Liu Xiang, China’s track star in the 100m hurdles, didn’t even make it past the first hurdle in the first heat before bowing out of Beijing Olympics with an apparent Achilles tendon injury. Despite leading the gold medal standings, the Chinese were waiting in particular for a Liu Xiang gold medal in track and field, a sport where they rarely top the podium. So when he pulled out to stunned silence from the capacity crowd, some Chinese were seen crying in the stands in disbelief and shock.
Liu Xiang was China’s most recognised and most marketed athlete in the lead-up to the Beijing Olympic Games and his race was eagerly anticipated within China.
International Herald Tribune stories:
China denied its ‘Cathy Freeman moment’
Will endorsements go away after Liu Xiang’s injury?
REDpoll
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I don’t think there is much room for skepticism here. After 7 gruelling years of training for this day, it is just unbearable to think that someone would chicken out just for fear of not being able to defend his title.
Moreover, in China, the “sports council” decides with an iron fist what the athletes do, the athletes have not much say. There is no way they’d agree to him pulling out because he is ‘not confident’.
The Chinese is also not prone to athlete-bashing, unless the athlete evidently underperforms. The Chinese knew that Liu has been injury prone; he had to show up on race day and glaze the tracks because 90% of the spectators have bought tickets way in advance + traveled from various parts of China specially to see him standing on the track.
Whether he runs or not, just showing up is quite enough to give people “their money’s worth”. It’s probably not so much to ‘show the pain’ than to ‘show his face’, a very Chinese thing. It’s symbolic in China that he just stepped onto the track, to them that is equivalent to his best shot.
Endorsements, I think it is doing more publicity for them than not! I mean nobody in China will forget this moment. And in China, an advertorial video clip to salute Liu Xiang has been done up and it is played over and over again on TV, in buses, on the streets…
i don’t think the injury’s a show. he’s faced pressure many times (2004 Olympics Gold, 2007 World Championships Gold)
i think that he was really brave in pulling out, not every athlete is brave enough to withdraw from a race that you had been training so hard for. and as Liu Xiang says, he will be back, i believe better than ever, so we should trust him.
Think Tiger Wood. He pulled out from his golf engagements because of knee injury. Wise move. Remedial medical treatment would only enhance his golf years. Do not see NIKE endorsement being affected. But then golf is a year round sport attracting a larger and more consistent following. Athletics is another story of course.
Totally agree, I mean who would want to pull out of defending their own title if he had a choice!
Word has it that Liu was not confident of beating Cuba’s Dayron Robles(who recently beat Liu’s record and is a favourite), so rather than fail to secure a Gold medal in front of the home crowd, he pulled out. In a way, the critics are trying to say that this injury debacle is all a show.
The Straits Times published comments and one of which was from a person who posted on an online forum.
The person commented that ‘even if he die on the track, he should give it a shot’
Is this the price of their pride?That a life means nothing to them?
Pull out now and he may recover to regain his title in the future, risk a permanent injury or (even death as the comment wrote) would guarantee an end to his career.
Months ago, The Straits Times published an article of how athletes risk losing their lives in the way they train even though they are injured.
What are they trying to prove, i wonder.