Chinese rowing first made its mark in 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games
when Cao Mianying and Zhang Xiuyun won women's double sculls silver
medal. In the following nearly ten years, China has never churned
out any Olympic or even world champion.
However, China broke the ice by lifting three titles in 2006
worlds and continued to add one gold and eight Olympic berths in
the 2007 worlds. Despite that, Chinese rowing is still in
predicament in terms of sustainable development.
Liu Jian, head coach of Nanjing rowing team, said: "This is well
explained when you compare two numbers. China has a population of
1.3 billion, while in contrast, only 2000 people took up rowing. We
did make good record on the international arena in 2006 but we
should also not neglect the fact that we don't have a sound backup.
"
During the ongoing 6th Chinese City Games, 441 rowers of 21
teams competed for twelve gold medals on stake.
"Only those from the national team caught our eyes," said Liu,"
They have clear advantage over the rest."
Liu also specially tipped women's single sculler Zhu Weiwei,
former national team member, as promising.
"But she is still young and can not compete against the other
national team members." added he.
The rest rowers failed to impress Liu.
"China only has a total of 2000 rowers at senior and junior
levels, each with 1000 people." said Liu, "As the sport is not
popular in China, we don't receive much exposure and don't have
many amateur rowers."
"The expensive equipment is another hurdle between the sport and
the public."
A singles boat usually costs 140 thousand RMB (about US$18.74
thousand), and a boat for eight is about 400 thousand RMB (about
US$53.55 thousand). Even a scull will cost about 10 thousand
RMB.
"This makes it harder for us to promote the sport. Up to now in
China, only several provinces like Guangdong, Jiangsu and Hubei are
engaged in it."
In China, as water sport centers are usually on the outskirts,
water sports are featured with three "isolated", i.e., isolated
from home town, from relatives and from cities.
Since its unpopularity in China, rowing fails to attract many
athletes and sponsors.
"Actually most Chinese rowers don't initially take up the sport,
they usually start with athletics and swimming. For example, Zhu
Weiwei was an athlete." said Wang.
"Rowing originated from Europe and it has been part of
Europeans' culture and lifestyle, so it's understandable that they
have quite a few top rowers." added Wang.
"Moreover, we do not have a good knowledge of rowing theories.
We need to go to Europe to communicate with German and British
rowers. But in fact we don't have many chances for lack of
funds."
In big contrast, as the Beijing Olympics is approaching, Chinese
national rowing team is granted with abundant funds.
But will the funds be distributed for regional rowing
development after the Games, and will the sport develop
sustainably? It's really hard to say.
(Xinhua News Agency November 1, 2007)