The Hindu : Sport : Stage set for China to emerge the best

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Wednesday, Aug 06, 2008
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Stage set for China to emerge the best

A. Vinod

The host has been running an ambitious project to win more medals

The Chinese, having toiled hard through every single day of the last seven years, are all set to host the Summer Games of the 29th Olympiad in Beijing from August 8 to 24.

True, all the meticulous planning and preparations apart, certain irritants do remain: like the problem of air pollution and the lack of sufficient volunteers with decent English communicative skills to guide the thousands of visitors expected to be at the Chinese capital during this 17-day period.

But then, all these things are certain to be swept under the carpet in the coming days as the focus shifts from China or rather Beijing’s preparedness for the 10,700-odd elite athletes from across 205 countries and their attempts to leave their indelible mark behind while competing for the 302 gold medals up for grabs in 28 sports disciplines.

Or more so, on a pertinent question that has been doing the rounds through the last several months among sports lovers the world over: Will China finally put an end to the U.S. domination of the Olympic Games in Beijing?

Indeed, a clear-cut answer to such a question will emerge during the fag end of the Games, possibly by August 23, even if this query is based only China’s impressive performances in the Games right from 1984 when it re-entered the Olympic fold after a long hiatus of 36 years.

Unimpressive

China had participated in the 1932 (Los Angeles), 1936 (Berlin) and 1948 (London) Olympics, returning medal-less on all the three occasions, before it broke away from the International Olympic Committee on the question of the IOC’s recognition of Taiwan (formerly known as Formosa).

At the 1984 Games in Los Angeles, China finished an impressive fourth in the overall medals tally with a haul of 32 (15 gold, 8 silver and 9 bronze). However, in Seoul (1988), China could manage only 5 gold, 11 silver and 12 bronze medals as it finished outside the top 10 bracket. But the resurgence that the Chinese have shown in every Games since then has been quite remarkable; finishing fourth in Barcelona (1992) and Atlanta (1996), third in Sydney (2000) and second in Athens (2004).

And at the Greek capital, though it did garner only 63 medals, China had a tally of 32 gold medals, just four short of U.S. which topped the table with 102 medals.

The Chinese surge to the top of the sporting world through the last two decades has often been dictated by its dominance in disciplines like badminton, diving, gymnastics, shooting, table tennis and weightlifting in the international arena.

And in Beijing too, things could hardly be any different in these events as the Chinese, despite entry restrictions in shooting, weightlifting and certain other disciplines, looks to be a better bet than any other country.

It is a known factor that home advantage has often led to some exemplary performances in many a sporting arena and given the fact that the Chinese themselves could well be partial in their approach in Beijing, the host country could also win a few more gold medals from outside its traditional strongholds.

However, this alone should in no way belittle the vigorous efforts of the Chinese, who have been running a massive project to cut down the gap that their athletes faced with the rest of the world since the 2000 Sydney Games.

‘Project 119’

Termed initially as ‘Project 119’, to signify the total number of gold medals awarded in marquee disciplines like athletics and swimming and other water sports, the scheme being run in over 300 special sports schools is yet to see an extraordinary upswing in China’s fortunes, especially in track and field and the pool.

But in Beijing, the project (now known as 122 with the inclusion of 3000m steeplechase for women and the 10km open water swimming for both men and women) could well help China to spread its area of influence to events like rowing and thereby help it to conquer the world.

Right mix

Given the fact that China has invested heavily on its future Olympic champions through the project, with a right mix of old-style Soviet and the most modern Western technologies, there is already a buzz in the American media that the U.S. contingent could have a tough time in holding back the spirited Chinese challenge.

But the Chinese themselves have been modest in their approach saying repeatedly that the fight for the top two spots will be between the Americans and the Russians.

This is only to be expected as the Chinese would not like to be discredited for having won the battle simply due to home advantage.

But one thing is for sure: it will take quite an effort from the Americans and the Russians to stop the Chinese juggernaut from mowing down its opposition in Beijing.

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