On August 3, Beijing time, in the men's 200-meter individual medley final of the Paris Olympics, Chinese player Wang Shun won the bronze medal.
Olympic bronze medal Wang Shun won in Rio 8 years ago with a time of 1:57.05, and today's bronze medal is 1:56.00, an improvement of 1.05 seconds.
In the past 8 years, he has swam faster, and Wang Shun has learned to grow in reverse?
"Old cadres" in "Young People's Game"
The medley is known as the "young man's game" in the Olympic swimming competition. Because of its almost brutal physical requirements, the medley swimmers are usually not too old. But now Wang Shun is an exception.
Wang Shun, born in 1994, is not only the oldest of the 37 Chinese swimmers who went to Paris, but also now the oldest medalist in the history of Chinese swimming. The entire swimming team called him "Brother Shun".
Brother Shun has a kind personality, and when he is interviewed, he speaks calmly and steadily, and has the style of a general, and is sometimes jokingly joked by his junior brother Pan Zhanle as "an old cadre speaks".
Wang Shun's state in the swimming pool is a bit against the laws of nature.
His all-time best time of 1:54.62 in the 200m medley was set at the Hangzhou Asian Games at the age of nearly 30. And today in the final of the Paris Olympics, the oldest athlete in the field grabbed another bronze medal.
The golden age of swimmers is generally considered to be in the 16-28 years range. In the 200m medley, the only one who has been over 30 years old in the past decade and has been on the podium at the World Championships is swimming god Phelps, who won gold at the age of 31 at the Rio Olympics in 2016.
And now, Wang Shun, who has also passed the age of establishment, is replicating miracles.
The Olympic journey continues to climb
If we look back at Wang Shun's Olympic journey, we will find that his trajectory is very impressive, and perhaps you can also get a glimpse of how an excellent athlete grows up.
Wang Shun is an Olympic veteran of the Four Dynasties, completely opposite to Ye Shiwen, who was at the peak of his debut, every time he travels to the Olympics, it is a process of slow accumulation and continuous climbing.
In London in 2012, Wang Shun was eliminated in 22nd place in the preliminaries, with a time of 2:00.85, and only once in the water, the first experience of the Olympics came to an abrupt end.
Four years later, at the Rio Olympics, Wang Shun swam 1:57.05 and reached the podium, and many people may have forgotten or never realized the extraordinary significance of this bronze medal, because in the men's medley, the most comprehensive event, the most comprehensive event, Chinese athletes have not won a medal before.
In particular, it was an epic contest involving many great protagonists, and Wang Shun achieved an incredible Jedi counterattack in the last 50 meters, turning himself from a supporting role to one of the protagonists.
Let's revisit the classics.
In the 200-meter medley final of the Rio Olympics participated by Phelps, Lochte and Kosuke Hagino, Wang Shun was in the penultimate after swimming the first 150 meters, and everyone's eyes were on whether Phelps could win his 22nd Olympic gold medal, and no one noticed that Wang Shun in the seventh lane began a magical counterattack.
In the last 50 meters, he chased four people in a row, and touched the wall for the third time amid the narrator's incredible exclamation. The champion and runner-up belonged to Phelps and Kosuke Hagino respectively, and Wang Shun's bronze medal was snatched from Rocht.
The importance of this competition lies in the fact that for the first time, Chinese male athletes have directly confronted a superstar in an event such as the medley, which tests their comprehensive ability, and fully demonstrated their strength.
This battle was extremely morale-boosting, and it can also be called a watershed moment in Wang Shun's personal career.
In Tokyo in 2021, Wang Shun's strength has improved significantly, and he has already been assigned the best lane in the final - four lanes, and Wang Shun won the Olympic gold medal he coveted in 1:55.00.
That's not all, at the Asian Games in Hangzhou two years later, Wang Shun improved his personal best to 1:54.62. If this result is taken to Rio, it will also be a proper championship, surpassing the "God of Water" Phelps in 1:54.64.
"I think I'm supposed to be in the water"
The age is increasing year by year, and the grades are rising instead of falling, what does Wang Shun's rare reverse growth phenomenon in the swimming pool mean?
A national team staff member who did not want to be named told reporters that Wang Shun is the most self-disciplined and demanding of himself among the athletes he has ever seen.
Although the Chinese swimming team is the oldest, the training has always been the first, and the training volume has never been discounted. 365 days a year, if Wang Shun didn't go into the water one day, unless he was in a hurry on the way to the competition.
In addition to the necessary qualities of outstanding athletes such as self-discipline and willingness to endure hardships, gold medal coach Zhu Zhigen told reporters that being good at summarizing and picking out details to find gaps is the reason why Wang Shun has been able to continue to increase his performance over the years.
The reason for the best swim in the history of the Hangzhou Asian Games is that he has significantly improved in the breaststroke, his weak link.
With the help of United States foreign coach Lafontaine and others, Wang Shun's breaststroke segment time has swam 33.56 seconds, but there is still a slight gap compared to France's Marchand, who has swam 32.94 seconds.
And in today's final, the gap between Wang Shun and Marchand was actually opened in the breaststroke.
As an all-round warrior in the pool, Wang Shun needs to pay equal attention to the four swimming styles, but in fact, he puts a lot of energy into the backstroke, not only because of his own need to improve in the medley, but also because of the strategic consideration of the Chinese swimming team in the men's mixed and mixed men's events.
In the relay event of the Chinese team, the men's backstroke has the greatest pressure, and the thickness is not enough, and it has only been supported by Xu Jiayu independently for many years. Brother Shun said that he was ready to go into battle in the relay preliminaries at any time to reserve his strength for Xu Jiayu in the finals.
Someone asked Wang Shun, after winning the Olympic championships, why do you still train so hard day after day?
Brother Shun said that first of all, because of the love in his heart, he started swimming at the age of 6, entered the provincial team at the age of 13, and has been in the pool for 24 years, "I think I should be in the water, and I will not be used to standing on the shore", he said.
In addition, Brother Shun always feels that he has a mission on his shoulders, "The society has given me a lot of honors, and I have the responsibility to give back to everyone on the field." This shows that Brother Shun has entered a certain state of life, and his value thinking has jumped above ordinary athletes.
If there is an athlete who has climbed to the top and can still treat the rest of his career with a reverent attitude, never slack off in every training, as simple and clean as when he learned to swim at the age of 6 and entered the provincial team at the age of 13, then this person must be called Wang Shun.
Source: CCTV