Judo Champion Owes Her Success to Husband

By Xue Zhi

Xian Dongmei is a judo legend in China. She has competed in five four-yearly national games and won three gold medals in the last three. And she won a gold medal in the half-lightweight class (52 kg) in 2004 Athens Olympic Games and defended her title in 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.

Yes, she is talented. Her brilliant career has proved her prowess and capability. Moreover, she is tenacity herself, a quality that sustains her spirit to fight and succeed. Her championships have come from serious injuries. Every time she seemingly sank down to the bottom of her career, she managed to come back to the new dazzling height. Without that tenacity, she wouldnt have been able to achieve what she has achieved. And like so many other successful women, she has a good man standing behind her. Liu Bo now is her husband and they have a daughter.

But back in 1994, the first year she was on the national team after winning national youth championship in the half-lightweight class (52 kg) in 1993, Liu Bo was her training mate, a 1.75-meter-tall muscular judo senior by two years. His task was to work as a target. She threw him down on the training mat hundreds of times a day. She was dominant on the training ground. After training, Liu Bo took care of her. He often cracked jokes, massaged her so that she could relax and get ready for the next training session, and now and then he would do shopping with her.

The close cooperation between the two bore fruit. In June, 1994, Xian Dongmei won the national judo championship and qualified for the Asian Games in Hiroshima. She was happy and told Liu Bo that she owed the qualification to the training mate. Liu asked unambiguously how she would thank him. At that moment, both knew what was said and meant.

Liu Bo went back to Qingdao shortly after Xian Dongmei was on the team for the Hiroshima Asian Games. They did not see each other for two years. The two years saw her failure and huge disappoint at the Hiroshima Asian Games and her gold medal at Asian Judo Championship in 1996. The career high came with a heavy price. Doctors diagnosed that a ligament in her left knee was seriously damaged and that her judo career was over. She needed surgery immediately or she would have difficulty walking in the future.

She called Liu Bo. Liu Bo came to see her the next day with a large bunch of flowers. This time what was unsaid two years ago was said out aloud. They decided to come together.

In October 2000, Xian Dongmei decided to retire from Judo and marry Liu Bo. After all, her body was full of injury and her career did not look promising anymore. But a few months in retirement, disappointment and regret, her heart yearned. The ninth national game was about to take place and she had another chance to prove herself. Xian Dongmei and Liu Bo talked about their upcoming marriage and her comeback. They agreed to postpone the marriage and they decided upon the comeback.

She suffered another injury in the preliminary competition of the Ninth National Games in the autumn of 2001. She did not back down. She fought all the way to the final. In the gold-medal fight, her right knee was dislocated. The referee called a time out. She pushed the knee back into the joint and resumed the competition. She won. She burst into tears when she was declared the winner. Liu Bo was full of tears too.

Shortly before the Pusan Asian Games in October, 2002, Liu Bo and Xian Dongmei got married. The next day Xian left for the national training camp for the game. In 2003, she qualified for the 2004 Olympic Games. It took her just 66 seconds to won her Olympic gold medal in the final in the 52-kg grade on August 15, 2004 in Athens.

In October, 2004, two years after the day of the marriage registration, the couple at last held a wedding and threw a banquet, the formal ceremony. They finally moved in as a family together.

Xian Dongmei was not in retirement though. She was a coach and team leader of the Guangdong Provincial Judo Team. On January 27, 2007, she gave birth to a baby girl.

She decided to try to qualify for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. She weaned the baby and began to train. In the first two months, she cut down her weight by 12 kg. The training was hard for Xian, a new mom. She often came home and cried. But she would go back to training the next day. Many people thought Xian was probably old and not strong enough for the Olympic Games again. She trained with junior judo players, most of them more than 10 years younger.

On August 1, 2007, she proved she was supreme and peerless in her category in the national championship. The next day, she headed to Beijing to join the national training camp, leaving her baby to the care of her husband. Liu Bo had his share of worries. With all these injuries after so many years training and competition, would her body strong enough to undertake the hard training again?

This time, her body proved tough enough to sustain all the strain and pressure. But the Olympic champion missed her baby girl. So every two or three months, Liu Bo and the little daughter came all the way to Beijing for a visit. The most important visit was June 11, 2008, just two months before the Olympic Games.

Xian Dongmei was in the final on August 10, 2008. Her gold medal rival was An Kum Ae from DPRK. Liu Bo was not worried after learning An would be the rival, for he knew pretty well Xian Dongmei could have upper hand, for those who had never competed against her often knew not how to defeat her. Xian successfully defended her Olympic title in the women -52kg final.

The tearful Liu Bo was proud. “My wife is great. I had known Dongmei would grab Chinas fifth gold medal in Beijing. She won the fifth gold medal in Athens, too.”

On a few public occasions after her successful defense of her Olympic title, Xian Dongmei talked about her husband. “What can I do for him? I know nothing but Judo. I came back with his encouragement. I owe a great deal to him for being what I am today.” □