Born to Run

2005, May 7th.

Nagai Stadium in Osaka, Japan, has ushered in the annual track and field event. Since 1996, Osaka has been listed as a key track and field event by the IAAF, and an international competition approved by the IAAF has been held every year.

Especially this year, the IAAF will unify the various Golden League Super Grand Prixes and so on that have been scattered before to form the IAAF World Athletics Tour.

The tour is mainly divided into two levels, the first level is the IAAF Golden League and the IAAF Super Grand Prix, and the second level includes the IAAF Grand Prix and regional licensed track and field events.

The IAAF World Athletics Tour has a total of 25 world-class track and field competitions, including six Golden League, five Super Grand Prix and 14 Grand Prix competitions. Every year, there are many regional licensing competitions organized by the six continents Athletics Associations. In these competitions, athletes get points rankings, and finally the athletes with the leading scores enter the annual World Athletics Finals.

The points for the Grand Prix are 10 points for the champion, and 1 to 8 points for other athletes based on the final ranking. The points for the Golden League and Super Grand Prix are twice that of the general Grand Prix.

In later generations, after 2010, the IAAF World Athletics Tour was replaced by the IAAF Diamond League and the IAAF World Challenge.

At this time, the Osaka Grand Prix, as one of the fourteen grand prix games, is a great promotion for a country’s local track and field sports. It’s a good idea to be able to improve yourself through the grand prix platform and the world’s top players. The advantages.

"This...Are there no athletes from other countries to compete?"

On the warm-up track of Changju Stadium, Ye Qin had just carried out a simple warm-up activity, and got a list of matches from Chen Zhongzhou a few hours later. He was a little confused for a while.

After leaving Xiushui No. 2 Middle School, he first returned to Yanjing and joined his team members such as Randy Hunter and Chen Zhongzhou. After a few days of training in the training bureau, he went to Shenghai City and found Coach Liu Yangyu, Sun Chaosheng and others, the two teams discussed the next itinerary together in Shenghai, and then together came to Osaka, Japan to participate in the Grand Prix on May 7.

This is Yechin’s first participation in the Grand Prix and his first time in Japan. At first he showed curiosity from the other side, but at this time, seeing only 8 athletes participating in the competition, Japanese players accounted for four places. Can't help but be a little surprised.

He thought that the Grand Prix were the top first-class players in the world, but now it does not seem to have reached as many as he thought. Instead, the number of local Japanese players stood in half.

"It's normal, there are 5 Japanese players in my group."

Liu Yangyu, who was also warming up together, saw Ye Qin holding the list of matches and was in a daze. He leaned over, glanced at Ye Qin’s list of matches, and said with a smile, "To the next stop in the United States’ Eugene and New York stations. Enough."

For example, Yeqin and Liu Yangyu participated in the men’s 400-meter and men’s 110-meter hurdles, but Japanese players occupied the majority in the race. The same was true in the men’s 100-meter race, except for Jax Trin of the United States. Another American player and a Barbados player came to the competition, and the rest were Japanese athletes. In addition to the main race, in the 100m event, there is a special team of 5 purely Japanese players for the men's 100m race.

"Brother Yang Yu, can we have so many domestic players participating in this year's Grand Prix at Shenghai Station?" Yeqin asked.

For the 14 IAAF Grand Prix, this year Shenghai Station also got the authority to hold it for the first time, but it was in September. Earlier, when Yechin was training for the national team, he had heard many people mention this. .

Shenghai City sent an invitation to Liu Yangyu and him early, and on September 17th, he had to attend the local Grand Prix to make a name for himself.

"Probably there are only two. By that time there will be more people competing." Liu Yangyu said with some uncertainty.

Osaka Station is the first stop of the IAAF Grand Prix. At the beginning of the season, many athletes are not in a hurry to start scoring points, and they are located in East Asia. Many athletes are far away and the number of participants is often insufficient. The organizers will seize the opportunity. As much as possible to put your own local athletes into the game, you can also let your own country's athletes get exercise.

But in August and September, it is the end of the season, and many athletes will seize the time and take advantage of participating in various IAAF competitions to improve their rankings.

According to the regulations of the IAAF, as the host city of the Grand Prix, a project has the right to recommend two players from its own country to participate. However, if the number of participants is not enough, you can add national players to the event.

"That's it!" Ye Qin understood the meaning of the IAAF World Tour. These events accumulated a few points. Ye Qin didn't understand it at first. Even if Chen Zhongzhou had done it once before, there were still many doubts.

Liu Yangyu smiled, patted Ye Qin on the shoulder and then said, "Although there are not many top international players who come to the Osaka station to compete, there are still many people, like the 100-meter Olympic champion Jax Trin. With you, Alain Francia from Grenada, 400 meters away, personal PB ran in 44.47 seconds, the strength is still relatively strong."

Ye Qin nodded, thinking about it. Although the majority of the players in the Osaka Grand Prix are mainly Japanese players, this is not a matter of the event after all. One can only say that it is a matter of time. At the beginning of the season, the athletes were still recovering. Status, the other is that the place is too far away, many famous players are not ready to cross the ocean to compete at this time.

Of course, it is not true that there are no famous players. The Osaka Grand Prix is ​​particularly attractive to American players, as well as players from Kenya and other countries, such as Jax Trin, and the men's 110-meter hurdle before Liu Yangyu. The first man, Alan Johnson, etc., have all appeared in the Osaka Grand Prix.

"It's no wonder that the gap between Japan and us in track and field has been getting bigger and bigger over the years. It's not unreasonable. It's just to invite international players to practice sparring for their own athletes."

Chen Zhongzhou also saw the list of competitions, and he knew more about men’s 100m and 400m hurdles, men’s 110m hurdles and 400m hurdles, men’s 1500m and men’s 3000m hurdles. Chen Zhongzhou has read all the lists of these competitions. In the men's track category, no matter which one, Japanese players account for more than half. For him, it is also a little weird.

In the IAAF Grand Prix, the men’s 200-meter event sometimes cancels the event due to the number of participants and the schedule time. This is also a good thing for Yeqin~www.wuxiaspot.com~One day double The intensity of the competition, it is not easy to get the best individual performance in both the 200m and 400m.

Sun Chaosheng, who was communicating with Randy Hunter on the side, heard Chen Zhongzhou’s emotions and smiled and said, "Zhongzhou, what you said is very pertinent. This is to attract international players to participate in the competition through high bonuses. And then try hard to push the athletes of their own country to contact these high-level players and accumulate experience in the competition. This is actually very obvious in terms of the results."

From the end of the 1990s to now in 2005, Japan has made great progress in men's sprinting, and it has been the top overall strength of Asian men's sprinting for more than ten years. All aspects of research investment, holding competitions, follow-up personnel training, etc., are all indispensable.

"We have applied to the IAAF to host the Shenghai Grand Prix a few years ago. This year, the IAAF World Tour finally passed the application. I believe that after another time, our athletes can also accumulate international experience through this competition. Slowly walk out some outstanding talents."

Sun Chaosheng's understanding of Japanese domestic track and field events, especially men's sprint events, is much more familiar than others because he has been participating in the early years. When he said something at this time, Chen Zhongzhou couldn't help but nod repeatedly.