When Chinese speed skater Yang Yang finished first in the women's 500-m short-track speed skating final at the 2002 Winter Olympic Games, China won its first gold medal ever in the Winter Olympics.Yang Yang's accomplishment of twice taking the gold in Salt Lake City was rated by China Daily as one of the top news stories of the year— indicating the importance in which society in general in China holds world-class sports. As widely expected, Yang Yang was honored at the annual China Sports Awards ceremonies held in March 2003 as the top woman athlete of 2002, while world champion gymnast Li Xiaopeng beat out favored NBA star Yao Ming to be named China's Sportsman of the Year 2002.
Throughout the year in 2002, Chinese athletes won 110 world championships in 22 events of world championship or world cup, and 42 of these titles are from Olympic events, accounting for 38 percent of the total number of championships won. Seventeen individuals and five teams broke 29 world records, seven of them in Olympic events. At the 14th Asian Games in Busan, ROK in October, the Chinese sports delegation won 150 gold medals, 84 silver medals and 74 bronze medals, winning the most gold medals of any country. Chinese athletes also broke 13 world records and tied five at this Asian Games. Chinese athletes were particularly strong in the country's most popular participant sports—table tennis, badminton, volleyball and swimming.
Among the most notable 2002 sports events was the participation of the men's soccer team in the World Cup tournament held in June in Japan and ROK, which marked the first ever appearance of a Chinese men's soccer team in a World Cup finals. Although the national team's first-round exit was a disappointment, Chinese fans and the media were delighted that the national team made it through the Asian qualifying group to enter the elite group of finalists to perform in the World Cup, the most watched event in television history.
Meanwhile, a Chinese team that did not disappoint was the team of Zhao Hongbo and his partner Shen Xue who overcame her seriously sprained right ankle to help the pair dazzle the audience and judges to win their second consecutive pairs crown at the World Figure Skating Championships in March 2003 in WashingtonD.C.
The Chinese men's soccer team's entering World Cup finals was considered a milestone achievement in the change from state-sponsored to professionalism in sports, which began in the 1990s when Chinese soccer led the way as China's sports associations became profit-making entities. The professional system soon followed for basketball, volleyball, table tennis and weiqi (Go or "encirclement chess"). Professional leagues have become major venues supported by operational and marketing systems of ticket sales, advertising, player trades, commercial matches, television broadcasting and other commercial operations. Today, China has league soccer competition and the beginnings of a soccer club system in with some foreign players. Chinese and foreign league soccer matches are televised live, and a soccer lottery started in 2001.
International success for Chinese professional athletes in 2002 was highlighted by the recruitment of 22-year-old basketball player Yao Ming to play for the Houston Rockets in the National Basketball Association in the United States. Yao in his rookie season became an international sports superstar and — certainly helped by his legion of Chinese fans who voted on the Internet — was selected to appear in the All-Star Game.In the wake of Yao's success came the first establishment of an NBA website in China in cooperation with Sohu, one of China's leading Internet portals. In January 2001, Wang Zhizhi, 23, officially became the first Chinese athlete to sign a professional sports contract with the National Basketball Association. Chinese soccer players Yang Chen and Fan Zhiyi are playing in professional soccer leagues in Germany and Great Britain.
While NBA Basketball is widely popular in China, two other professional sports are beginning to catch on, tennis and golf.China today has some 150 golf courses including several designed by Robert Trent Jones Jr., Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player. There are 60 golf courses alone in Guangdong where in 2001 three of Asia's top-ranked professional golfers took on world number one Tiger Woods at "BBK Tiger Woods Mission Hills Challenge" at the Mission Hills Golf Club. In January 2003, Professional golfer Zhang Lianwei became the first Chinese golfer to win a PGA European Tour event when he overcame South African great Ernie Els in the final round of the Caltex Masters in Singapore. In regard to tennis, Shanghai received rave reviews from officials of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for its hosting in November 2002 of one of professional tennis’ most important events, the Tennis Master's Cup, in which only the eight top players on the men's tour compete in a round-robin.The six-day event at the ShanghaiNewInternationalExpoCenter in Pudong attracted nearly 300 journalists from around the world, including 147 from overseas, and was broadcast to more than 130 countries and regions. After the Australian Lleyton Hewitt, the top men's tennis player in the world in 2002, came out on top in Shanghai, the ATP announced in January 2003 that the men's tour would add a Beijing tournament the week starting September 8, the week following the U.S. Open.
