Rocky road to success
After clinching gold in the 2018 Winter Paralympics, China’s curling team share the story of their hard-fought path to victory. Li Yingxue reports.
The Gangneung Curling Centre was packed out for the final game of wheelchair curling at the 2018 Pyeongchang Paralympic Winter Games on the afternoon of March 17.
Lights off. Music on. Then the ice was illuminated with the images of the national flags of Norway and China, the finalists in the event, with both teams hoping to clinch their first-ever Paralympic wheelchair curling title.
And for China, it would be its first Winter Paralympics medal of any color, even though China has ended top of the medals table for four consecutive Summer Paralympics, winning a staggering 239 medals including 107 gold, 81 silver and 51 bronze at Rio de Janeiro in 2016.
China’s lead curler Wang Meng, second Liu Wei, third Chen Jianxin, and skipper Wang Haitao were introduced to the spectators in turn. They looked relaxed on camera.
Half an hour earlier outside the stadium, the team members were spinning their wheelchairs to popular tunes as a warm-up with alternative Zhang Qiang. When the music stopped, Wang Meng sang aloud instead.
Despite their smiles, they were nervous by the time they took to the ice. By the close of the first end, Wang Haitao’s last draw was light, and didn’t make to the house, or target. His last rocks in the second and third end also failed.
Of all the 13 matches of this Paralympic Games, Wang played his best performances during the first 12 matches.
In the semifinal the previous day, China beat three times Paralympic defending champions Canada 4-3 in a nail-biting game, thanks to Wang Haitao’s accurate last shot.
Four years ago, Wang Haitao faced the same situation in Sochi, where his last shot decided whether Canada or China would join the final, but he didn’t make it. Then China squandered a 3-0 lead to lose to Britain in the bronze final, and lost its chance to climb the podium.
This time, Wang Haitao was given the hammer again and he had a tough shot to beat Canada.
“I’m mentally stronger than I was four years ago. I used to play rashly when our scores started to fall behind, and it would affect my teammates. But now I’m getting better, and we trust and encourage each other during games,” says Wang Haitao.
After beating Canada in the semifinal in the afternoon, Wang Haitao and his teammates continued training well into the evening in preparation for the final — the only team to do so at that stage.
Before Wang Haitao took the shot in the fourth end in the final, Wang Meng wiped the rock, picked up his captain’s stick and handed it to him.
Curling is all about detail. In the 2009 World Championship in Vancouver, Canada, China lost a game because a hair on the ice suddenly changed the track of the last rock Wang Haitao played, which looked set to score.
Wang Haitao played a takeout and made the score 3-3. Zhang Qiang clapped loudly for each successful shot, sitting next to coaches Yue Qingshuang and Li Jianrui.
Yue used to be in the China women’s curling team, winning the world championship as a team member in 2009. She stepped in as head coach for the national wheelchair team in November.
The team assembled 19 athletes last July, and the five-person team was not selected until early February. “The athletes who were not competing in Pyeongchang but were part of the team also trained really hard,” says Yue.
Chen, 26, who had a traffic accident at the age of 18, started wheelchair curling four years ago. The youngest curler of Team China is currently the deputy skipper of the team.
In the fifth end, Chen played a nice takeout — a stone that hits another stone and removes it from play. His teammates shouted at the stone as the rock slid toward the target. “Hurry up! Hurry up!” said Wang Meng.
Of all the teams competing in the Paralympic Games, China’s shouting was the loudest. It’s a trait they picked up from the Olympic team during training and is meant to encourage the sweepers.
“There is no sweeping in wheelchair curling, but the technique isn’t as simple as it looks. The athletes have to think it through before they take a shot, and account for all the possible lines and errors.”
“So they have the habit of shouting when the stone looks it’s heading in the right direction, it’s like they are ‘sweeping it by thought’. It also improves morale,” says Li.
In the seventh end, Wang Haitao missed a three score again with his last stone, like the first end, and only scored two. His teammates all came together to cheer him up before the next end.
After eight seesaw ends, China and Norway tied at 5-5, which led to an extra tiebreaker to decide the winner.
After Chen Jianxin’s last stone landed almost bang in the center of the house, Norwegian skipper Rune Lorentsen failed to knock out Chen’s stone with the final shot of the match — handing China the gold medal.
The win sent Team China into a frenzy, and saw the team members hug each other with tears in their eyes, while also beaming from ear to ear.
Kate Caithness, president of the World Curling Federation, presented the gold medals to Team China members.
Wang Haitao said after the match that he was too nervous during the final, and thanked his team for leading them to victory.
When Wang Haitao was asked about his mistake in the seventh end, Chen Jianxin came to his skipper’s rescue, “We did that on purpose, it was part of our plan.”
Wang Haitao was the flag bearer for the Chinese delegation during the closing ceremony of the Winter Paralympics. Two days after the final, the team flew back to Beijing and were greeted by a group from the Beijing National Aquatics Center, bearing flowers.
The aquatics center, or Water Cube, will be the venue for curling and wheelchair curling events during the 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics.
Li and his team train three to four months each year. When the team is not training, Li and his athletes have to find their own ways of making a living. Liu Wei will continue working as a taxi driver and Wang Haitao will return home to his family’s farm. Li used to deliver takeaways, and he even set up a street stall selling small goods.
Despite all the difficulties, Li still wants to continue coaching the team, “We’ve been through the most difficult days, and now we are getting better, so I will insist on competing in 2022.”
The 2022 Paralympic Winter Games will take place in Beijing, which is also teammate Chen’s hometown. “I want to be on the podium again in 2022 in my hometown, and maybe hear the national anthem again,” he says.