Paralympian fencer Yu Chui-yee poses for a picture prior to a training session at the Hong Kong Sports Institute. AFP

Hong Kong's Yu Chui-yee fenced her way to four gold medals at the Paralympic Games in 2004 but she faces an epic battle in Beijing as she sets out to defend her titles against newcomer Team China.

Yu's team brought home 14 medals including eight golds from Athens, well ahead of nearest challengers and traditional powerhouses France and Poland.

All that has changed, she said.

China's women's wheelchair fencing team, who did not compete in Athens, "will be the biggest challengers in Beijing," Yu told AFP.

Hong Kong team coach Zheng Zhaokang, a former Olympic fencer for China, has no doubt she is right.

"There is a big difference between the Chinese team then and the Chinese team now," he said.

"The Chinese athletes have had really intensive and professional training in these four years," he said.

More than 4,000 disabled athletes from around the world will compete in the Paralympics, which opened in Beijing last Saturday and runs through next Wednesday.

Yu, 24, is the world women's wheelchair fencing champion in the foil and epee, and will be defending her Athens gold medals next Sunday to Wednesday.

Team China's fencers trail Hong Kong in the International Wheelchair Amputee and Sports Federation rankings - Yu is the world leader, and her teammate Fan Pui-shan ranks 4th.

China's Zheng Chunhua, Zhang Chuncui and Zhang Wenxin are all in the top 15.

But the numbers don't tell the full story as the up-and-coming Chinese did not compete in three major internationals this year, so their rankings don't reflect what their real status would otherwise be.

Yu won the wheelchair fencing world cup in Poland in July, but the victory did not bring total satisfaction, she said, because the Chinese stayed away.

"The results were not so important, they don't really reflect the true situation," she said.

Her gold medal haul from Athens is history, she said, irrelevant to the upcoming bout because in fencing there is no winner until the last moment.

"Before that, you are just a fencer, not a winner," she said.

Diagnosed with bone cancer at the age of 11, Yu's left leg was amputated to save her life.

She started training as a swimmer a couple of years later but by the age of 17, she said, she knew she wanted to fence.

"It's a sport where you have to have communication skills. You have to have good observation and you have to use your brain, to observe and then to analyze quickly," said Yu.

Unlike swimming, she said, fencing is not a race but a fight which requires skills and strategies.

Being a world champion athlete makes Yu a rarity in the former British colony, which won no medals in the Beijing Olympic Games last month.

"In Hong Kong the sports culture is not very good, it is not very developed," she said, explaining that an emphasis on academic success puts people off sports at a young age.

Hongkongers who want to aim for athletic success must "have a very strong spirit otherwise they cannot survive," said Yu.

And she said she would need that strength to defend her individual epee and foil titles. "There is pressure to compete in Beijing because it is the capital of our country," she said.

But with her biggest rivals also competing in their capital, she does not have much advantage.

Coach Zheng, however, has no qualms about his Hong Kong fighters setting out to destroy the hopes of his compatriots.

"Sports should not have any boundaries, and it should not matter if the players are related in any way. Even a father and son should compete against each other just like in any other matches."

AFP

(HK Edition 09/12/2008 page4)