Media peek into China gymnast’s life (Deseret Morning News)

Posted on August 17, 2008

Unlike Johnson, who arrived later, obviously delighted with her medal, Yang displayed little outward emotion. She smiled obediently, all small teeth, when reporters asked her to pose with regard to photos. Her little mouth pursed again when the lenses were turned away.

Perhaps Yang is shy through nature. But, in fact, she just seems to have been sheltered by the Chinese coaches who direct her life.

“For the drug test,” coach Liu Qunlin said, passing Yang a bottle of water so she would be able to provide a sample for the dope-testers.

Then, a little hesitantly, Yang started to answer the questions. And the more she said, the greater quantity awful it was. The answers were brief, spoken without heart. What emerged was a picture of a in one’s teens damsel who has been kept largely cut off from family and the outside world for more than a year, so she could be intensely trained to reach medals for China at its own Olympics.

Were your parents here to see you compete, among the cheering crowds?

“I slip on’familiarily know.”

When was the last time you went home?”

“Ummm … near the front of I joined the national team,” Yang reported, her small voice hard to hear.

When was that?

“More than a year agone.”

Will you go on holiday after the Games?

“I don’t know.”

How many holidays do you get a year?

“I have not had a holiday since I joined the national team.”

China’s national athletics squad trains in a sports complex in Beijing, not to a great distance from the Temple of Heaven, where elderly men and women keep their aging joints and minds supple with taiji exercises in the dim mornings. The training center is a guarded, single-minded and demanding world, where China’session brightest talents are honed to bring honor to their country and the communist government.

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