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Klaudia Lee

As Guo Wenjun   stood on the podium waving to thousands of spectators on Sunday, the new gold medallist for the women's 10-metre air pistol event  wished that her father was out there watching.
Her parents divorced about a decade ago, and her father left the country soon after.
'Since my father left 10 years ago, I have always searched [for him]. I hope that one day my father will appear before me,' the 24-year-old was quoted by  Tengxun.net  as saying after winning her gold medal.
The day after the Shaanxi  native stole the limelight in the shooting event, the mainland press carried  features about her, revealing little-known stories.
Spectators were enamoured not only  by Guo's outstanding performance at the shooting range, but also her calm and reticence,  which remained firmly in place until after she had beaten her rivals, veteran shooters Natalia Paderina  of Russia and Nino Salukvadze  of Georgia.
Instead of shedding tears or appearing overjoyed at her success  like many other champions, the only hint of happiness on Guo's otherwise calm face was her warm smile and waves to the crowd.
The opposite was true in Guo's hometown, Xian , on Sunday.
Applause and tears erupted when she won the second gold medal in shooting for China but there was a notable absence among family and neighbours watching the competition live: her father, Guo Jingsheng .
'We divorced and he went abroad afterwards,'  Zhang Lin , Guo's mother, told the Xiandai Express, a newspaper based in Nanjing  and operated by Xinhua.
Guo got her start in the world of shooting in 1997  when a sports school in Xian  selected the then 13-year-old to learn to shoot under coach Huang Yanhua .
Her father left about a year later.
Guo's path was by no means smooth. In 2005, she temporarily quit the sport to sell sports clothing in a department store after finishing ninth in the fifth City Games in Changsha . She returned to shooting a year later, and went on  to win the national championships. She was also noted as a rising star at that year's Doha Asian Games, where she won a silver medal.
But her father's whereabouts were never far from her mind - which Huang, her coach,  noticed and used as a tool to motivate her, the Chongqing Daily reported. 'The Olympics  are coming, if you give it up now, your father will be disappointed. If you get a gold medal, it's going to be the best missing-person's notice. Perhaps your father will come to find you,' Huang reportedly told Guo.
'She told me: I will certainly get good results to let my father see it.'



Gold medallist wishes father was  around in her hour of triumph