Will China’s Winter Olympics buzz last? Judging the success of the Beijing 2022 Games

Before the Winter Olympics in Beijing, we asked what success for China might look like. In the first of a two-part series, Jess Ma looks at the host nation’s achievements on the snow and ice. “Simple, safe and splendid” was China’s promise for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. What followed over 16 days of competition this month were fierce battles on the slopes and rinks for athletes, and with the raging Omicron variant and diplomatic boycotts for organisers. Rigorous Covid-19 testing meant Hong Kong alpine skier Audrey King had to isolate 10 days before her event, after a positive test upon landing in Beijing. Tearful Belgian skeleton athlete Kim Meylemans, meanwhile, took to social media to vent her frustration from a quarantine facility, after initially being kept away from the Athletes’ Village. Disputes also erupted behind the scenes, with a doping scandal engulfing 15-year-old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva. A potential gold medallist with the Russian Olympic Committee in the team event, Valieva faced a gruelling hearing soon before the short programme segment of her individual event, which ultimately ended in tears as the promising favourite fell several times in her free skate routine. IOC president Thomas Bach then called out the “disturbing” treatment she received from her ruthless coaches in the “kiss and cry” area at the Capital Indoor Stadium. American-born Team China athlete Eileen Gu’s nationality was also the subject of hot debate, prompting arguments among Chinese and American fans on social media. On the more wholesome side, there were plenty of scenes of athletes congratulating and consoling each other, in victory and defeat. Japanese skater Yuzuru Hanyu also felt the love from his legion of fans – including thousands who lined up outside the venue in the Chinese capital – following his failed title defence in men’s singles skating. With the second pandemic Games over, the Post evaluates whether China lived up to its promises, and met its own expectations, for its second Olympic journey. China’s medal haul In terms of the hosts’ medal count, China went above and beyond all expectations. Before the Games, data analyst Nielsen Gracenote predicted 13 medals for China. They ended up finishing third in the table with a total of 15 medals – nine gold, four silver and two bronze. Only traditional Winter Olympics powerhouses Norway and Germany managed to nab more gold medals, with 16 and 12 gold medals respectively. The United States finished fourth, with 8 gold medals, 10 silver, and 7 bronze, knocked down from the No 3 spot by a world record effort from Chinese figure skating duo Sui Wenjing and Han Cong on day 15, which snatched the pairs figure skating title. China’s medal haul was in stark contrast to the 2018 Pyeongchang Games where they won just a single gold medal, from short-track speed skater Wu Dajing in the men’s 500 metres race. Besides Wu’s world and Olympic record-setting win, China also won 6 silver medals and 2 bronze in snowboarding, freestyle skiing, short-track speedskating, and pairs figure skating. Four years later on their home turf, China performed significantly better, clinching more medals in familiar disciplines and debuting in a wider array of events. China’s gold rush in Beijing was largely concentrated in freestyle skiing and short-track speedskating, which contributed four and two gold medals respectively, and this impressive haul was no accident. All eyes were on China’s golden girl Eileen Gu – who fulfilled her Olympic mission by winning 2 gold medals and 1 silver in freestyle skiing – and her fellow Games debutant Su Yiming, who won a gold medal in men’s snowboard big air and a silver in slopestyle. But there was more at play behind China’s leap up the medal table, with many veteran athletes going one better after reaching finals or taking home silver or bronze at previous Games. Freestyle skier Xu Mengtao, who won an incredible gold in the women’s singles aerials in Beijing, is a three-time Olympian with a silver medal from the 2014 Sochi Games, who had finished ninth in the same event in Pyeongchang. The hotly tipped figure skating pair Sui and Han, who fulfilled their dream with an Olympic gold at the Capital Indoor Stadium, arrived at the Pyeongchang Games as world champions in 2018. They took home a silver medal then, with Sui sobbing in Han’s arms on the podium. Besides athletes’ individual improvements, China’s ambitious programme to develop winter sports after winning the Olympic bid in 2016 saw increased participation in a wider range of events. China made its debut in ice hockey, luge and Nordic combined, while their teams in cross-country skiing, biathlon and bobsleigh expanded. The hosts also recruited ethnically Chinese talents from abroad, adding naturalised athletes to their roster. These athletes include Gu, who grew up in San Francisco and skied for Team USA before announcing a switch of affiliation to China in June 2019. Figure skater Beverly Zhu Yi, who received heavy criticism from Chinese netizens after multiple falls in her routines, is also American-born. Zhu renounced her US citizenship in 2018. The men’s ice hockey team also drew ire for reportedly relying on players of Kunlun Red Star, a team in Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League, which is said to be acting as a de facto China national team based out of Moscow. Its recruitment of Canadian-born players to the roster in a bid to acquire experienced team members also caused consternation. The team were blown out 8-0 by the United States in their debut match, before a 7-2 loss to Canada in the qualification play-off. In their training for the Beijing Games, the Chinese cross-country skiing team also set up a partnership with Norway, which allowed Chinese athletes to train with elite teams in Trondheim. In an interview with the Post, Chinese national cross-country team manager Zhang Bei said: “The active performance of the Chinese athletes at this year’s Olympics will have a profound impact on the confidence and enthusiasm of the people and the project. “China has provided strong support to the sport, not only in nurturing elite athletes to participate in elite international competitions, but also to promote the project among the masses.” Beyond an elite sporting stage Besides promising a smoothly-run Games, China also pledged to have 300 million people taking part in winter sports by the start of its second Olympics. China said in January it had smashed its target, claiming 346 million people across the country had taken part in winter sports since 2015. China’s definition for winter sport participation, though, stretches beyond leisure participation in skiing and skating, as the sports administration included coaches, referees, visitors to winter carnivals and even audience members at quiz shows as “participants” of winter sports in 2015. Whether such interest will last after the fanfare of the Games fades is also up in the air. “It may have started with government policy and the Winter Olympics, but now people see skiing as an enjoyment and a means to socialise. The Winter Olympics factor is not as important now,” Chen Qian of Chinese consumer research firm Daxue Consulting said. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Eileen Gu 🖤🌈🧊🐲 (@eileen_gu_) “This could be seen in the social media posts of people who tried skiing for the first time in the past two years. People talk more of being fashionable when mentioning skiing and hope to brandish their economic status.” Analysts say that education and training programmes are key to sustaining popular interest in winter sports beyond the Winter Olympics buzz. Laurent Vanat, a consultant specialising in snow and mountain tourism, told the Post the main challenges for China’s skiing industry lie in attracting regular consumers and building a healthy image for skiing. “Ski resorts need to provide a good experience to beginners first, especially to avoid beginners trying out skiing without coaching. It’s a good thing in China that they can learn in a safe environment in indoor ski domes,” Vanat said, regarding what can be done to turn one-time skiers into regular enthusiasts. “People also need to learn that skiing is an exercise, a healthy sport – this will lead to dedicated skiers. This isn’t a done deal yet – it relies on the ability of the ski industry to retain customers,” Vanat added. Chen said the Winter Olympics’ impact on China’s winter sports industry will be a long-term one, as she expects sports development to take off after the Games. She raised examples of ski resorts spreading to southern cities and Xinjiang, where the government hopes to develop a winter sports industry hub, as opposed to a few major resorts concentrated in northern China before. A ski resort opened last October in Koktokay, a region in Xinjiang’s Altay prefecture, while Anji county in southern province Zhejiang has three outdoor ski resorts despite its location and relatively short snow season lasting two months. Chen believes companies should focus on increasing convenience for consumers by spreading facilities across the country and providing experiential training to attract beginners. However, unlike Vanat, she sees the attraction of skiing to consumers as a social activity and class indicator, rather than a sport. Negligible boycotts Beijing organisers opened the Games under the scrutiny of the world, amid diplomatic boycotts from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia. However diplomatic disinterest did not translate into viewers staying away, as figures broke records, particularly in host country China. Figures released by the International Olympic Committee recorded almost 600 million viewers in China for the Winter Olympics in the first week, with more than 515 million people tuning into events by February 10. China’s Twitter-like social media platform Weibo also saw an explosion in interest, especially for victories by Chinese athletes – hashtags related to Games competition often topped the search lists, and prompted vigorous discussion. However, viewership outside China presented a split picture. Nearly 3 million watched the opening ceremony in Hong Kong through TVB, which had exclusive broadcasting rights to the Games. This enthusiasm was not seen in malls, however, with only sparse crowds stopping to watch live broadcasts of events because of the Covid-19 pandemic. This contrasted sharply with last summer’s Tokyo Olympics, where malls were packed as citizens cheering for local athletes. The Discovery Channel, which aired events for European audiences, saw the total number of streaming viewers surpassing Pyeongchang 2018’s total figures after just four days of competition. Australian official broadcaster Seven Network also reached 11.7 million viewers on February 16. In the US, viewership for NBC’s coverage of the first four nights of the Games sank by 55.3 [er cent from the same period at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games. Online streaming presented a much more optimistic picture, though, as data from Adobe Analytics and Nielsen recorded a 78 per cent increase in minutes of content streamed across NBC’s main broadcast and social media platforms, totalling 3.9 billion minutes. Pu Haozhou, a University of Dayton assistant professor, said robust viewership in China indicates strong interest for the Games at home. However, he was reserved as to whether such interest arose from watching winter sports or the star athletes on show. Pu also suggested that social media channels and streaming services are altering how audiences follow the Olympics. “I found it interesting that the Olympic athletes, with their own social media channels such as Instagram and TikTok, created an alternative angle for the fans to experience the Olympics. This might have a larger impact on the public views and perception on the host particularly for the young generation,” Pu said. A green path ahead Powered by renewable energy and reusing some venues from the 2008 Summer Games, the Beijing Winter Olympics had set out to be the greenest ever held. But even though the slopes are now clear and the rinks are empty, sustainability is still a key issue for China’s ongoing winter sports development quest. Having relied entirely on artificial snow to provide sufficient coverage on the slopes, the environmental costs of fake snow will need to be mitigated if China is to continue to use these venues for skiing. A 2016 IOC evaluation report noted the sparse snowfall in Yanqing, saying the Beijing bid had “substantial reliance on snow-making in all-mountain venues” which may affect the “the visual perception of the snow sports setting”. According to a pre-Games legacy report released by the Beijing organising committee, all venues used to host competitions will be repurposed for public usage. The Yanqing venues, namely the National Alpine Skiing Centre and the National Sliding Centre, will be used for national team training with part of them opened for the public to experience skiing and sliding sports. For other outdoor snow venues, many will be converted into parks. The National Ski Jumping Centre, National Biathlon Centre and National Cross-country Skiing Centre in Zhangjiakou will be open to the public for skiing in the winter and converted to skiing alternatives in the summer. The Genting Snow Park in Zhangjiakou, which held freestyle skiing and snowboarding events, will continue to operate as a commercial ski resort. The Beijing venues will resume their operations as stadiums and indoor skating rinks, or as a fitness centre in the case of the Big Air Shougang, the only outdoor venue at the Games.

Will China’s Winter Olympics buzz last? Judging the success of the Beijing 2022 Games

China’s athletes more than delivered on the ski slopes and the ice rinks, with a record Winter Games medal haul But time will tell if the second Beijing Olympics live up to organisers’ lofty expectations and promises

China’s athletes more than delivered on the ski slopes and the ice rinks, with a record Winter Games medal haul

But time will tell if the second Beijing Olympics live up to organisers’ lofty expectations and promises