Zhongxin.com, Tianjin, August 29th, question: Zhang Ping: The Olympic champion won the doctoral Admission Notice and the identity will be converted into volleyball

author Zhang Shaoxuan Cui Jingsheng

on August 29, 2004, zhang Ping stood on the highest podium of women’s volleyball team in Athens Olympic Games. On August 29, 2022, Zhang Ping said, “I got the doctoral offer from a well-known British university and will report for duty soon.”

After winning the Olympic champion, Zhang Ping once chose to study in the Chinese University of Hong Kong and obtained a master’s degree. Later, she became a physical education teacher, and she still stayed in volleyball. Today, when she will become a “student” again. She said like this: “When a teenager moves, she will always move. Along the way, I was always hot and hot. What I was excited about was Volleyball. All my choices were to make volleyball move more people.”

From a young boy to become Chinese pride

Zhang Ping was born in an athlete’s family. His father Zhang Jinggang was a volleyball coach of Tianjin Hexi district sports school and also her volleyball Enlightenment coach. “Volleyball and I can be said to be two-way choices, and we prefer each other.” He inherited the excellent physical quality of his parents. Zhang Ping was higher than his peers from an early age, and his strength and physical coordination were also more prominent.

From kindergarten, she began to contact volleyball, often holding the ball and not letting go. Under the continuous training of his father, Zhang Ping entered the volleyball team of Tianjin Hexi zone Center Primary School in the third grade. Since then, everyone knows that there is a girl with great strength in spiking sets volleyball court. Due to hard training and outstanding personal characteristics, Zhang Ping was selected into the first line of Tianjin Women’s volleyball team in 1998. In February 2002, she became a member of the national team.

When recalling the trip to Athens, Zhang Ping said that he was “ordered in danger and did not disgrace his mission”. During the competition, the “violent counterattack” was fully developed. Various tactics such as close-fitting, short and flat, back flying, back slipping, and back attack were used alternately, making the opponent invincible.

At the Athens Olympics, Zhang Ping played all eight games with a total score of 114 points. Volleyball officials of the Olympic committee at that time said that this was very rare in the deputy attack. In that year, the Chinese women’s volleyball team won the Olympic champion again after 20 years and was reborn after several hardships. As a member of the golden generation, Zhang Ping was also named the best attacker of Athens Olympic Games.

There has never been a smooth road

perhaps many people think that Zhang Ping has a smooth road along the way, but only she knows that the road is blocked and long. “From sports school to Tianjin team and then to national team, it is a change from children to adults for me. My father always told me to go forward and not give up easily.”

“I am strong in character, and I think I am a very strong person. This may have something to do with the coaches I met, from my father to coach Wang Baoquan to coach Chen Zhonghe.” After that, Zhang Ping burst out laughing, but his eyes revealed a kind of gratitude and gratitude.

When she first arrived at the national team, although Zhang Ping was a substitute, she always followed the main training meticulously and trained for up to 10 hours a day. It is such a high degree of teamwork and full-hearted efforts that have made the spirit of the Chinese women’s volleyball team shine so far.

“I tell you, I still remember Suxian Ridge in Chenzhou, Hunan province. Every weekend, Chen Zhonghe coach will organize team members to climb the mountain within a limited time. One person timed out and the whole team climbed down the mountain! I think we are “Superman” at that intensity.” Although Zhang Ping seemed to talk bitterly about her past, she also said that these were all her own treasures.

“It was with these experiences that our Tianjin Women’s volleyball team won the championship in the National Games in 2005, which was also the peak of isport.” No matter in the national team or the local team, what Zhang Ping gained was the trust and friendship among the team members, which also affected her future life attitude and life choice, making herself more determined to love volleyball.

What changed her identity was the heart of volleyball

As an athlete, Zhang Ping reached the peak, but in her view, it was not the end but the starting point. She regarded herself as a successor, so she chose to go to college for further study after her retirement. In her view, to have a deeper understanding of sports and the spirit of sports, one must take a longer view and get in touch with the wider world. “I hope to pass on the spirit and life perception of the women’s volleyball team that I have learned to young people, so that they can all have their own glory in the future life path.”

After his retirement, Zhang Ping buried himself in Sea of books publishing press and was admitted to the Chinese University of Hong Kong and got a master’s degree all the way. “I studied sports science and physical education at that time, which was also the first to be admitted as an Olympic champion. So far, I can speak some English, Cantonese and Latin, and we cannot embarrass athletes.”

After graduating from graduate school, Zhang Ping stayed in the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen) and became a physical education teacher. Speaking of his experience as a teacher, Zhang Ping was full of smiles. “Our team just won the first place in the women’s team of the University volleyball team of Shenzhen University and middle school students not long ago, which is happier than I won the championship myself.”

Rooted in Xingtan and speaking of his own educational philosophy, Zhang Ping thinks that it is more important for students to have the spirit of riding the wind and Breaking the Waves and marching forward bravely. Outside the classroom, she will discuss the problem of love with students. If students encounter difficulties, she will enlighten them with her own personal experience. She would say that the spirit of the women’s volleyball team is “the supremacy of the motherland, unity and cooperation, tenacious struggle and never giving up. But first, you have to be a person who satisfies you.”

“I always tell the students that life is wonderful, not only being outstanding. Every difficulty you overcome, just like every ball we deduct, is a hit of the Earth and can get a point in life.”

At the end of the interview, Zhang Ping told the reporter excitedly that he had got the admission notice from well-known British universities, and the future phased goal was to study for a doctor’s degree in sports medicine. She hopes that she can help more people avoid damage caused by incorrect sports methods in the future, so that people with sports dreams can avoid detours. “Maybe I still have bigger goals in the future, but I feel at ease when I return to campus and continue to move forward with my feet on the ground.”

This is Zhang Ping, the world champion of women’s volleyball team, who is about to become a foreign student, and will still be a person with unremitting pursuit of sports in the future. (Finished)