In a country long-focused on bringing home as many Olympic gold medals as possible, this year’s haul is not what China expected.
When China’s 416-athlete delegation set off for Rio, state sports officials were banking on 30 to 36 gold medals. As the games end, it had won just 24 for the nation’s worst showing since the Atlanta Olympics in 1996.
Lagging in third place, China’s total is a far cry from the country’s 51-gold performance in Beijing that topped the gold medal chart. However, the once-feverish obsession with the gold tally has slowly subsided among the Chinese public, which has shown more interest this year in lavishing adoration on athletes with personalities, such as bronze medal-winning swimmer Fu Yuanhui (傅園慧), rather than counting medals.
“Finally, the public desire for golds has returned to normal,” said Lu Yuanzhen (盧元鎮), a professor of sports at South China Normal University who has long argued that a mature nation should have a more relaxed attitude toward wins and losses in athletic competitions.
“The ordinary Chinese people have become more indifferent to the medal counts now they understand Olympic golds bear little impact on their real lives,” Lu said.
For decades, the Chinese Communist Party has rallied national unity and pride in the country’s athletic performances on the world stage, especially in the Olympics.
The entire country was moved to tears when Xu Haifeng (許海峰), a pistol shooter, won the first gold Olympic medal for China in Los Angeles in 1984. It was considered a sign that China finally was able to claim a place among world powers, a huge boost to national pride.
The fever only grew as Beijing sought better Olympic performances and the ultimate goal of hosting the games. The Olympics was a national obsession, and gold medalists were household names and rewarded generously.
However, following the climax in Beijing, public obsession with Olympic golds began to fade, and voices of criticism grew louder against the state-run sports system credited with the country’s stellar Olympic performances.
Critics say the brutal system has sacrificed vast numbers of rank-and-file athletes, encouraged dishonesty — such as doping, age alteration and game rigging — in the name of national honor, and distanced sports from the public.
When this year’s games began in Rio, state media lamented the lack of golds on the opening day, but Chinese sports fans stayed nonchalant. They were more interested in chasing athletes oozing with personality.
The most telling example is Fu Yuanhui, a female swimmer who overnight became a social media sweetheart for claiming she had used “primeval force” in a semifinal.
Shaped by the social media instead of the state parlance, Fu’s vernacular resonated with ordinary Chinese, who were already bored with empty talk.
Ning Zetao, (寧澤濤) another swimmer, came home empty-handed from Rio but still grabbed headlines because of his undiminished popularity back in China.
The swimmers got a welcome from thousands of fans at a Beijing airport. Fu was scared. Ning’s appearance caused congestion, and besieged by fans seeking photographs and autographs, she could barely move.
As recently as 2008, the public booed hurdler Liu Xiang (孫楊) when he could not get off the starting line in Beijing because of injuries.
“The public has gone to another extreme — tolerance of non-champions and even adoration of them,” wrote Li Ruyi, a veteran Chinese sports writer in a commentary on the news Web site ifeng.com.
Even if there is more acceptance that every year will not bring a haul of gold, there is still a sense of alarm, and many do not like that China sits behind the US and Great Britain in the race for golds.
There are also whispers that Japan, the upcoming host of the 2020 Summer Olympics, could pose a threat to China.
That prospect is likely to rekindle the country’s nationalistic sentiments, because of long-time animosity toward the neighboring country that invaded China and shamed the Middle Kingdom in the early 20th century.
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