Liu Xiang
Asia's Gold Rush
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| JAVIER SORIANO—AFP / GETTY IMAGES |
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By Hannah Beech
Posted Monday, October 4, 2004; 21:00 HKT
As Liu Xiang raced to victory in the 110-meter hurdles at the Athens Olympics, his legs pumping with flawless precision to clock a world record-tying time of 12.91 sec., the panic creeping into sports announcers' voices was almost palpable. Even though China had touted the 21-year-old Shanghai native as a medal hopeful, few in the West knew that China had a decent hurdler, much less a record-making one. Stunned by the victory, a Greek TV announcer stammered: "In first place, it's ... it's a Chinese man." Foiled by the X in Liu's given name, the broadcaster sidestepped the problem: "He is Mr. Liu. Congratulations to Mr. Liu from China."
The world had better get used to Mr. Liu and his given name (Xiang is pronounced Shee-ahng). With his chiseled jaw and winning smile, Liu has already been tapped as a pitchman for Coca-Cola and Nike. More importantly, the Chinese hurdler serves as the charismatic icon of a continent galvanized by an unprecedented athletic ascendancy, just as Asia gears up to welcome the next Summer Olympics to its home turf. Back home, Liu is beloved for his natural persona, in marked contrast to most of China's other élite athletes, who can only offer their fans canned statements about how much they love their motherland. Liu does pay obligatory tribute to his nation, but he revels in the limelight, belting out karaoke songs on Chinese TV and even engaging in flirty banter with pretty anchors on air.
Unlike the vast majority of Chinese athletes, Liu was not picked by the sports system. Instead, the boy with highlighted hair and a self-professed disdain for coach-mandated curfews went knocking on the doors of sports schools himself. Four months into running hurdles, he was doing times in national trials that placed him in the top echelons of his age group.
Liu wasn't the only Asian to excel in a sport in which the region's athletes were expected to be outclassed. Kosuke Kitajima, 22, won two swimming events, helping Japan triple its gold-medal tally from Sydney to Athens. These days, observes Tatsuo Sekine of market researcher CM Databank, Kitajima is so popular that he commands about $450,000 per advertisement in Japan. Says Sekine: "He is a symbol of [our] long-awaited [economic] recovery." China's Liu Xiang, however, is a symbol of something visceral and emotional, something all Asians can take pride in: the pure ecstasy of triumph. "For some athletes, it's just a job," Liu says. "For me, it's what I love."
With reporting by Yuki Oda/Tokyo
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