When you think of your favorite sport, what comes to mind: jogging to train your heart and lungs, or badminton, which seems to be more relaxed and fun?
I believe that for many boys, basketball is their favorite, since middle school, the school's basketball court can always be crowded with a lot of boys playing basketball, which is also a beautiful landscape.
In fact, basketball is not a special area for men, and in the mainland, there are many women who shine in basketball.
For example, Li Yueru, as a member of the women's basketball team, has won a lot of honors for the mainland. Now she has directly joined the American Sparks.
Today, the editor will lead you into the story of the "basketball goddess" Li Yueru.
1. Low self-esteem brought about by height
In the nineties of the last century, Li Yueru was born in an ordinary working family.
Her parents are ordinary white-collar workers, and although the life of the family is not as good as that of the wealthy and expensive businessman's family, the three of them are always happy, happy and comfortable.
But Li Yueru's family has an "unusual" side, and her parents are both of unusual heights.
Li Yueru's father is more than 1.9 meters tall, and her mother is also 1.8 meters tall, and the husband and wife can always attract the attention of pedestrians when they walk on the road - after all, this pair of partners with the right height is actually too "eye-catching".
As their daughter, Li Yueru's height naturally has not been pulled down, and since kindergarten, Li Yueru has shown a different side from her peers.
The most significant thing is, of course, height, at the age of four, many kindergarten children are less than one meter tall, and they are more than one meter taller than the "outstanding".
But at this time, Li Yueru's height has reached one meter three, and every time the kindergarten has a group activity, many people think that Li Yueru is a primary school student mixed in with the children.
If the difference in childhood can be offset by the innocence of children, then the youthful ignorance in middle school cannot erase the inferiority caused by height.
Although China, with a population of more than one billion, is an out-and-out big country, women exude all kinds of charm and are not confined to one pattern.
But for fourteen or fifteen-year-old junior high school students, "demure and well-behaved", "gentle and moving", and "cheerful and lively" may be the ideal state for most girls.
At the very least, no one wants to be taller than a boy or even an adult male.
Li Yueru has such a problem, she has not yet reached the age of sixteen, but she is already one meter eighty-three tall.
Every time the school recess exercises, the whole school students scattered and lined up to do exercises together, and Li Yueru was always the last one in line.
Looking from afar, others can only see the top of their heads, only Li Yueru, who is tall, will always be seen at a glance.
What bothered her the most was the excessive interruption of other classmates, especially some adolescent boys, who always liked to make some inappropriate jokes, and they always teased: "Li Yueru, why do you look taller than our principal?"
All kinds of uncomfortable, well-behaved and sensible Li Yueru will talk to her parents when she gets home.
She asked parents of the same "outstanding" height if they had such struggles when they were students.
Li Yueru's parents answered in the affirmative, and they comforted their daughter: "When I was a student, I needed a lot of group activities, which inevitably required comparison with other classmates.
Even if you don't want to do this, there are always other people who compare you with others, and the height is given by your parents, and we can't change it, so we can only deal with it calmly. ”
2. Step into the world of basketball
Even if they comforted their daughter so verbally, Li Yueru's parents still couldn't bear to let the girl suffer this kind of trouble for a long time.
Therefore, the husband and wife came up with the idea of letting Li Yueru learn to play basketball.
They clearly know how strict the height requirements of basketball are, and they also know how rare Li Yueru's height of 1.83 meters is for the women's basketball team at this time.
In this way, after many inquiries, Li Yueru's parents decided to send their daughter to a basketball school in Jiaozuo City, Henan Province.
Jiaozuo has always been regarded as the "home of basketball players", and there are many famous basketball schools here.
There are also many well-known athletes who have come here to study, so Li Yueru's parents decided to use this place as the first starting point for training their daughter.
After entering the basketball school, Li Yueru gradually lost the inferiority complex brought by ordinary middle schools.
Because the girls who practice basketball here are very tall, generally more than 1.8 meters, her 1.8 meter tall is not particularly eye-catching in the crowd.
And Li Yueru feels that she gets along better with the people here, perhaps because of the reason for practicing sports, and the women's basketball players are very easy-going and lively.
A group of people often get together to chat and help each other when doing sports.
But soon, Li Yueru couldn't laugh anymore.
Because as she has been in basketball school for more and more time, Li Yueru needs to carry out physical exercises that have increased in intensity.
She not only needs to practice basketball, but also needs to run, pull-ups, sit-ups, etc., all kinds of sports training is never stopped, and she always sweats profusely after training every day.
What Li Yueru can't stand the most is the diet.
At home before, because she was an adolescent child, Li Yueru's parents would always cook her a lot of delicious food, and stewed prawns, lion's head, and sweet and sour short ribs were Li Yueru's favorites.
But now she is a basketball player, and she can't consume too much heavy oil and salt in her diet, which makes Li Yueru, who is still a child, a little unbearable.
So Li Yueru still called her parents to complain as usual, but this time, Li Yueru's parents did not obey their daughter again.
They said earnestly: "Since we have chosen this path, we must grit our teeth and go on, and we must make good use of your advantages."
But height is no longer your exclusive advantage when you put it in the women's basketball team, so you have to bring out your potential and see if you have other strengths. ”
Therefore, Li Yueru never complained again, she was always the first to train every day, even if she sometimes didn't have her own games, she would go to the basketball gym to see how other senior players played.
As the saying goes, "hard work pays off", Li Yueru's efforts were unexpectedly discovered by Ding Wansong, the head basketball coach of Dongguan City, who came to Jiaozuo for exchanges.
He felt that Li Yueru was a good seedling worth cultivating, so he invited her to study in Dongguan. After getting the affirmation of the coach's parents, Li Yueru embarked on the road to Guangdong.
After arriving in Dongguan, Coach Ding Wansong formulated a personal training plan for Li Yueru.
And this period of time has also become the hardest, most boring and most difficult period of Li Yueru's training career.
But this period of time in the future is also a time that Li Yueru constantly recalls and is grateful for, she feels that if there is no foundation for this period of time, there will be no glory behind her.
In 2015, at this time, Li Yueru was already nearly two meters tall, she successfully entered the Guangdong women's basketball team, represented the team in the WCBA competition, and also helped the team win the championship in one fell swoop in the PK with the Shanxi team and the Henan team.
3. Break into the international field
Just when countless people thought that the Chinese women's basketball team had a successor, the American basketball team also set its sights on Li Yueru, a talented player.
In 2017, Li Yueru participated in the Women's Basketball Asian Cup.
At this time, Li Yueru has become a member of the Chinese national team, and in this competition, she also won the title of "Asia's Best Charge", and also began to make her name in the international arena.
Later, Li Yueru participated in the WNBA competition and won the runner-up, as a newly adult athlete, Li Yueru can tap more and more value.
As a result, the Chicago Sky team of the United States signed Li Yueru.
The domestic view of Li Yueru's joining the US Sky Team is similar, and many people feel that Li Yueru, as a Chinese, cannot add glory to the United States.
But in the face of many doubts from the outside world, Li Yueru did not respond too much.
Later, Li Yueru represented the United States in several WNBA games.
She came on as a substitute, and although she didn't win the title directly, she still showed her extraordinary strength in just four minutes of appearance.
In 2023, when it was reported in the United States that Li Yueru would no longer participate in the new season's competition, it immediately aroused a lot of discussion, and many people speculated whether Li Yueru was expelled?
Just when everyone was disagreeing, Li Yueru posted a video on her personal social platform, saying that she temporarily withdrew from the competition because of injury.
Originally, she thought that she was just an ordinary strain and could recover after a week of rest, but she did not expect the doctor to tell Li Yueru that her cruciate ligament had been torn to the third degree and that she had to recuperate and could no longer do high-intensity physical exercise.
In this regard, the Los Angeles Sparks signed Li Yueru under their names, and when Li Yueru recovers later, he will once again show himself as a member of the Sparks.
According to a person familiar with the matter, after Li Yueru's return, the salary in the new season can be as high as 60,000 US dollars, and the future is limitless.
epilogue
No matter what decision Li Yueru makes, no matter where she wants to develop, this is her own decision, and we have no right to interfere.
There are many outstanding women's basketball players in China, and they will all bring honor to our country, no more than Li Yueru going to the United States to compete.
Perhaps, for Li Yueru, she has her own ideas, and she doesn't want others to point fingers at her decisions.
I believe that she will bring more wonderful performance to the world later, as a Chinese, she will be the pride of our Chinese wherever she goes!
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