All-round Athlete

Chapter 755 Short track speed skating has changed

Before the finish line, Zhang Guan raised his arms high in celebration, and the Chinese coaching team rushed forward one after another and handed a piece of the national flag to Zhang Guan.

In the next second, countless photojournalists came over, some of them even jumped over the guardrail and came to the arena, just to take a close-up shot of Zhang Guan.

The three members of the South Korean team all lowered their heads without exception, extremely frustrated, and the leader Lee Jung-soo had already burst into tears.

Coach Cui Guangfu stood there with a dull face, and he even hoped that all this was just a nightmare, or the game was not over yet.

"We lost? We really lost? We lost!" Coach Cui murmured to himself in despair. He recalled the game just now. His three players did not make any mistakes, especially Lee Kwang-soo, who could even be said to have played well. Very good, but in the end South Korea still lost, three players lost to Zhang Guan alone!

The South Korean team has a clear group advantage, but lost the game in a three-on-one situation. This is really a complete defeat.

"How did this happen? Why did this happen? You lost so thoroughly!" Coach Cui looked at the score card, and the 2:08.021 was particularly conspicuous.

"2 minutes 08 seconds 021! World record, this is a new world record!" At this moment, Coach Cui finally understood why the South Korean team lost the gold medal, why the world's No. Against a new world record, it is impossible for Lee Jung-soo to win!

...

"The referee confirmed the result again, 2 minutes 08 seconds 021, we congratulate Zhang Guan, he broke the world record of short track speed skating 1500 meters. Minute 10.639, Zhang Guan improved this result by more than 2 seconds in one fell swoop, which is really unbelievable. You must know that even an improvement of 0.01 second is very difficult in the world record level, and Zhang Guan participated in this for the first time. In this sport, the world record has been improved by 2 seconds! You really deserve to be Zhang Guan, the greatest athlete in the world!"

"Today's Zhang Guan seems to bring us back to the track and field, where he can easily break the world record! Perhaps for Zhang Guan, the track and field are the same as the short track speed skating. To be the fastest man in the world! He is the fastest man on land, the fastest man to drive a racing car on land, and now he will become the fastest man on ice? It is not impossible, Zhang Guan will also participate in the men's 500m and 1000m short track speed skating competitions, I believe he will definitely bring us surprises, and we are also looking forward to the next event of short track speed skating coming as soon as possible!"

The commentator's series of commentary was full of praise, and this is a relatively neutral commentary in Canada, while on the other side of the world, the commentator of CCTV has already praised Zhang Guan to the sky.

The birth of a new world record is enough to make the whole world applaud.

Of course there are exceptions, such as South Korea.

South Korea pays much more attention to the Winter Olympics, especially short track speed skating than other countries. The reason is of course that South Korea's short track speed skating strength is the strongest in the world. It's like the Chinese don't miss a table tennis game. Among the three levels of short track speed skating in the Winter Olympics, the 1500m is the strongest event of the Korean team and the most stable gold point. In addition, three players have entered the final, so whether it is the Korean media or the public , all think that the South Korean team will sweep the top three.

The 1500-meter final started at 12:20 noon in South Korea, which was also lunch time, so the ratings were very high. Many office workers even went to eat in some small restaurants with TVs, just to watch the 1,500-meter short-track speed skating final.

However, the result of today's game is destined to disappoint the Koreans. When Zhang Guan crossed the finish line, disappointed faces appeared in front of the TV. Whether it was a small restaurant or the school cafeteria, as long as there was a TV, there was no sound at all, including the TV. It also became a silent mode, because the commentator of the Korean TV station also stopped talking, and he didn't know what to say.

The event that the Koreans regard as the strongest, and the event that the Koreans regard as inevitable to win the championship, lost. This result is not only unacceptable to Korean audiences, but also difficult for them to understand.

"Why did Lee Jung-soo lose? Could it be that he wasn't fast enough?"

The next moment, the time of 2:08.021 appeared in front of everyone, and the two big English letters behind it were even more eye-catching.

WR, the English abbreviation of world record.

"World record! Ahn Hyun Soo's world record has been broken!" Someone exclaimed.

A sense of desolation instantly rose from the surroundings, and people's expressions seemed to have just experienced a catastrophe.

Losing the 1,500-meter short track speed skating gold medal is indeed a big blow to the national confidence of Koreans, and the breaking of Ahn Hyun-soo's world record is far more serious than the blow to losing the gold medal. If they just lost the gold medal, the Koreans might comfort themselves. Anyway, the world record for this event is still held by Ahn Hyun-soo, and the Koreans are still the strongest in this event. But now, even this last fig leaf has been torn away.

Koreans have always valued these honors more, because they are so lacking in everything, so any achievement will be infinitely magnified, and sometimes they will even take other people's things as their own to show off. Therefore, those Olympic champions and Winter Olympic champions in South Korea will be promoted as national heroes.

And now it is in response to that sentence, the higher you hold it, the more painful you fall.

"Why, why didn't Ahn Hyun Soo go! Ahn Hyun Soo is the world record holder, and he is the strongest short track speed skater in our country!"

"Yes, if Ahn Hyun-soo is allowed to play, today's result will definitely not be like this. Maybe Ahn Hyun-soo will break the world record again! I really don't understand what the coach thinks."

"This is the responsibility of the coaching staff, and Coach Cui Guangfu is responsible for it!"

"Yes, it's Coach Cui Guangfu's responsibility, he should step down!"

...

In the locker room, coach Li Bing danced excitedly.

"Zhang Guan, although I guessed that you might break the world record, I never expected that you would be so fast! Your time has improved by more than 1 second compared to more than a month ago. I have been doing short track for so many years. Speed ​​skating, I have never seen someone who can make such great progress in such a short period of time!" Coach Li Bing said.

It is indeed very difficult for professional short track speed skaters to improve their performance by 1 second after their skills have matured. Sometimes they even have to greatly improve their technical movements to achieve such an improvement. In the world record level, it is an arduous battle to improve by 0.01 seconds. More than a month ago, Zhang Guan's time was just within 2 minutes and 10 seconds, but now it is almost close to 2 minutes and 08 seconds. If this speed of progress is spread, it will definitely shock other ice athletes.

Zhang Guan smiled slightly and said: "I still have to thank the national team for the conditions provided to me. Without you, I can run within 2 minutes and 10 seconds."

While talking, Zhang Guan pointed to the skates under his feet, and continued: "This custom-made skate is different from the one I bought in the store, and Coach Tang also gave me a lot of help."

While talking, Zhang Guan pointed to the equipment coach surnamed Tang not far away, and this coach Tang smiled shyly.

Professional skating must be equipped with an equipment coach, which is a major feature of skating. In other sports, equipment coaches are often played by training coaches or athletes themselves. For example, in table tennis, the rackets are glued by the athletes themselves; in shooting sports, the guns are calibrated and maintained by the athletes themselves. Many other sports and competition equipment are also adjusted by coaches or athletes.

However, skating is different. Ice skates usually require professional maintenance and maintenance. They need to be polished with oil stones, fixed with an arc meter, and bent with a bender. These tasks must be done by professional equipment coaches, such as pressing. In this part of bending, without certain experience, it is easy to break the skates.

The ice skates of short track speed skating are actually installed obliquely, which is beneficial for athletes to corner. For example, the calculation of the curvature of the skate, the calculation of the inclination angle, the selection of the skate angle according to the venue, etc., require certain mathematical skills and rich knowledge of physics. Ordinary athletes have been training since childhood, and may not even have the opportunity to go to high school, and it is impossible to master this knowledge. Therefore, the equipment coaches for short track speed skating are all highly educated professionals, and few of them are professional athletes.

And a set of suitable equipment, for athletes, the benefits are self-evident. Just like a suit, a tailor-made suit will definitely fit better than a store-bought ready-to-wear. So before that, Zhang Guan used the equipment he bought and tried his best to skate but just entered within 2 minutes and 10 seconds.

If a worker wants to do a good job, he must first sharpen his tools. The national team made tailor-made equipment for Zhang Guan, and then equipped with a special equipment coach, which further improved Zhang Guan's performance. In today's competition, Zhang Guan had some reservations in order to maintain stability. He could already get close to 2 minutes and 08 seconds. Zhang Guan felt that if he tried his best, it would definitely not be a problem to score within 2 minutes and 08 seconds.

...

It is not new for Zhang Guan to win the championship by breaking the record. In track and field racing, "winning the championship by breaking the record" is the normal state of Zhang Guan, but this time the venue has been changed to the skating rink, and the competition has become a short competition. speed skating.

When the news came out, the whole world was shocked again. Zhang Guan once again surpassed the project, and then successfully stood on the top of the world. He became the first athlete in the world to win individual gold medals in both the Summer Olympics and the Winter Olympics, and also the first person in the world to break world records in both the Summer Olympics and the Winter Olympics. Zhang Guan inadvertently achieved another unprecedented achievement, and wrote a strong stroke in the history of world sports.

And many professional sports commentators are even more aware that the event of short track speed skating is about to change!

...

The second competition day of short-track speed skating is on February 18, four days later. On this day, Zhang Guan only needs to participate in one competition, which is the 1000-meter group competition. At the same time, there is also a preliminaries for the relay race in the men's event, but because the opponent is relatively weak, Zhang Guan, who is responsible for winning the gold, did not participate in the relay race.

The preliminaries went without any surprises, Zhang Guan advanced smoothly, and another player of the national team, Han Jialiang, also successfully advanced to the next round.

Three days later, on February 21, there will be two events in the short track speed skating arena, namely the women's 1,500 meters and the men's 1,000 meters, and these two events will also determine gold medals.

Men's 1000m short track speed skating started with the quarter-finals. Zhang Guan met South Korean player Lee Ho-seok again. Apart from this, there was no decent opponent in this group. They all reserved their physical strength for the next game, so the bayonets that didn't kill were popular.

Later in the semi-finals, Zhang Guan met another Korean player, Sung Shibaek, and American player Apollo in the same group.

Apollo is the defending champion of 500-meter short track speed skating. He also has the nickname of "American Prince". It can be said that he is the strongest short track speed skater except for Korean players. His strength is indeed very strong, at least in the first half of the race, he did not lose to Cheng Shibai in terms of speed, and he was not surpassed by Cheng Shibai until the final sprint.

In the end, Zhang Guan and Cheng Shibai qualified as the top two in the group, and Apollo ranked third. Whether he can advance depends on the results of the other group.

In the other group, Korea's Lee Jeong-soo was the best. His teammate Lee Ho-seok won the second place, and the third place was won by Canada's Hamelin, but Hamelin's result was better than Apollo. Since there were only five places in the 1000m Group A final, Apollo could only be eliminated to Group B. The five players who remained in Group A were Zhang Guan, Li Zhengzhu, Li Haoxi, Cheng Shibai and Hamelin.

The 500m and 1000m finals of short track speed skating are divided into two groups, A and B. Those who fail to make it to the final in the semifinals will participate in the final of Group B. In the two groups, the players in Group A compete for the championship, second and third place, while the players in Group B compete for the ranking. For example, in the 1000-meter short-track speed skating, if a group of five people competes in group B, even if they win the first place in group B, they will only be sixth in the end. As for the 500-meter short-track speed skating, a group of four people, the first place in group B is equivalent to the fifth place.

...

Coach Cui Guangfu seemed a little nervous, firstly because the finals are about to start, and secondly because he has felt tremendous pressure these days. This pressure mainly comes from Korea. The reason is of course the Korean team Lost the men's 1500m gold medal.

"In the 1,000-meter event, all three of our competitors once again entered the final, and there were only five participants in the 1,000-meter final. Our advantage is greater than that of the 1,500-meter event! So this time, we must not lose." Cui Guangfushen Taking a breath, I forced myself to calm down.

"But Zhang Guan also entered the final. Since he can break the world record of 1500 meters, maybe he can also break the world record of 1000 meters! Even if he can't break the world record of 1000 meters, it will definitely threaten our players to win the championship This gold medal is bound to be won, and Zhang Guan must not be allowed to affect the result of the competition!" Coach Cui Guangfu's eyes flashed coldly when he thought of this.

"Since the conventional method is risky, some special tactics may be used. If necessary, a team member should be sacrificed to ensure this gold medal!"