All of the statements in this article are based on reliable sources and are reproduced at the end of this article.
In this year's Olympic Games, the Chinese diving team won various gold medals one after another, and it has become an unattainable benchmark in the diving industry, but all these achievements are inseparable from Zhou Jihong, the "head" of the Chinese diving team.
At the age of 19, she won the first Olympic diving gold medal for China, completed the Chinese diving gold medal "0 breakthrough", and when the Chinese diving team fell into a trough, she was ordered to be in charge of the Chinese diving team for 26 years, leading the team to win more than 300 gold medals, and was the biggest contributor to the success of the diving team.
But it is difficult to have both merits and demerits, she is known as the "Iron Lady" because of her vigorous and resolute behavior, and she was criticized for expelling Tian Liang from the team with her own hands, and the criticism of Quan Hongchan also made her label "suppression" and "snobbery", and the incidents of "embezzling bonuses" and "awarding gold medals" also made a lot of noise, but is all this her fault?
Now, looking at Guo Jingjing, who has become the referee of the diving event in the audience, only then can I know Zhou Jihong's good intentions......
China's first gold in diving
Zhou Jihong was born in Wuhan, Hubei Province in 1965, because her body coordination was beyond ordinary people since she was a child, her parents sent her to a sports school to learn gymnastics, but after practicing for a while, she found that she was better at diving, so she "changed careers" at the age of 12.
Later, Zhou Jihong was selected by the provincial team coach with his amazing talent, and it happened that in 1979, China restored its legal seat in the International Olympic Committee, which gave athletes more opportunities to step on the world stage, and made Zhou Jihong firmly "go to the black" in diving.
Zhou Jihong
In 1981, Zhou Jihong, who was only 16 years old, won the national diving championship in one fell swoop, and it took only four years from amateur to national championship.
However, the diving team did not have much experience at that time, and it was just established in the early 70s of the last century, and Zhou Jihong could only "cross the river by feeling the stones" under the guidance of the coach, but her understanding was very good, and her skills also improved by leaps and bounds.
In 1984, Zhou Jihong jumped into the Olympic arena to perform the "Splash Disappearance Technique", at the age of 19, she won the first Olympic diving gold medal for China, showing the world the demeanor of Chinese Olympic athletes, so that the people of the whole country in front of the TV are excited and proud.
But just two years after Zhou Jihong got the highlight moment of her life, she suddenly chose to retire, because the perennial high-intensity training made her sick, even if her love for diving "burned more and more", she could only lose to reality before the illness.
Later, Zhou Jihong and the national team badminton player Tian Bingyi got married and gave birth to a healthy child, Zhou Jihong also completed the transformation of the athlete from a "housewife", which was five years, during which she was trapped by trivial housework, but the dream of diving in her heart has not been extinguished.
After that, the Chinese diving team continued to fall into a trough, and was disbanded in 1997, Zhou Jihong was heartbroken after knowing it, seeing that the child had grown up and did not need to be taken care of, in 1998 she took the initiative to ask Ying, hoping to reorganize the national team again for training.
So Zhou Jihong was ordered to take over this mess, but the result did not develop in the direction she imagined.
Caught in criticism
Seeing that the 2000 Sydney Olympics is only two years away, Zhou Jihong, who has no management experience, can only "grasp it", and new problems emerge one after another before the old problems are solved, which is completely like "catching ducks on the shelves".
After two years of anxiety, Zhou Jihong led a group of team members to the stage of the Olympic Games, she was under tremendous pressure and criticism, once she could not produce results, all the efforts she made became "useless", and people's expectations were also very high at that time, thinking that the Chinese diving team could win the "Grand Slam" in 8 events.
But unexpectedly, in the three events in which the Chinese diving team is most likely to win the gold medal, the three players lost one after another, which made Zhou Jihong hide in the room of the Olympic Village and cry secretly.
Information source: Guangming.com 2022.07.18 "How to get more than 300 gold medals in 24 years?" Interview with Zhou Jihong, leader of the Chinese diving team》
In the previous Olympic Games, the diving team led by Zhou Jihong achieved good results one after another, and the cumulative number of gold medals reached more than 300.
On the eve of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Yu Fen, who originally coached the Chinese diving team, wanted to return to the national team to teach, but was rejected by Zhou Jihong, which made her retaliate and wrote a report letter to the State Sports Supervision Bureau, claiming that Zhou Jihong had embezzled the athletes' competition bonuses, but after verification, there was no such thing.
Source: CCTV 2008.10.28 "Who Moved My Bonus - Zhou Jihong and Yu Fen Contradictions"
In the 2009 National Games, Zhou Jihong was accused by a coach of "internal determination" of the diving gold medal, but in fact, Zhou Jihong came forward to point out that the referee's scoring was unfair, and in order to maintain the professionalism of the competition, the statement of "internal determination" was completely groundless.
Source: China News Network 2009.10.16 "Xiao Tian: Zhou Jihong will not and dare not make up his mind that ugly things will eventually be exposed"
What gave Zhou Jihong the most headache was probably the relationship between her and Tian Liang, because Tian Liang was expelled by Zhou Jihong, and many people who liked him were indignant, thinking that Zhou Jihong was the "mastermind" behind all this.
But in fact, Tian Liang obviously violated the rules of the national team, athletes are not allowed to enter the entertainment industry without permission, and must be approved by their superiors, not only Tian Liang, but also Ning Zetao and Fu Mingxia were punished for leaving the team because of the same problem, so Zhou Jihong was not aimed at Tian Liang himself at all.
Information source: Jingchu.com 2005.01.27 "Tian Liang was removed from the national diving team: the national team hurt me (picture)"
Compared with these false rumors, Zhou Jihong single-handedly introduced Guo Jingjing to the seat of the diving referee, so that her good intentions can be seen.
Justify the name of the Olympic athletes
In this year's Olympic Games, everyone must have seen that mainland athletes have been facing unfair treatment, and they have the highest number of traditional Chinese medicine tests of any country, and they will be slandered by the Western media for "doping".
Information source: Dawan News 2024.07.18 "Chinese Swimming Team Receives Nearly 200 Drug Tests in 10 Days"
Zhou Jihong has long discovered this, she has seen Chinese players make trouble in the referee's seat when they encounter injustice, but her words are slight, and she can't shake those deep-rooted prejudices at all, so she wants to become the "rules" herself and change this status quo with her own hands.
In 2021, Zhou Jihong became the first female vice president in FINA history, and she successfully won more voice for herself and the Chinese diving team.
As more and more Chinese referees appear on the international stage, the "military spirit" of the Chinese diving team is becoming more and more stable, because they know that behind them there is the protection of a strong motherland, and there is a phenomenon of injustice to Chinese referees.
Information source: The Paper 2022.07.05 "National Honor|Lead Dancer Zhou Jihong: The Goddess Behind China's Diving Dream Team"
Today's Zhou Jihong is committed to the development of China's sports world, and I believe that under her leadership, the mainland will frequently achieve good results, and no longer have to endure the criticism and injustice of others.
Information sources:
1. Guangming.com2022.07.18 "How to get more than 300 gold medals in 24 years?" Interview with Zhou Jihong, leader of the Chinese diving team》
2. Global Online2008.07.09 "Interview with the Olympic Champion Iron Lady Zhou Jihong: Diving is Life"
3. The Paper2022.07.05 "National Honor|Lead Dancer Zhou Jihong: The Goddess Behind China's Diving Dream Team"