Who is the highest-paid female athlete in the world? This time, two Chinese athletes are on the list.
On December 22, Forbes announced the list of the highest-paid female athletes in sports in 2023, and two Chinese people were on the list. Among them, Gu Ailing ranked second, and Zheng Qinwen ranked 15th.
This list is quite interesting, among the top 10, 9 people are tennis players, and only Gu Ailing alone made it to the top 10, ranking second.
At the top of the list is Swiatek, a young tennis player born in 2001 who earns $23.9 million a year, of which $9.9 million comes from tennis and $14 million from outside the tennis court.
Gu Ailing became an outlier on this list, and he is the only non-tennis player in the top 10. His income reached 22.1 million US dollars, which is equivalent to about 157 million yuan.
What is somewhat embarrassing is that as the world's top freestyle skier, Gu Ailing's on-field income is only $100,000, and the other $22 million comes entirely from off-site endorsements.
Gu Ailing's achievements today need to be fully grateful to the great motherland and Chinese netizens. If he hadn't completed naturalization and was still an American, then his income was estimated to be less than a fraction of what it is now. It is precisely because she chose naturalization and became a Chinese athlete that Gu Ailing won the title of "Frog Princess", not only won a large number of Chinese fans, but also made a lot of money.
Objectively speaking, Gu Ailing's results are indeed excellent, and her two golds and one silver in the Beijing Winter Olympics also proved her strength. It has also contributed to China. But Gu Ailing's rewards are handsome, and she earns money that most of the top freestyle skiers can't make in their lifetime.
Normally, as a Winter Olympian, Gu Ailing's income should plummet between the two Winter Olympics, but she is an exception, with long-term sponsorships around the world. If it weren't for the Chinese players, if it weren't for the popularity of Chinese fans and netizens, this phenomenon would not have happened.
Chinese tennis player Zheng Qinwen ranks 15th, as the current first sister of the Chinese women's tennis, Zheng Qinwen earns as much as 7.2 million US dollars, Zheng Qinwen is also another Chinese women's tennis player on the Forbes income list after Li Na.
As Li Na's hometown in Hubei, Zheng Qinwen will have excellent results in 2023, in Rome in May, Zheng Qinwen advanced to the top 8, Zheng Wei followed Li Na and Zhang Shuai, another Chinese golden flower who advanced to the top 8, in Palermo in July, Zheng Qinwen won the women's singles championship and won the first championship in her career, and at the Hangzhou Asian Games in September, Zheng Qinwen defeated Zhulin 2-0 and won a valuable gold medal.
The most gratifying thing is that Zheng Qinwen is just 21 years old this year, and her future has infinite possibilities, and it is not impossible to surpass Li Na and win more Grand Slam titles.