China's youngest Olympic athlete Zheng Haohao appeared at the skateboarding competition: There is no failure in young dreams
2024-08-07
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The skateboarding venue is located in the Place de la Concorde. The sky is cloudless, and from the highest point of the stands you can see the Eiffel Tower, the Grand Palais and the Arc de Triomphe in the distance. The nearest obelisk has also lost its majestic feel. This may be the first and last time people feel its smallness.
In this historic atmosphere, the women's skateboard park race preliminaries - the youngest event at the Paris Olympics - kicked off in a noisy atmosphere. The host encouraged the audience to shout together, and the test results were displayed on the big screen - "98 decibels, not enough!" "105 decibels, great!"
There were 22 contestants, with an average age of 16.9 years old. The oldest was 23-year-old Brazilian Dora. In this gathering of middle school girls, there squeezed in an elementary school student - to be precise, she had just graduated from elementary school and would enter middle school in September this year - 11-year-old Zheng Haohao was not only the youngest Chinese Olympic athlete in history, but also the "youngest" among the contestants in the Paris Olympics. She was a face. Before her three appearances, the on-site commentator would add a sentence "She is only 11 years old", in response to the applause from the stands.
Zheng Haohao was the third in the second group. Zheng Haohao, wearing a white helmet and white clothes, completed his first slide smoothly. His score of 63.19 points was not impressive. He made mistakes in the last two slides and finally ranked 18th. However, no one would ask more of this kid. His appearance and finish were both surprise gifts. Coach Danny Voinright happily knocked on his apprentice's helmet. Indeed, there will never be failure in young dreams.
"I ask myself to relax, but not too much, and show my best. I have no regrets for being able to step onto the Olympic stage, because I feel I will have another chance in the future." Zheng Haohao recalled his Olympic debut with his signature bright smile, "I feel that the Olympics is similar to what I imagined, and it is also similar to the World Championships. I feel that my main job here is to have fun."
As for “playing”, it definitely doesn’t mean playing around, “skateboarding is playing”.
After six or seven days in Paris, this girl, who will celebrate her 12th birthday on August 11, can only travel between the stadium and the Olympic Village. "I saw the Eiffel Tower on the bus, and it felt as beautiful as in my dreams." She also had some regrets, but they were related to the competition. "I broke my face on the first day of practice, so I didn't practice that day. I wasn't familiar enough with the venue." There are still scabs on her right cheek, but she doesn't care. She is excited enough to see the various performances of the sisters in the training and competition. "They fly so high, have good skills, and have a sense of power. I have a lot of movements, but the feeling of doing them is small."
What made Zheng Haohao happy the most was the support of her classmates. Before she went on stage, her classmates' encouragement had already "blown up" the WeChat group. After she left the stage, she saw a WeChat message from her best friend, and found that her personal status read "I wish my best friend a gold medal." Zheng Haohao couldn't stop laughing when she talked about this. If the Paris Olympics awarded a gold medal to elementary school students, it would definitely be hers.
There is no summer homework for the transition from primary school to junior high school, and her mother and coach are not strict, so she can drink Coke every day. Zheng Haohao is like most Chinese children of the same age, with one exception. "Will you participate in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics?" a foreign reporter asked in English. Zheng Haohao kept playing with the various commemorative badges pinned to her ID card with both hands, and replied in English without hesitation: "Yes, I think I will go, why not?"
Author: Shen Lei
Text: Special correspondent of this newspaper/Shen Lei Photo: Xinhua News Agency Editor: Wu Shu Responsible editor: Chen Haixiang
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