Back on track: Chinese star hurdler Liu Xiang rumoured to have married in Shanghai
China’s star hurdler Liu Xiang is rumoured to have married his actress-girlfriend at a Shanghai on Tuesday.
China’s star hurdler Liu Xiang is rumoured to have married his actress-girlfriend at a Shanghai on Tuesday.
A picture of Liu and a young lady leaving Shanghai’s marriage registry was posted on Weibo on Monday.
The two were shown leaving the registry holding bouquets of flowers, triggering speculation that Liu had tied the knot on Monday’s mid-autumn holiday.
The quoted Liu Xiang’s father as saying the pair would get married on Tuesday.
Liu Xiang posted a photo of himself and Ge Tian leaning against a set of hurdles on his Tencent microblog on Tuesday morning. “The thing and the girl I love most,” he wrote, referring to the hurdles and his girlfriend.
Ge Tian later responded with a similar photo on Weibo, and a message echoing Liu’s, “The man I love most and the man who loves me most. Thank you everyone.”
Ge’s Weibo account says she graduated from the Central Academy of Drama in 2012 and has performed in a few television dramas since then.
Ge is said to have met Liu after the London Olympics and the two have been dating for over a year.
Liu Xiang won the first Olympic gold medal in men’s track and field for China at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
He impressed Chinese fans by winning the men’s 110m hurdles in a record-breaking 12.91 seconds, proving for the first time that Asian athletes were able to compete in sprinting events at the highest international level.
Liu unexpectedly withdrew from the 2008 Beijing Olympics after a false start in the first-round heat, dashing hopes that he could win a major event in his homeland.
His coach Sun Haiping said he had suffered from a recurring tendon injury and the pain was so unbearable that he had to “pull out of the race.”
Liu was anticipated to return to form during the 2012 London Olympics, but he crashed out of the first race and failed to make it to the finals.
Chinese media reported that Dayron Robles, the Cuban athlete who broke Liu’s record in the 2008’s Ostrava Golden Spike competition in the Czech Republic, once suggested that Liu find a girlfriend. “It’s time for him to do it. Life is not all about tracks and hurdles.”
