Olympic stars promote winter sports

Growing interest in winter sports as ice arenas even move into warmer climes

For Chen Lu, China's first figure skating women's singles world champion, the way to continue her life on ice is offering a place for more youth to join the sport. As the manager of the World Ice Arena, an upscale mall rink in Shenzhen, in Southern China's Guangdong province, Chen is among the first group of people in the country to run a commercial ice arena.

One of China's winter sports icons, Chen is still making efforts to help promote winter sports in the country.

Retiring from the competition after the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympic Games, where Chen claimed her second Winter Olympic bronze medal, she joined some commercial performance in the United States, until she was offered a chance to run an ice arena by property developer China Resources Land Ltd.

"When I learned that the ice arena is in Shenzhen, I realized that it was a good chance to promote skating in southern part of China," said Chen, who is also one of the coaches of the arena.

"The commercial ice arena is very mature in the US, which drew lots of skating fans. I want to bring it to China."

The World Ice Arena opened at the beginning of 2005. After 10 years' running, it has more than 40,000 members now.

"It shows that such pattern of running an ice rink is successful. It helped to promote the ice sports in China," said Chen, who was crowned with her first world champion title in 1995.

"I'm glad to see that more people are joining the sport. I want more people to know that skating is not only for athletes, but also for ordinary people to try."

Chen is not alone on the road of promoting winter sports in China.

Ye Qiaobo, China's first Winter Olympic medalist, and Yang Yang, the first Winter Olympic champion of the country are also doing the same.

Under the name of Ye, an indoor ski dome opened in Shunyi district of Beijing in 2005. Covering about 40,000 square meters, the Qiaobo Ski Dome is the only place to ski all year round in northern part of China.

"When we started training and competing in the 1970s, we had to train outdoors in cold winter and witnessed the development of China's winter sports," said Ye, who won two silver medals at the 1992 Winter Olympic Games in women's speed skating.

"My heart always belongs to sports and I'm very glad to see those young ski fans practicing in the ski dome. It's continuity of my dream. I hope it can be a cradle of future Olympic champions."

Yang also started her own skating center in 2013 as Feiyang Skating Center opened in Shanghai last June.

"No matter how I changed my position, I always remember that I used to be a short track speed skater," said Yang, who broke the Winter Olympic gold medal jinx for China at the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Games.

"Now, what made me excited is to see more children to realize their dreams on ice."

Her center is a comprehensive skating arena in Shanghai, capable of hosting international competitions of short track speed skating, ice hockey, figure skating and curling.

The contribution of those retired stars has been highly praised by the sports authority.

"All of them paved the way for China's winter sports and made great contribution to the development of sports," said Xiao Tian, deputy director of the State General Administration of Sport.

"They are still working for the popularity of winter sports in China and we respect them very much."

leilei@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 04/18/2014 page19)