Orc Undead Sports Warrior

Chapter 180 Before the game

The competition was held on March 28th, and everyone arrived at Jiangbei Airport on the afternoon of the 27th.

After getting off the plane, everyone understood why the Track and Field Management Center chose Chongqing as the first stop of the National Track and Field Grand Prix.

The temperature here is even higher than at Haigeng, with outdoor temperatures approaching 20 degrees Celsius, and it's also a bit humid. There's absolutely no problem with playing outdoor games in this weather.

"What a lovely day! This mountain city truly lives up to its name. Even in winter, thanks to its location nestled in the mountains, the air is so humid and refreshing!"

As Coach Sun spoke, he took a deep breath, giving the impression of looking down upon a fairyland from a high mountain.

"It's nice, but the road is uneven, with ups and downs, making it a bit difficult to walk! But the girl's skin is really nice, haha!"

Liu Feiren chuckled as he spoke, perhaps because his facial skin was relatively rough, so he paid more attention to everyone else's skin.

However, judging from the few people who passed by, their skin was quite good.

Many members of the track and field team are coming to participate in the competition, so after communicating with the event organizing committee, they will send a bus to pick them up from the airport.

"Finally, I don't have to climb hills anymore. I really miss the days of walking on flat roads!"

After boarding the bus, Zhang Yuanteng began to remark to himself that he was from the north and lived in a plain area, and had never encountered such road conditions before.

"That's how Chongqing is. The city is built in the mountains, and the roads go up and down. If you're not a local, it's easy to get lost. There's usually only one shortest route to a place, and if you miss it, you don't get another one!"

Perhaps knowing in advance that the track and field team would be picking them up at the airport today, the driver seemed to be in high spirits, and immediately chimed in when he heard Zhang Yuanteng speak.

Although his Mandarin was quite good, a hint of local dialect could still be heard in the last sentence. Judging from the driver's expression, he exuded the pride of a true Chongqing native.

After arriving at the hotel pre-booked by the organizing committee, Team Leader Sun contacted the organizing committee to complete the check-in registration process.

After making some simple adjustments, Wang Qiao took advantage of the free time before dinner to lead the five members of the sprint team to get used to the venue.

Logically speaking, national team members should be battle-hardened and familiar with various competitions and venues in major cities.

However, this sprint team is an exception. Apart from college student Hu Huo, who has a few years of competition experience, the oldest of the other team members is only 20 years old. A team of this age cannot have a lot of competition experience.

They possess extraordinary talent and potential, and because they are young, there are many possibilities for their future.

Time can be a terrible thing. Sometimes you haven't even transitioned from being a young person to someone who suddenly finds themselves no longer young.

Wang Qiao, being an athlete himself, has a deep personal understanding of this, which is why he keeps a close eye on these athletes. Although he doesn't have the coaching skills to compare with renowned coaches like Zou Zhen and Coach Sun, he's far inferior to Coach Jiang, a true encyclopedia of track and field knowledge.

After all, I've been a coach at schools for many years, a sports coach at most universities, and my daily work is not much different from that of a physical education teacher.

Even a translator who has accompanied the team many times has more experience in major competitions than Wang Qiao at this time. In this respect, Wang Qiao feels like a rookie among athletes, and he needs to further familiarize himself with many new technologies and the situation of young athletes from other countries.

However, Wang Qiao is quite confident in becoming a qualified and professional coach. Aside from lacking live competition experience, he has been closely following domestic and international track and field developments while coaching at the school.

Of course, professional competence is only a basic requirement for a coach. Wang Qiao was able to be accepted so quickly and establish himself in the national team. Besides his dedication to his work, this is also reflected in his character.

For example, of the five team members present this time, he was only responsible for Lu Wei's performance. However, during regular training, he kept a close eye on everyone, not allowing any team member to slack off.

As someone who's been through it all, he knows very well what youth means for these players. He's experienced what today's young people go through, so he absolutely cannot allow these players to never achieve good results because of the coach.

For example, after meeting Lu Wei, he changed his rough and straightforward teaching style from his university days. He would explain every step of the movement and the reason for doing it clearly to Lu Wei.

Although Lu Wei was often annoyed by his words, he was able to listen patiently to the end when he realized that Lu Wei genuinely cared about him.

During regular training, he also pays close attention to the mental state of the team members. Wen Ningyi, a substitute member of the relay team, is in a rather awkward position in the team due to his age. Compared with the main players, substitute members always feel that they are not quite as good as others. Other athletes and coaches may hurt young people like Wen Ningyi by saying things they don't mean.

Wang Qiao paid close attention to these details during training. Before Lu Wei and Shen Liang began their daily 60-meter races, Wen Ningyi trained with Shen Liang.

Shen Liang is the kind of player who always wants to be the best. During training, he never lets Wen Ningyi win. After a day of training, Shen Liang usually wins in their group matches.

After Wang Qiao arranged for Shen Liang to train with Lu Wei, Wen Ningyi was grouped with two other teammates. In terms of emotional intelligence, college athletes Hu Huo and Zhang Yuanteng were far more sophisticated than the 18-year-old Shen Liang. Every day's matches were a back-and-forth affair, preventing Wen Ningyi from experiencing any real conflict.

Over time, everyone reached a consensus: training with Wang Qiao felt very comfortable.

That's why the Track and Field Management Center allowed Wang Qiao to bring these five young men to participate in the competition. Anyone else who had been in the team for half a year would never have had such an opportunity.

Because there are relatively many participants in this competition, the competition will last for 3 days. If all 3 days are used for the competition, the time is not too tight.

The first event on the second morning was the men's 110-meter hurdles. Because Liu Xiang was participating, the stadium, which can hold about 5000 people, was already more than half full by 8 a.m., which was quite remarkable.

People in Chongqing have a great passion for sports, most notably the shouts of "Rise up!" for their teams in the early days of the professional league.

The 110-meter hurdles is a highly technical event, difficult to train for and with many unpredictable events during the competition. The budgeted team barely managed to form four groups; there were no semi-finals, and the final was held in the afternoon.

Liu Feiren's performance in the preliminary round can be described as effortless. After getting off the last hurdle, he slowly and leisurely ran across the finish line.

Even so, his advantage remains significant. In domestic competitions, the name "Liu the Flying Man" is an intimidating presence for other team members; those in the same group as him basically back down before the competition even begins.

Shi Peng also won first place in his group. Although he did not have the same dominance as Liu Feiren, he could basically win all the domestic competitions when Liu Feiren was not around.

Following the 110-meter hurdles, the preliminary rounds of the men's 5000-meter and women's 800-meter races were held. The organizing committee also took into full consideration the audience's feelings when setting up the competition, pairing an intense race with a relatively less exciting event.

At 9:30, check-in for the 100-meter race began. After giving a few final instructions to the participants, Wang Qiao turned and walked towards the podium to greet Yu Wei.

"Coach Yu, you don't need to say anything today. Why are you in such a rush? Did you take an early flight here?"

Wang Qiao sat down behind Yu Wei with a smile. Because he was a national team coach, the organizing committee had also arranged a seat for him.

"Absolutely! I slept the whole way after boarding the plane this morning and missed the in-flight meal. So after I got off, I didn't do anything but go to a ramen shop near the airport and have a bowl of ramen. I didn't expect the ramen to be spicy; I'm getting old, I'm afraid I'll have to run to the toilet..."

Upon seeing Wang Qiao, Yu Wei's urge to make sarcastic remarks immediately arose.

"I remember that after getting off the airport bus, I just turned one corner and found the bus that came this way. I walked for almost half an hour and still couldn't find it. I asked for directions but didn't understand. What a waste of time! By the way, how are those clowns doing today?"

After finishing his rant, Yu Wei first asked the young men on the sprint relay team.

In this Olympic cycle, Yu Wei was responsible for supervising the adult team as well as the youth team.

Logically, four out of the five members of this relay team should be sent to the youth team for training. However, in Yu Wei's view, China's current sprinting level is basically like this: no more than ten athletes can run under 10.3 seconds, and those who can qualify for the Olympics...

These players are basically the strongest among the young players. Compared with the other players, their performance is about the same, and even if there was a gap before, it wasn't much weaker.

After a year of training, they are probably no less capable than the other team members.

"They should all be in good form. This time, apart from Wen Zhengming who is a little weaker, the other four should all be able to run under 10.3 seconds. I think Lu Wei has a very good chance of meeting the standard, while Hu Ge and Huo Jianhua will probably have to see how they perform on the day."

Hearing Wang Qiao's words, Yu Wei nodded in satisfaction: "If we can get four people to achieve the Olympic A standard, it means our strength is not bad! Since the establishment of our Track and Field Management Center, we have never won all the spots in the 100-meter competition. Sometimes we struggle to even get one spot. This time we can finally hold our heads high. It feels great!"

Clearly, Yu Wei had a lot of confidence in the team members under his nose. Today was the day to test their sprinting skills over the past few years.