decided to give full play to her own strengths, from an athlete to a coach, hoping to discover and cultivate some disabled athletes through her own efforts, so that they can also increase their self-confidence through sports, and even change their fate through the road of sports.
Turning to coaching, Wang Yuqin has a lot more to consider. The first is the selection of team members, this process is not simple, she needs to personally go to the following townships or special schools to find and discover. Some athletes themselves are eligible, but their families do not know about the content of Para athletes, and they do not want their children to participate, which also becomes a hindrance to her work.
The difficulty of finding team members made Wang Yuqin constantly think about how to find out all the eligible children without landing on the ground. Wang Yuqin decided to build a talent pool of disabled athletes. This process is cumbersome and complicated, especially for Wang Yuqin, who is inevitably slower to do these tasks than others due to physical reasons. Taking the phone call as an example, her own eyesight is slightly poor, others may look at the phone number and take the phone to enter, but Wang Yuqin can only read it once and write it down before taking the mobile phone to dial out. She never feels troublesome, although this work is difficult and tedious to do in the early stage, but once the talent pool is established, when there is training and competition in the future, you can directly select from the reserve, and a group of potential athletes can be found in the process.
In 2016, Wang Yuqin took her children to participate in the first disabled youth athletics championships in Shandong Province for the first time, winning two gold medals, one silver medal and two bronze medals. Wang Yuqin felt that she was happier than them.
For every member of the team she trained, Wang Yuqin was very impressed. Among the team members was a child with cerebral palsy with uncoordinated limbs, deformities in one upper limb and one leg, and no strength. The people who went to the selection with her did not believe that he could practice sports, and Wang Yuqin insisted that it was no problem. In her opinion, sports is the best kind of rehabilitation for such children. Since 2016, Wang Yuqin has taken him to train whenever he has the opportunity, and by the time of last year's provincial games, the child had recovered well. Now when he walks, it is not obvious at first glance from behind that he is a disabled child. This is what Wang Yuqin hopes and pursues: she always believes that taking these children to achieve some results is one thing; But on the other hand, she wants these children to be better than before through physical training.
After experiencing so many difficulties, Wang Yuqin has always maintained a positive and optimistic attitude, although she has also experienced painful moments such as disappointment and even despair, but she can quickly adjust her mentality every time. She felt that nothing and no difficulty could defeat her, and it was with this mentality that she got to where she is today. From an ordinary rural girl to a world champion, Wang Yuqin feels that opportunities and hard work are indispensable for her today. When it comes to her future wishes, Wang Yuqin's only goal is to cultivate more and better para-athletes so that they can realize their life value.
(Photo courtesy of interviewee)