zhejiang athlete wang lichao wins china's 600th paralympic gold medal
2024-09-07
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chao news client reporter wang chenhui correspondent he yiwei
in the early morning of september 6, beijing time, in the 20-minute finals of the men's and women's 4x50m medley relay at the paris paralympic games, zhejiang athlete wang lichao and his teammates lu dong, zhang li, and guo jincheng, the chinese team, won the championship with a time of 2 minutes 24.83 seconds and broke the world record. this is the 70th gold medal won by the chinese sports delegation in this event, and also the 600th summer paralympic gold medal since the first gold medal won at the stoke mandeville and new york paralympic games in 1984!
wang lichao is the first on the left in the second row. photo by reporter peng peng
in the competition, wang lichao was the third runner. when he came on the field, the chinese team was in the fifth place. wang lichao caught up and surpassed three opponents in succession, bringing the team's position to the second place, laying the foundation for the chinese team to win the championship.
"great, i'm proud of you!" after winning the gold medal, wang lichao's wife xia mengxue was the first to congratulate him, and wang lichao also expressed satisfaction with his and his teammates' performance.
photo by reporter peng peng
behind every disabled athlete, there is a tortuous and touching story. the experience of wang lichao from xiaoshan, hangzhou is particularly representative. in 2001, wang lichao, who was only 8 years old, encountered the darkest day of his life. at that time, because he accidentally touched a high-voltage wire while playing in the village, wang lichao's arms were amputated from the shoulders.
at that time, wang lichao didn't know what it meant to lose his arms. it was not until more than a year later, when he was ready to go to school, that he found that the children around him were doing things he could not do at all. with the encouragement of adults, little lichao began to learn to write, brush his teeth, and eat with his toes. he also started running and playing with other children, trying to step out of the shadow of life step by step.
in 2006, wang lichao attracted the attention of a teacher from the disabled persons' federation of xiaoshan district because of his tall stature and agility. the teacher recommended him to learn swimming. encouraged by the teacher, wang lichao resolutely decided to give it a try.
soon, wang lichao was selected to join the provincial team. the training days were not easy. he had to swim nearly 5,000 meters every day, all by leg, which was almost the limit of his training. but wang lichao never complained about the hardship.
hard training also paid off. starting from the 8th national games for the disabled in 2011, wang lichao has achieved good results in many major competitions. at the tokyo olympics, wang lichao won one gold, one silver and two bronze medals, and won two more gold medals at the hangzhou asian para games.
xia mengxue told reporters that as a 31-year-old veteran, this paralympic games may be wang lichao's last paralympic games. he cherishes this opportunity to participate and has trained very hard. since participating in the hangzhou asian para games, wang lichao has been preparing for the paris paralympic games in beijing and rarely meets with his wife and daughter.
"he always said that he wanted to end his sports career with a perfect performance, and he did it. his results are worthy of his efforts over so long," said xia mengxue.
photo by reporter peng peng
at the paris paralympics, wang lichao participated in many swimming competitions and achieved quite good results. among them, on the evening of august 30th, beijing time, he worked together with his teammates to win the championship in the 20-minute final of the mixed men's and women's 4x50m freestyle relay; in the early morning of september 4th, beijing time, in the men's 50m backstroke s5 final, wang lichao won the bronze medal; on the evening of september 5th, beijing time, in the men's 50m freestyle s5 final, wang lichao won the third place again.
wang lichao and xia mengxue got married in 2021, but because they were busy with training, they did not go on a honeymoon. wang mengxue said that they plan to take their daughter on a trip after the paris paralympics to make up for their honeymoon.
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