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BEIJING—Liu Xiang, China’s great hope for track glory at
the Beijing Games, said he was sorry for his dramatic
withdrawal from the Olympics, but that he had no choice
because pain from a foot injury became unbearable.
“There’s
so many people concerned about me and who support me. I
feel very sorry. But there’s really nothing I could do,”
a downcast, disconsolate Liu told China Central
Television in an interview aired Tuesday.
A day
earlier, Liu withdrew from his heat in the 110-meter
hurdles, shocking and disappointing millions of Chinese
who wanted to see him defend his Olympic title at home.
Liu
appeared pale and tired, wearing a plain white T-shirt
rather than the flashy red that has characterized the
uniform of China’s athletes at the Games. A drop of
perspiration clung to the corner of his left eyebrow as
he spoke in a steady voice against a white background.
ECSTASY and agony:
Pole-vaulter Yelena Isinbaeva is overjoyed after
retaining her Olympic title and extending her world
record by one centimeter to 5.05 meters on her final
attempt. That was far from what Liu Xiang (below) felt
at the starting blocks ahead of his 110-meter hurdles
heat, from which he eventually withdrew. -- AP
The
official Xinhua News Agency said CCTV recorded the
interview Monday night and showed parts of it Tuesday
for the first time.
The
25-year-old Liu won China’s first Olympic gold medal on
the track in Athens four years ago, and became a
superstar to rival National Basketball Association (NBA)
hero Yao Ming at home and a poster boy worth millions
for the Beijing Games. His surprise withdrawal on Monday
shocked China. His coach was among those who wept
openly.
China’s communist leaders sent a message of support to Liu
and his team that was printed Tuesday on the front page
of Chinese newspapers—a sign of recognition of the
athlete’s popularity in China.
“I
didn’t feel right when I was warming up before the
race,” Liu said, in Xinhua’s translation of his
comments. “I knew my foot would fail me. It felt painful
when I was just jogging.”
He
talked about running a competitive time just two weeks
ago.
“I
didn’t know why things turned out this way,” he said. “I
wanted to hang on. But I couldn’t. It was unbearable. If
I had finished the race, I would have risked my tendon.
I could not describe my feeling at that moment.”
Speculation swirled for weeks that Liu was injured, and
he trained in seclusion before he first appeared at the
Bird’s Nest on Monday.
In his
warm-up, Liu grimaced through clenched teeth and limped
gingerly after clearing two hurdles, but took to the
blocks anyway for the first heat of the event for which
he was the favorite.
When the
starter’s gun fired, Liu launched out of the blocks but
started hobbling immediately after the gun fired again
to signal a false start by a different hurdler. Rather
than go back to the blocks, he headed inside the
stadium.
Team
doctors applied traditional Chinese medicine treatments
to bring down the swelling on Liu’s Achilles tendon
after he returned to the Olympic Village on Monday,
according to Liu’s web site, which had no further
details.
In the
interview, Liu signaled he feared doing more damage to
his damaged tendon, but vowed he would return to
competition.
“I know
I have the ability, once my foot recovered,” Liu said,
according to a translation of the interview by The
Associated Press. “Now the most important thing is to
heal my injury. I still have a chance next year, after
all, I’m still at the peak. I must be optimistic, and I
shouldn’t blame everyone and everything but not myself.
I will not easily give up.”
Stretching the lead
CHINA stretched its lead in total gold medals in Beijing on
a day Liu Xiang, its most popular track athlete,
withdrew from the Olympics because of an injury.
While
the host nation failed to win medals in any of Tuesday’s
six track-and-field finals, China grabbed three more
gymnastics golds and the men’s team table-tennis title.
China has 39 gold medals with six days of competition
remaining and leads the US by 17 in the race for Summer
Games supremacy. The host nation’s successes continued
after the loss of Liu, who quit his first heat in the
110-meter hurdles because of an ankle problem.
“It was
a heartbreaking moment for us,” said Feng Shuyong, the
head of China’s athletics team.
China
continued its gold rush after Liu’s injury, which
produced a stunned silence from the crowd of 91,000 at
the Bird’s Nest stadium.
Chen
Yibing won the men’s rings, He Kexin took the women’s
uneven bars and He Wenna captured the women’s
trampoline. He, who faced questions over whether she was
old enough to compete this past week, edged Nastia
Liukin of the United States after both finished with the
same score. The tie was broken by a new scoring system
introduced after controversies at previous Games.
“Unfortunately that’s our sport,” said Liukin, 18. “In
other sports like track and field, it’s all times. Here
you do your performance and turn it over to someone
else’s hands.” China has won eight of 12 possible
gymnastics medals. (AP, with Bloomberg) |
