My favorite athlete is ZHANG NING who plays badminton very well. In the 2008 Beijing Olympic games, she beat her teammate XIE XINGFANG who ranked No.1 in the world to be the champion again after the 2004 Athens Olympic games. When she won the final, she was so excited that she fell on her knees to celebrate the great moment. People who watched this match were all moved by this 33-year old athlete. It was actually tough for her to defeat the formidable opponent.
ZHANG NING was born in Jinzhou, Liaoning province on 19th May 1975. When ZHANG NING was about ten years old, her father bought her a pair of badminton rackets which were made of wood. Upon holding the racket, little ZHANG NING fell in love with the sport. Then the story between she and badminton began. When competing in one of the matches organized by her school, she met with the coach of the Jinzhou city sports school. Her concentration and tenacity towards badminton deep impressed the coach who later changed her life. Then ZHANG NING started to receive professional training under the guidance of the coach DU ZHIXIN. However, after one vacation’s training, ZHANG NING had to give up. Because she needed to look after her younger brother with her mother being ill. During this time, she persevered with exercise every day. After her brother could took care of himself, she went back to the sports school.
Just after her returning for less than two months, there was a competition for her age. ZHANG NING won the fourth prize as an amateur player. The first third ones were all professionals. So it was uneasy for her to achieve that. Before long she was chosen as an athlete in her province’s team, where she could receive more professional training . At that time, she was only 12 years old. She had made great progress since she was admitted to the province team. She was soon chosen by the national team, starting her career there.
She has represented China for international games since 1994. She was as famous as YE ZHAOYING at that time. She was outstanding at a young age. However, when she competed with ZHANG HAILI from Indonesia at the third game, she lost it with being in a bad condition. That had a great influence on her. She suffered from insomnia. At the same time, she was suspicious of herself. The confident smile on her face disappeared. The failure affected her in the following 9 years. In the nine years, YE ZHAOYING succeeded, and GONG ZHICHAO took strides towards victory, while ZHANG NING did not show up.
In 2003, she stood out, never throwing herself into dumbness. She became the world champion. A year later, she met with ZHANG HAILI again. This time, she walked out from the past shadow and won, which made herself sit in the throne of No.1 in the world. She was always in a fantastic condition, which made her a lot of champion titles. However, she has suffered a lot from her injuries since 2006. That almost ruined her at one time. She insisted on her goals, never gave up. Just 100 days before the Beijing Olympic games opened， there were still severe problems with her knees. But she coped with that, appearing at the course.
So we can learn a lot of things from ZHANG NING. When facing with doubt and criticism，what should we do? It is no use complaining or depressing. What you need to do is to arrange your own life in another point of view. Maybe it will take a little long time for you to succeed, as long as you try and are patient. Then the outcome is that you have a feeling of accomplishment. You make your own life fulfilled. Just as the flowers turn into fruits to prove their self-value, you can, too.
There is really a lot of things we can learn from ZHANG NING and many other athletes, and the best qualities that stand out I think are assiduity, persist and optimistic. Just think how a little girl standed out among many professional players and ranked fourth, we will know how much effort she took to achieve that. I remember it is reported that in the past 7 years, there were only 3 days that Phelps did not swim. All the things Phelps did were swimming, sleeping and eating. It is such hard work that makes them top athletes in their fields. Having the confidence of defeating failure and always believe in themselves are also important. Without confidence she would not walk out from her past shadow.
ReplyDeleteIt is important to be resilient in the face of adversity. What about you? Do you play badminton?
ReplyDeleteThis is a great story to share with the boys when I next meet them for our weekly Literature sessions. One of them has been very disappointed since he was rejected by his school team. He had wanted so much to be part of the badminton team when he joined the school. During the holidays after his primary school leaving examinations, he attended lessons every week in preparation of the selection test at his new school. The blow was hard to take when he saw how much better his friends were than him. Your story is a good illustration of what it means to be resilient.
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