Columnist: Some conversations.
On February 20, 2022, the Beijing Winter Olympics came to a successful conclusion. In a short period of 17 days, the China delegation not only achieved the goal of participating in the whole competition, but also set a new historical record in the number of gold medals and medals won.
177 China athletes who participated in the Beijing Winter Olympics came from 20 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities), and about15 of them had never been trained in ice and snow since their sports career. Nearly half of the snow events are cross-border athletes. Yan Wengang, a native of Tianjin, was originally a long jumper. After nearly six years of professional training in steel snowmobile, he became the only athlete in China who won a medal through cross-border cross-sports selection. In 2065,438+06, Yan Wengang was 65,438+09 years old when he transformed into a winter project.
Gu Ailing and Su, the heroes of the post-00 Winter Olympics, who are sought after by the whole people, have undoubtedly become the top stars in the two fields of rolling body by virtue of their brilliant achievements of two golds, one silver and one gold and one silver, as well as their outstanding comprehensive quality performance in the public media.
Strictly speaking, Su, who was only 14, was only a skier who was keen on performing arts before joining the "National Team Training System" in 20 18. Gu Ailing, a talented girl, has a wide range of specialties and hobbies, such as track and field, basketball, ballet, piano, singing, model performance and mathematics. , each one can be easily mastered. As dazzling as Gu Ailing's Olympic medal, there is also an admission notice from Stanford University.
As we all know, the two talented players each encountered many "setbacks" during their participation in Beijing. But in the face of defeat, their confidence was not crushed, but they dared to challenge-by improving the technical difficulty coefficient, the follow-up project movements were perfectly presented and successfully counterattacked. Although they are both participating in the Olympic Games for the first time, the self-confidence and self-psychological adjustment ability of the two talented teenagers in the world competition are in sharp contrast with their actual ages. What impressed us even more was that it seemed so easy for them to win the Olympic gold medal.
So, is it really that easy to win on the peak stage of world competitive sports?
In August, 2004, scientists from the world-famous Australian Institute of Physical Education (AIS) put all their chips on the overall athletic ability that has nothing to do with the specific events themselves. They plan to spend one and a half years, through physical training, to train a female athlete who is qualified to participate in the ice sledding event in the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. But at that time, they turned their attention to female athletes who had participated in track and field, gymnastics, water skiing or surfing. The whole snowmobile industry says, "You will never succeed. This project is an art and needs time to understand. 」
Indeed, the athletes recruited by the Australian Institute of Physical Education have no previous experience in ice sports, but they are all top athletes with comprehensive conditions. Melissa Hall is the world champion of the World Surfing Lifesaving Games, and Emma Kalls is the champion of the World Water Skiing Championships. They were taken to Calgary, Canada for ice trial training.
As it turns out, the "feeling" of ice seems less important. After setting foot on the ice for the first time 10 weeks, Melissa Hall defeated half of the skaters in the 23rd World Skating Championships and won the next competition. MICHELLE STEELE, a former beach sprinter, also made it all the way and qualified for the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. Scientists from the Australian Institute of Physical Education published a paper entitled "1April, rookie on ice goes to the Winter Olympics", and the training plan was recorded in the history of sports.
Australia has always been a world leader in the field of "cross-selection and cross-border training". Starting from 1994, in order to prepare for the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, they launched the "National Star Search Program"-focusing on testing the physical fitness and physique of teenagers aged 14- 16. At the Sydney Olympic Games that year, only the Australian sports delegation with a population of 6.5438+0.9 million won 58 medals, that is to say, there were 3.03 medals for every 6.5438+0 million citizens, almost 654.38+00 times that of the United States.
Before the 20 12 London Olympic Games, Britain also followed Australia's example and systematically re-planned the Olympic material selection strategy: highlighting transnational material selection, which also achieved success. Among them, the story of a legendary athlete is thought-provoking. She is CHRISSIE WELLINTON, a legendary British triathlete, a famous writer and philanthropist.
Wellington spent her childhood in a small village in the east of England. She was not interested in intense sports since she was a child, but she did take part in many sports, such as running, hockey, five-a-side basketball, swimming and so on. /kloc-at the age of 0/5, Wellington refused the professional swimming club training arranged by his parents in order to prepare for the school exam. Later, Wellington graduated with honors from Birmingham University and studied for a master's degree at the International Development Center of Manchester University. Later, she joined the British government and participated in drafting the British policy of assisting Iraq's post-war reconstruction. However, in the process of promoting policy reform, Wellington is increasingly tired of all kinds of bureaucracy in government departments.
In 2004, she came to war-torn Nepal alone and began to help the local sewage cleaning project. But in the Himalayas, she gradually sprouted the idea of engaging in professional triathlon. At that time, she had no experience in road riding at all, and the first time she sat on a bicycle seat turned out to be 27 years old! She rode her bike across the Himalayas at an altitude of more than 4,500 meters, engaged in natural high-intensity training, and at the same time began to discover her talent in endurance sports, and decided to launch an impact on the peak of the project.
In February 2007, 30-year-old Wellington became a professional triathlete. After short-term professional training, she won the world championship in June 65438+1October 65438+March of the same year, leaving the nearest athlete behind for nearly 2 minutes, which was praised by the British Triathlon Association.
In the whole professional sports career, Wellington participated in 13 official competitions, including four world champions, and never lost. At the World Championships in Germany, she finished in 8 hours 18 minutes 13 seconds, breaking the world record at that time, half an hour faster than the world record before she started to participate in the professional competition of Tiesan in 2007, and her performance was only behind the four outstanding male athletes in the world.
Wellington later mentioned that receiving a good education plays a key role in self-discovery, self-motivation and self-discipline. With her talent and initiative, she showed the world a typical case of "being a late bloomer".
Another well-known world sports star, the legendary tennis superstar Federer's growth story is also a classic.
Federer's South African mother is a tennis coach, but interestingly, she has never taught her son. When Federer was a toddler, he played football beside his mother. I started playing squash with my father when I was a child. Later, I tried skiing, wrestling, swimming and skateboarding. I also played basketball, handball, tennis and table tennis. It was not until he entered adolescence that Federer decided to give up his favorite sport, football, and specialize in practicing tennis ... In the future, he will have excellent sports talent and superb hand-eye coordination, all thanks to his experience in many sports.
At the same time, the facts also prove that although Federer later defined his special goals, it did not affect his later development at all. Many tennis superstars usually retire around the age of 30, while Federer is still active in tennis at the age of 40 (202 1) and ranks among the top ten in the world.
At present, a lot of research in the field of international sports science shows that it is meaningless or harmful to athletes' career to carry out targeted or specialized training too early.
Especially in CGS sports (such as cycling, track and field, sailing, swimming, skiing, weightlifting, etc. ), scientists have found that if 15 years old is taken as the dividing line, children who have received extensive sports training like Federer will perform better in adulthood than children who have received specific sports training before the dividing line.
Of course, those excellent coaches in sports also know the way of "stones from other mountains can attack jade" Also known as Dief, the legendary football coach in the early Soviet Union, not only played well when he was young, but also taught fencing at the Fulongzhi Military Academy. He deeply understands that the "parry, parry" tactics in fencing are similar to the defensive counterattack in football, and puts this analogy description in the monograph "Football Tactics" published by 1946, which has been regarded as a standard by coaches all over Eastern Europe for many years.
There are also many such cases in modern football. In 2003, ALAN CURBISHLEY, head coach of Charlton Club in Premier League, appointed WAYNE DIESEL, a South African sports medicine expert, as the medical director of the club. Before that, Wayne had been working in a well-known professional football club. Wynn soon brought various changes to the team, such as ice bath after training. In the absence of excellent hardware facilities at that time, I found a large trash can to temporarily replace it. Even the biggest star of the club, Paolo Di Canio, was puzzled and had to "jump into the ice bath bucket"-in fact, such rehabilitation measures have long been commonplace in football.
Wynn's cross-border innovation has not stopped yet. He integrated the sports research department with the sports medicine department ... Similarly, these ideas were later successfully brought to Tottenham Club by him, which is why Mourinho only brought a small number of teaching assistants when he joined Tottenham-all the professional support teams are ready!
Wynn's amazing work in the Premier League club gave him the opportunity to move to Miami Dolphin Club in the NFL in 20 15, and set up a powerful sports performance department-in fact, it was later than the introduction of rehabilitation trainers and special coaches for the German national team from the United States1kloc-0/year. Klinsmann also urged German meritorious ice hockey coach Peters to join the coaching staff, which not only caused an uproar in German football, but also raised doubts about him. It was not until the German national team achieved excellent results in the European Cup in 2006 that the doubts gradually subsided.
For another example, the British cycling team before 2003 can be said to be useless. In the past 1 10 years, we didn't win a medal in the Tour de France or the World Series. But at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games only five years later, the British team swept 60% of the gold medals; In the 20 12 Tour de France, the British won the first championship. 20 14 London Olympic games, the team broke 9 Olympic records and 7 world records ... since then, the British team has been overwhelmed in all fields of the project, including roads, venues, mountains and BMX.
All these brilliant achievements are attributed to Dave Brisford, the sports performance director appointed by the British Cycling Association in 2003.
Dave has never been a professional coach before. He was the general manager of Sky Bike Club. Before that, he was a salesman, which means he was a sports manager and businessman. But it is his broad vision that brings "marginal benefits" in economics to the team's overall training strategy. Dave orderly decomposes the elements that can achieve excellent performance for the team into countless modules in hardware and software, and each module needs 1% improvement every day. Although there is only a small progress every day, it will become excellent under the "compound interest effect of time". This is the world difference between success and failure, and the so-called "a thousand miles a day".
More importantly, Dave has promoted cross-border cooperation with experts in many fields, such as psychology, medicine, environmental chromatics, material science and dynamics. He is committed to promoting technical training, equipment research and development, scientific research data and even business model cooperation with F 1 team. Dave has made great achievements in the field of cycling, which made him win the BBC Best Coach Award twice in 2008 and 20 12. His "1% theory" has been highly praised inside and outside the sports circle and widely spread. The British Ministry of Education regards it as one of the principles of policy making, and Harvard University even writes "1% theory" into business management textbooks.
Through these vivid cases of the world's top athletes and coaches, can we think further: from prehistoric times, primitive sports competitions aimed at winning began to appear in early human life, and then wrestling was the starting point for the development of competitive sports in ancient Greece until various sports "competitive sports" competitions in modern times ... In addition to constantly challenging the limits of human sports, we have been pursuing "faster and faster" in recent 120 years.
The topic is very big, but at least we can get some inspiration from the above cases:
As modern homo sapiens, our greatest advantage is actually the opposite of high-depth specialization-the ability to integrate all kinds of knowledge and experience extensively. In all walks of life, many so-called "successful people" who have made some achievements can learn knowledge from various channels, then find potential "connection points" in various fields, and creatively apply this knowledge to other fields through analogy, and are good at breaking down "cognitive barriers".
Undoubtedly, modern society needs universal talents who can connect seemingly distant and unrelated fields. For example, returning to the field of competitive sports means that the breadth of athletes' "training" is likely to indicate the breadth of transformation. That is to say, the more knowledge or background trainers/learners have, the richer abstract models they create, and the less they rely on concrete examples.
Gu Ailing completed the ultra-high difficulty of 1620 in the third jump of the freestyle skiing women's platform final in Beijing Winter Olympics, and got the highest score of 94.5. After the game, she said: "I thought of this (action) in training last week. I have never done it on snow." I only ranked second after the second jump, so I chose this action as the third jump. " She succeeded. This unconscious simulation phenomenon is called "meditation" in sports psychology. Yes, although Gu Ailing never practiced this specific movement in training, she used her extensive knowledge and skills (such as track and field, ballet, mathematics, etc. ) and stimulate some muscle memory to present the abstract model formed in the concept of consciousness perfectly and concretely.
Similarly, we don't know what specific role the film and television performance played in the promotion of Su in the Olympic Games, but it is obvious that the performance first requires the actors to have the ability to imitate their own body and language, as well as the sense of role substitution on the stage or in front of the camera, and even enter a state of "forgetting me" and "forgetting me"; At the same time, as a hobby, guitar playing and singing talent performance training have a positive impact on his snowboarding skills and psychological quality.
Unfortunately, in the traditional athlete system of our country, talents with backgrounds like Gu Ailing and Su are really rare. However, it is gratifying that another sports hero who is also loved by the public appeared during the Winter Olympics: China women's football coach Shui.
At the beginning of the Year of the Tiger in 2022, water led China women's football team to win back the Asian Championship trophy many years later, which brought a glimmer of light and dignity to China football. If you look at her glorious growth history, you will be surprised to find that the water coach didn't change to practice football until 17 years old. Before that, she was a professional track and field athlete, focusing on long jump and pentathlon.
With the unprecedented success of the Beijing Winter Olympics, a new wave of national fitness and love for sports has been set off all over the country. Especially in the younger generation after 00, under the influence of the new generation of sports idols established by Gu Ailing and Su, as long as we uphold the scientific spirit and keep an open attitude, we will certainly find more athletes with excellent potential in a wider field. Maybe they are "doing nothing" now, maybe some are still "chop and change", and some are even "too late" ... but who can say that when God opens the door to success for them, he will definitely close that window first? !
Let's boldly imagine whether we can hire more compound Bole people with cross-border thinking and the ability to transform general knowledge, as well as industry leaders who are not afraid of "whimsy" and can "win by surprise" in the positions where the head coach leads the selection and training of athletes, or in the leadership positions of sports management departments.
We will wait and see.