Sheer icy determination

Despite seeing their season abruptly cut short, China's winter sports teams are drawing on all their ingenuity and tenacity to stay fit, competitive and, above all, safe during the coronavirus pandemic.

Improvisation has now become the name of the game, as Chinese athletes endeavor to keep their preparations for the 2022 Beijing Olympics on track while navigating the myriad of logistical, physical and mental challenges presented by the global crisis.

Due to strict virus-prevention measures adopted by all businesses, China's National Winter Sports Administrative Center last week canceled all of the remaining 11 events on the 2019-20 domestic calendar, officially wrapping up a season that has already seen all major international championships called off or delayed indefinitely.

However, China's efforts to prepare its athletes for the home Winter Olympics show no sign of slowing down.

As the country's most decorated winter sports team, the short-track speed skating squad filled the gap left by March's canceled world championships by staging internal test races at the national training base in Beijing.

Featuring exactly the same format as the worlds, the live-streamed event provided a much-needed test for the squad following an intensive 18-day pre-worlds training program, said Wu Dajing, the reigning men's 500m Olympic champion.

"Despite learning of the world championships' cancellation midway through our program, we've never relaxed for one day the whole winter," Wu said in a news release sent by the winter sports administrative center to China Daily on Wednesday.

"With uncertainty appearing the only certain thing during these tough times, it only matters to spend every day to the fullest.

"I am glad that my efforts paid off at the internal test event, which really gave me great encouragement," added Wu, who won the 500m test competition and came third in the 1,500m.

Out of China's 13 total gold medals won at the Winter Olympics since its debut at the 1980 edition in Lake Placid, New York, the short-track team has contributed 10 to spearhead the country's quest for a dominating home run in 2022 in Beijing and co-host Zhangjiakou, Hebei province.

With the peak of the pandemic overlapping with the busiest stretch of the international winter sports calendar in early March, multiple Chinese teams traveling abroad had to improvise on their original plans, either training at makeshift camps on their extended stay abroad or rushing back home to keep their fitness programs going during mandatory quarantines.

Such efforts were highlighted in a viral video post that showed some of China's national freestyle skiers lifting water barrels and doing bedside push-ups during their isolation.

"It's important that everybody does his or her own bit in the fight against the virus," said Xu Mengtao, a three-time Olympian in freestyle ski aerials.

"For us, it's our responsibility to stay in competition shape during the season whatever happens out there. I've never felt so strong to want to compete for my country during this tough time when everybody is looking for positive energy."

After winning the International Ski Federation's World Cup season opener in Changchun in late December, Xu remained with the national team in Jilin province at a closed-door training camp for the next month and a half as the outbreak was peaking in China before being cleared to travel to Europe for the Cup series' final three events in Russia and Belarus.

Although dealing with inconvenience of traveling between European countries at a time when the pandemic ravaged the continent, Xu managed to pull off some impressive runs to finish second in the overall standings of the six-event series.

China's women's curling team are also keeping the action sliding along with behind-closed-doors training sessions in Tianjin.

All of the national team curlers retested negative for COVID-19 following a two-week quarantine upon their return from Canada, where the team had been preparing for the since canceled world championships, originally scheduled for March 14-22 in Prince George.

Having witnessed China's efforts to balance safety with providing logistical support for its sports teams, the curling squad's Italian coach Marco Mariani believes there is no better place to focus on athletic pursuits these days.

"I feel very protected here in China right now, and this is because, despite the fact that the COVID-19 contagion in China is currently under control, China's leadership has absolutely not let down its guard," the 2006 Olympian said in the news release.

"I'm very worried about my family in Italy, honestly. I think if they were in China right now, they'd be safer."