Nicola Lu Min confident despite training venue mix-up
Hong Kong fencer is taken to wrong location, making him late for practice, but he believes the team have a strong chance of taking home a medal
Nicola Lu Min, of the Hong Kong fencing team, was more than two hours late for his training session yesterday because the driver went to the wrong place, but he is confident the team are on the right road to medal success.
"There are always hiccups in a major games, there is always room for improvement," said the 36-year-old, who first represented Hong Kong at the 2002 Busan Games and takes part in the men's épée today.
"I have seen many things like this before and it won't affect my preparation."
We are definitely the underdogs - but maybe that's an advantage for us
The men's épée team were supposed to train at Goyang Gymnasium, the competition venue, but instead were sent to the modern pentathlon training ground, perhaps because fencing is one of the event's five sports.
They were stuck for more than an hour, waiting for a taxi then rummaging through their training gear to cobble together 70,000 won (HK$600) for the fare.
Fencing and wushu are two medal hopes for Hong Kong on the opening day as the 17th edition of the biggest sporting extravaganza in Asia kicks off.
Lu, who has an Italian father and Hong Kong mother, is competing in his second Asiad after he quit the sport 10 years ago to seek a new career path; now with a stable banking job, he can devote more time to the sport.
He picked up fencing again three years ago and finished sixth in the individual épée at the 2012 and 2013 Asian Championships.