Man with passion for winter sports teaches youngsters

"I went to see how the Yinchuan skaters performed, only to find they just finished one-fifth of the competition," Liu recalls. "So I decided to resign and become a coach, cultivating skaters for this city."

Liu has coached around 3,000 children, but most of them left his tutelage after entering middle school. The eldest member of his team is 19-year-old Ma Zhao, who has been following him for 10 years and won a gold medal at the 2014 Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing, Jiangsu province.

"Ma used to have a competitor in the team. It's a pity that the other boy left. The two boys could make progress together if he was still here," Liu says.

Parents have been supporting their children to learn skating, thanks to the country's commitment to engage more than 300 million people in winter sports. Liu's team is now sponsored by the Ningxia Sports Bureau.

As a coach, Liu keeps learning new skills for short-track speedskating by watching elite competitions on TV. "If I don't learn, how is it possible for my children to step on the stage of the Olympic Games?"

Liu says he feels his age. The pain in his muscles and joints that used to be cured by a good night's sleep now keeps torturing him. He is seizing both the day and night to cultivate his team and successor.

He has also been invited to teach at Ningxia Vocational College of Physical Education. Students from the once poverty-stricken Xihaigu region used to have no idea of skating, but many of them have changed their majors to learn to skate with Liu, thanks to the country's poverty-alleviation campaign and emphasis on ice and snow sports.

"I believe the place will have a lot of skating talent in the near future," says Liu. "And this is my dream."

Xinhua