Olympic champion Xu Lijia expects a sailing boom in China

by Yan, Xinhua on 1 Aug 2017 With less than a month to go before the Chinese National Games to kick off in Tianjin, Xu Lijia, the London Olympic Games champion, can only cherish her dream to compete in the Tokyo 2020 Games.

In a picture posted on her social media Weibo after a surgery, Xu, the women's Laser Radial Olympic champion in 2012, smiles at the camera wearing a hospital patient’s gown, with her left arm in a sling and her right hand bandaged - but thumb up! Xu knows she will miss the National Games due to her shoulder surgery, but the 30-year-old hopes to compete in Tokyo 2020, and thereby encourage more Chinese people to take up and enjoy the sport of sailing.

One month before the 2016 Rio Olympic Games, Xu felt pain in her shoulder, but managed to finish the regatta. After taking the advice of doctors to rest for three to six months, she was still in pain, and received surgery to her left and right shoulders respectively in May and June 2017. 'Recovery will take six to nine months, and then I will start high intensity training,' said Xu. 'I want to tune up for the next Olympic Games. I may not be able to sail for a while, but I can still enrich my life,' she added.

In 2014, Xu became a World Sailing judge, and is also a member of the World Sailing Athletes Committee. In addition, she is studying for a Master’s degree in International Management in the UK, which she calls 'the heaven of sailing. I am like a sponge when I am there, absorbing all the knowledge related to sailing,' she says.

Meanwhile, Xu has a professional team behind her to promote sailing in her hometown: she is an Ambassador and training partner of China One Ningbo, the team that won the inaugural M32 World Championships in Sweden. 'China One Ningbo aims at cultivating Chinese sailors, and we hope that Xu Lijia's participation will arouse the interest and enthusiasm of the Chinese people,' said Sun Xiao, the team's co-founder.

Apart from the M32 World Championships, China One Ningbo also takes part in the World Match Racing Tour. Most of its members compete in both professional tours, as well as the Olympic Games. This Xu sees as a growing trend, one that will break down the barrier between professional sailors and national team members, like the US basketball team in 1992.

Philip Sohmen, co-chairman of the team, is the grandson of Sir Pao Yue-Kong, owner of the World-Wide Shipping Group. The team is named after his hometown, Ningbo, a coastal city close to Shanghai. And both sides are firmly supportive of the International Sailing Center project based in Ningbo that aims to bring more global sailing competitions to China.

That's what Xu hopes. She is delighted to see increasing numbers of clubs and marinas being built in China. 'Once there are more professionals and a complete training system, we'll see a huge growth in sailing in China.'

Nowadays in China, sailing is still regarded as a ‘luxury sport’. Xu disagrees with that: the price of the Optimist dinghy that she sailed as a young teenager was less than RMB10,000. She suggests that beginners learn the sport in clubs, and then build their confidence through racing, before buying their first boats. 'No matter what is your age, gender, height or income, you can find the most suitable boat from all the hundreds of different ones out there,' she said, 'or the most suitable position in a crew - skipper, strategist, and so on.'

Aside from the Olympics, her biggest dream at the moment is to take the helm of an M32 herself, and she has been receiving tips from the skipper, team leader and world champion, Phil Robertson. 'Getting myself back into racing is the best way to express my love for the sport and to promote it in China. I hope one day you will see me back on the water,' says Xu.