Beijing 2022: Wu Dajing recalls face-saving gold from 2018 as Chinese skaters eye more glory on home ice
- China were without a gold medal at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games until Wu fronted up for the men’s 500m on the last day of the short-track speedskating competition
- The mainland squad have secured a full quota of five men and five women for the competition and are expecting an improved performance from four years ago
Defending men’s 500-metre champion Wu Dajing will spearhead Team China in short-track speedskating at next month’s Winter Olympics as the hosts look primed to improve on their results from Pyeongchang four years ago.
China have secured a maximum quota of 10 (five men and five women) in the discipline across nine events, including the newly added mixed relay.
Wu, China’s only gold medal winner at the 2018 Winter Games, qualified for the Beijing Games after winning one of the four World Cup legs late last year, along with men’s teammate Ren Ziwei.
Wu won the 500m in the Netherlands, where Ren claimed victory in the 1,500m before going on to win the same event in Hungary.
Eileen Gu takes half-pipe crown in Dew Tour, second in slopestyle
The 27-year-old Wu is still remembered as the man who added late sparkle to China’s 2018 Olympics. The country had failed to win a gold medal until the last day of short track speedstaking competition when Wu fronted up for the 500m and the relay.
“We had great expectations before going to Pyeongchang, but the strict rulings by the referees gave us a lot of difficulties and our gold medal hopes disappeared one by one because of disqualifications,” Wu said.
“We suffered two penalties in the 1,000m heats before I was also disqualified in the quarter-finals. There were also three other penalties in the women’s 500m and 1,000m when they reached the semi-finals. Our women’s relay team was also disqualified in the final. It all came down to the men’s relay and 500 metres when we surprisingly won one gold and one silver.”
As team captain, Wu said they had one target in mind – to do well in the Beijing Winter Games. “Hopefully we can work together to go from being good athletes to becoming great athletes,” he said.
Hong Kong’s Sui set to seal Beijing 2022 Olympic spot
The eight remaining places on the quota were open for internal selection with two skaters booking their places for Beijing in round one on Tuesday.
Youngster Zhang Tianyi and women’s compatriot Zhang Yuting topped the table after calculating all results from three events – 500m, 1,000m and 1,500m.
At 17, Zhang Tianyi beat veterans An Kai and Sun Long to clinch his place in the squad despite finishing first in only one event, the 1,500m, while Sun won the two other disciplines. The youngster collected more points than his rivals in the overall rankings across all three events.
In the women’s category, Zhang Yuting failed to win one race but her overall ranking across three events put her top of the list. There will be two more rounds of selection races for the remaining two men’s and four women’s Olympic tickets.
