The Paper's reporter Song Chengliang
Gong Li.
Long before the Start of the Tokyo Olympics, Gong Li was on fire on social networks.
With a handsome face, exquisite facial features, and a tall figure of 1 meter 73, netizens once called her the "Ishihara Rimi" of Chinese karate.
But in training and competition, Gong Li is a fierce character - in the women's karate 61 kg or more competition at the Tokyo Olympic Games on the 7th, Gong Li won 2 wins, drew 1 and lost 1 loss in the first game of the group stage with a result of 2 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss.
In the semi-finals, Gong Li lost to Azerbaijan's Irina, adding another bronze to the Chinese delegation!
Gong Li showed her muscles.
Teenager meets Bole
The Chinese Karate Team was founded in 2007, and most of its members were re-established from other sports. With full of love and continuous struggle, the Chinese karate team quickly jumped from "starting from scratch" to a strong team.
In the national team assembled for the 2018 Tokyo Olympics, two female athletes got their tickets to the Olympic Games as they wished – they were Yin Xiaoyan, who had won the silver medal the day before, and Gong Li, 22, who had won the silver medal the day before.
Born in 1999, Gong Li only grabbed the Olympic "ticket" in the last Olympic points race. Gong Li began practicing taekwondo at the age of 8, and the story begins with a township teacher named Zheng Haofeng.
At that time, Zheng Haofeng was admitted to the Ningde First Normal Affiliated Primary School, and during the 5 years of teaching in the township school, he brought his martial arts skills to the physical education class. After becoming a full-time physical education teacher, he changed his career to taekwondo and, with the encouragement of Principal Nguyen Quang Thanh, established the "Little TaeKwondo Club".
Gong Li is from the "Little Taekwondo Club".
"Gong Li was studying martial arts outside the school for two years, and her mother thought she was grinning and had a more pungent personality, so she sent her to my club." During that time, due to Gong Li's mother's work, Gong Li stayed at Zheng Haofeng's home for a long time.
Gong Li on the stage of the Tokyo Olympics.
Zheng Haofeng found that Gong Li had already shown a good talent in speed and explosiveness when she was in the third grade. But interestingly, due to her rampage in her playing style, for a while she kept losing to a boy in the next class.
"At that time she was going to cry when she lost, but I told her that competitive sports are not just about winning and losing, learning to face failures, and then reflecting in failures, and being good at observation."
These are actually the teaching concepts and sportsmanship taught by Principal Ruan Quang Thanh to Zheng Haofeng, in the words of Zheng Haofeng, "I just pass on the spirit of Principal Nguyen Quang Thanh from generation to generation." ”
Later, Zheng Haofeng sent Gong Li to fuzhou major sports school for training, and this decision also put Gong Li on the road of the national team and the Olympic Games.
Changing karate was fooled
At the age of 18, Gong Li, who trained in the Fuzhou Sports Team, was favored by the coach of the North Sports Brigade who went to select materials.
She came to Beijing happily, only to find that she had to practice karate and began to be very unhappy.
"I also practiced taekwondo for nearly 10 years, and then I practiced karate because I started practicing taekwondo and I played traditional protective gear, and then slowly evolved into electronic protective gear. It may be that the electronic protective gear playing style is completely different from the traditional protective gear, and the traditional protective gear has more of this ornamental and strong confrontation feeling in karate now. ”
"So I felt a little bit like I was being fooled, I didn't even look at karate at that time, I didn't know what karate was, and then I followed my team to the national team."
It wasn't until after watching a practical combat lesson that Gong Li changed her mind, "At that time, I saw the old players of the national team playing in real combat, and I forgot which brother did a bodywork, anyway, it was particularly cool, and at that moment I thought karate was so cool." ”
"Maybe it was this project that attracted me, so I started to get interested, and then from interest to now I love."
This "goddess" can really fight
Although Gong Li's appearance is quite similar to that of Japanese actress Rimi Ishihara, she is definitely not a cute girl, and this goddess is very capable of fighting.
Weng Ningning, a male member of the karate team, described Gong Li this way, "Very domineering, there are very few little girls who dare to fight and run, she just likes to fight with others." But in ordinary life, she is a big grin, a girl who loves to make trouble, and she also loves to laugh and cry. ”
When she first changed to karate, Gong Li chose the big level, so training with male players every day made her also become a female man.
"Tired, that kind of tiredness that tears the heart and lungs, I feel that I can't breathe." And the group of intermittent is also relatively tight, and then the whole person is particularly eager to lie down. But no, then everyone has to resist. ”
Speaking of the reason why she has persisted until now, Gong Li simply said, "Feeling is a belief, that is, a requirement for yourself." ”
In the eyes of coaches and teammates, Gong Li not only has solid leg skills, but also has a flexible mind, and has a strong understanding and execution of tactics.
In the past two years, Gong Li has made rapid progress, in the February 2020 Olympic points race, she won the 68 kg championship of the Super League in Dubai and Austria, and could have successfully won the Olympic quota, but the arrival of the epidemic made her have to press the pause button.
However, during the closed offseason, Gong Li practiced hard, trying to make her skills more comprehensive while strengthening the advantages of her leg technique.
Gong Li's roar.
In the Lisbon race in early May this year, Gong Li seized the first and only opportunity after the rematch to win the project again, and with three consecutive championships, she raised her world ranking to the second place in her level, and successfully qualified for the Olympic Games.
Gong Li, who came to Tokyo, showed herself and won honors for China.
Editor-in-Charge: Ascendas
Proofreader: Liu Wei