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China's 2010 Winter Olympians: Liu Jiayu, snowboarding

Thursday, 18th February 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (4)

UPDATE:Despite heading into the final in second place, Liu finished just out of the medals at 4th, behind Tora Bright of Australia, and Hannah Teeter and Kelly Clark of the USA. Sun Zhifeng came in 7th. Despite a medal-less day, China held steady at 9th in the medal standings.
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For the most part, in the 2010 Winter Olympics, China's best medal hopes come in sports where it has had some success in the past—speedskating, skiing aerials and figure skating. But there are a couple of exceptions. In 2009, China won its first ever world championships in two winter sports—women's curling and women's snowboarding.

Snowboarder Liu Jiayu (刘佳宇) started training in 2003, and shook up the snowboarding world order when she won the world championship in the halfpipe last year at the age of 17. Liu uses wushu (Chinese martial arts) in her training, according to this CCTV report. Like all of China's medalists to date in these Olympics, she was born in Harbin in far north Heilongjiang province. Liu's success in the sport doesn't reflect a snowboarding boom on the mainland, it is among several extreme sports that are growing in popularity. For videos of Chinese snowboarders, skateboarders, surfers and parkour runners, check out Niurenku.com.

The women's halfpipe competition takes place Feb. 18--qualifying round at 12:30 PST (4:30 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19), semifinals 4:00 p.m. PST (8:00 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19) and finals at 6:00 PST (10:00 a.m. Beijing time, Feb 19).

China also has a sliver of a medal hope in women's speedskating Thursday, as 500-meter bronze medalist Wang Beixing takes to the ice again. She is not as strong in the 1,000-meter event; her best ever finish was sixth at the Nagano World Championships in 2008, and she dropped to 10th at worlds last year. Also skating for China are Yu Jing, Ren Hui, Jin Peiyu.

Video:

CCTV report on Liu Jiayu

Metacafe.com on Liu's world cup win

Liu Jiayu on NBCOlympics.com

Liu Jiayu image: Sports.sina.com

Tags: China's 2010 Winter Olympians, Liu Jiayu, snowboarding, speedskating, Wang Beixin