Athletics official: China getting better in tracks
By Chen Xiangfeng (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-08-16 06:22

HELSINKI: Although the Chinese track and field team will return home with only one silver medal from the World Athletics Championships, senior athletics official Feng Shuyong believes it is no cause for alarm.

"It is a pity we did not win a gold medal at the championships. But the overall performances are still encouraging," Feng, deputy director of the China Athletics Administration Centre, said after the closing ceremony on Sunday.

China won a bronze at the last tournament and picked up two golds at the Athens Olympics last year.

Olympic 110m hurdles champion Liu Xiang grabbed the only medal for China in Helsinki.

As a team, China's athletes top eight finish points total is up on both Athens and the last worlds, so there is obviously an overall improvement claimed Feng.

"We have not lost confidence in this tournament. We still have potential and a lot of room to improve before the 2008 Beijing Olympics," Feng said.

To speed up the improvement, Feng is determined to send athletes to compete at more high-level international competitions and to invite foreign coaches to China over the next two years.

"We will send our athletes to compete abroad in large numbers. From this tournament, we saw that our athletes lack the experience to compete at large occasions. We have to stay in touch with the rest of the world's athletics," Feng said.

Focus on technique

But Feng admitted, compared to foreign athletes, the Chinese did not have any physical advantage.

"We must pay more attention to those sports that require better techniques.

"If we want to beat them, we have to make extra effort with technique and consistency."

Feng said the two factors play a pivotal role in achieving better results in the future.

Actually Liu's success and youngster Huang Xiaoxiao's breakthrough in the women's 400m hurdles qualified Feng's view of point.

"Liu Xiang is not as strong as all the other finalists. He also lacks acceleration.

"Thanks to his superior skills in clearing the hurdles, Liu has become one of the world's top hurdlers."

Feng also singled out the field events as future medal hopes.

"Compared to the track events, field events call for even mor technique. So I think apart from Liu's hurdles, we will also be looking towards the field events for medals."

China's first two golds from the world championships were won by Huang Zhihong in women's shot put and Xu Demei at women's javelin in 1991 in Tokyo.

Wang also defended the title in 1993 in Stuttgart of Germany.

Conflicts and language

But a big headache for the national track and field team is the conflict with the National Games (the biggest domestic tournament among the provinces) every four years.

"When the two tournaments are held in the same year, China has poor results in some of the events abroad.

"I know some of the athletes were told by their province leaders to take it easy and try to avoid injury at the worlds in order to do well in the nationals."

Feng said that he had no specific proof but knows that the problem exists for some athletes.

"Some of our athletes underwent excessive training so they were not at their best at the worlds, keeping their energy for the coming National Games (in October)," bemoaned Feng.

Apart from the national Games, Feng mentioned the learning of English for the first time.

As a graduate student from Beijing Sports College, Feng has fluent English but has concerns about the athletes' ignorance of the language.

"It is a big problem. Our athletes will feel isolated at international events and it has affected them psychologically," said Feng.

"It is also very important for them to communicate with the world's top athletes when given the chance, but most of our athletes have no such ability."

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