The "fever" of ice and snow sports in Beijing
Geng Bingwa, 27, medalist at the Chinese Figure Skating Championships in the "free program" category, is now a coach at the Tus-Ice and Snow Center, a sports complex dedicated to winter sports in the Shijingshan district of Beijing.
“When I learned figure skating, it was still a niche sport. But now, all it takes is an ice rink to be open and it's taken over by children,” remarked Geng Bingwa, a first-hand witness to the rise of ice and snow sports in the capital. Chinese as everywhere in the country. As she explained, the Tus-Ice and Snow Center has daily figure skating and ice hockey lessons that are sold out. She herself currently supervises about twenty children, much more gifted and motivated than previous generations.
And the Tus-Ice and Snow Center only hints at a "tip of the iceberg" when it comes to people's enthusiasm for ice and snow sports in Beijing, a "double Olympic" city. Indeed, after hosting the Summer Olympics in 2008, Beijing is preparing to host the Winter Olympics in 2022.
Specialized training
Thanks to the Beijing Winter Olympics, training is becoming more and more specialized.
Gao Bowen, 9, started skating over two years ago. At the very beginning, as soon as he jumped on the ice, he fell repeatedly. But following the intense training he underwent, he now participates in skating competitions organized at the borough and city level, and he obtains excellent marks there. He even became the best skater in his age group. This young boy, whose idol is Olympic champion Wu Dajing, finished in 3rd place in the Beijing 2021 short track speed skating championship (7 laps), in the "U10 men" category. Under Gao Bowen's influence, his little sister Wu Yutong also joined the skating team.
Gao Bowen and his sister take skating lessons at the Meng Qi Yuan (literally, "origin of the dream") society, which was founded five or six years ago. After the appointment of Beijing as host city of the 2022 Winter Olympics, this company was responsible for forming and training teams of young ice and snow sports enthusiasts in the Yanqing district of Beijing, with the mission to popularize these sports among young people. With its twenty coaches, all top-level national athletes, it contributes to projects associated with winter sports in the Yanqing district and to the development of these disciplines in schoolyards.
Meng Meijun, coach at Meng Qi Yuan Ice Rink, said, “When Gao Bowen arrived, he was a relatively well-behaved, introverted, and tight-lipped kid. During training, he repeated the movements diligently and diligently, working hard and above all, showing great seriousness. From now on, he ranks among the top three skaters in his 8-10 age group. I hope he will have the opportunity to establish himself as a great champion. »
"Young people are the future of our motherland, and the future of ice and snow sports will also depend on them," said Liu Xiaoming, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Education Commission. , stating that now, nearly 2.1 million students from elementary to middle school in Beijing practice this kind of sports in the school grounds. Moreover, already six editions of the “Beijing Winter Games for primary and secondary students” have taken place in the Chinese capital. These "children's version of the Olympics" are like a convincing "calling card" which calls for the organization of events linked to winter sports in the schoolyards of the Chinese capital, while helping Beijing to a pool of promising athletes.
The explosion of winter sports tourism
Tourists visit a high-tech Winter Olympics exhibition at the Beijing Science Center on Jan. 9, 2022.
On Nov. 23, 2021, in Yanqing District, "snowflakes" could be seen floating through the air and settling on the snow-covered slopes, creating an idyllic mountain backdrop. Indeed, on this date, Shijinglong Ski Resort started making artificial snow. Following the official opening of the area on November 27, this ski resort has experienced an upsurge in the number of Chinese tourists coming to enjoy the joys of skiing.
Since 2014, Beijing has held its Ice and Snow Festival in municipal parks, an event that attracts nearly 2 million visitors each year. “Beijing's parks each have their own characteristics: the Beihai Park ice rink has been a must-see place for playing on ice since the Qing Dynasty; the winter sports facilities at Taoranting Park is the largest site in the southern part of Beijing (inside the 2nd ring road) for fun in the snow; the frozen Kunming Lake at the Summer Palace has become Beijing's largest natural ice rink and offers a 360° panorama of the all-white classical gardens, much to the delight of tourists," commented Zhang Yahong, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Parks Administration Center. In recent years, about ten types of activities associated with winter sports have been on the program, including: sports competitions, ice shows, fun matches, public interest activities, thematic exhibitions, family games in the snow, etc. .
In order to encourage ever more massive practice of ice and snow sports, and thus help citizens to stay in good health, a large number of dedicated sites offering all kinds of activities accessible to all have been built almost everywhere.
These sites have particularly proliferated in Beijing. According to figures quoted by Ge Jun, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Sports Bureau, there are now 82 indoor ice rinks, 97 outdoor ice rinks and 32 winter sports resorts in the Chinese capital. Meanwhile, Beijing Municipality has held seven mainstream winter sports events, in which more than 20,000 various activities for all skill levels have been conducted and attracted more than 31 million participants. In fact, the influence of ice and snow sports has expanded even further.
After the Winter Olympics, the National Speed Skating Oval, nicknamed "Ice Ribbon" (literally, ribbon of ice), will gradually open its doors to the public, with the aim of providing sports sites and facilities in for the good physical health of the Chinese. The LeSports Center, formerly the Wukesong Omnisports Centre, will be converted into a place also suitable for summer sports after the 2022 Olympic Games. In addition to the basketball matches and other competitions that it will continue to host, this center will expand the size and scope of its operations, since ice hockey, short track speed skating, figure skating and other ice sports events will be held there. It will therefore carry out development on all levels, with an ice rink accessible in all seasons and a full range of services.
Beijing's Yanqing District is one of the three competition areas of the 2022 Winter Olympics. It has invested extensive efforts in spreading and generalizing ice and snow sports, as well as promoting the development of tourism. related. Based on the splendid views offered by the Shijinglong ski resort, Badaling ski resort or the Longqingxia ice lantern site, it seeks to promote "white tourism" at many winter sports sites. , such as the International Horticultural Exposition Park and Yudu Mountain. “Since 2015, when Beijing was selected to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, Yanqing District has received a total of 11.753 million tourists wishing to indulge in ice and snow sports, with revenue amounting to 823 million yuan,” said Ren Jianghao, deputy mayor of Yanqing district. The mayor of Yanqing has the firm intention of reusing the facilities set up for the Winter Olympics after these games. By first targeting the improvement of ski infrastructures, the organization of top-of-the-range brand events and the development of tourism based on ice and snow sports, this borough will quickly be able to establish itself as "a international tourist destination for winter sports enthusiasts”.
A motor effect
While the ambition “to encourage 300 million people to practice ice and snow sports” has translated into concrete actions, the winter sports sector has had an increasingly important driving effect. Let us quote some statistics on the sales of equipment related to winter sports which are recorded on the e-commerce platform JD.com on the day of the "Double 11" 2021 (i.e. November 11, on the occasion of the singles, the Chinese equivalent of Black Friday). Compared to data on the same day a year earlier, the value of transactions associated with skiwear increased by 270%; snowboard orders jumped 590%; orders for goggles and ski goggles increased by 300%. Women's ski wear and parent-child ski gear became the star items.
The winter sports industry is not satisfied with "increasing the production and sale of goods". To create remarkable experiences for consumers, the new trend in the industry is to “improve quality and increase capacity” by offering personalized, differentiated and quality services. Under the influence of the threat of COVID-19 and the impetus of the approaching Winter Olympics, a whole series of various mobile applications have been launched to allow winter sports enthusiasts to learn, save content, share their experiences and participate in activities more quickly and easily by connecting online.
The Keep fitness application has more than 200 million Internet users. In 2020, her team of instructional writers and famed freestyle skier Xu Nannan created a series of online courses, where this professional teaches introductory downhill skiing techniques. To date, this video tutorial program has been viewed over 3.4 million times. In order to popularize winter sports, in 2021, Keep continued to integrate ice and snow sports content into its new category of live virtual classes. Like the fast-paced, fat-burning “Ski Jumping” program, it aims to promote users' interest and enthusiasm for the Winter Olympics, as well as the sports that will be represented there.
