On July 13, the Chinese Olympic delegation to Paris, France was officially established. The replacement of old and new players is an important label for this Olympic team. Among the 405 participating athletes, there are "veterans from three dynasties" and even "veterans from four dynasties", but there are also 223 "fresh blood" who are debuting on the Olympic stage for the first time.
24-year-old track and field athlete Mo Jiadi is a new face in this team.
More than two months ago, in Shizuoka, Japan, Mo Jiadi ran a personal best time of 54.78 seconds in the women's 400-meter hurdles final. Not only did she win the championship and rewrite the competition record, she also successfully qualified for the Olympics and helped China's track and field team win the championship after 12 seconds. In 2016, she returned to the top stage of the Olympic women's 400-meter hurdles again.
Mo Jiadi
Since the retirement of the famous player Huang Xiaoxiao, the Chinese women's 400-meter hurdles once fell into a low ebb. It was not even absolutely competitive in Asia until Mo Jiadi was born. This Guangdong girl, who has a lot of expectations on her shoulders, likes to use the word "bad" to sum up her achievements and breakthroughs.
What she refers to as "showing off" is not self-effacing, but the truest state of mind after experiencing ups and downs and many failures.
"After experiencing too many highs and lows, I am now in a bad mood. I feel that as long as I can use my abilities to the best of my ability." This girl in the "butterfly transformation" may start in Paris and lead the Chinese women 400 She crossed the meter hurdle further, "I want to work harder and see how much breakthrough I can make."
On the eve of getting the Olympic ticket, she chose to "show off"
Mo Jiadie did not appear on the Chinese Olympic delegation at the founding meeting. As early as July 4, she and a group of national team teammates such as Lin Yuwei set off for Paris for adaptive training and preparations. In an exclusive telephone interview with a reporter from The Paper (www.thepaper.cn), she was full of expectations for her first Olympic trip.
"I am a little nervous when facing competitions, but I am still relatively calm and relaxed now. I will no longer be unable to sleep at night like before, or even doubt myself."
The story of "cannot sleep at night" happened not long ago Shizuoka, Japan, the night before the 2024 World Athletics Intercontinental Tour, this girl who had participated in many international competitions could not control her emotions. Nervousness, excitement, and the expectation of reaching the Olympic standards made her think Iterate on technical details. As a result, she had complete insomnia in the first half of the night.
"I had to get up and watch some TV series, hoping to distract myself, but found that it had no effect." Thinking of what happened that night, Mo Jiadi couldn't help but laugh, "Later, I just It was so messed up that I thought I would sleep as long as I could, and if I couldn’t sleep, I would just have a good run tomorrow.”
Fortunately, the 400-meter hurdles race was scheduled for the afternoon of the next day. Mo Jiadie had some more time to adjust, and in the end, she was the first to cross the finish line. 54 seconds 78. Looking at the timer showing the final revised time, Mo Jiadi was very excited. "I am very surprised. It is the kind of surprise that can eliminate all fatigue."
54 seconds 78 is the best time of her personal career. The good result also exceeded the Paris Olympic Games entry standard of 54.85 seconds. This means that after Huang Xiaoxiao retires, Mo Jiadi will take the Chinese team jersey, which has been absent from the Olympic stage for 12 years, to the women's 400-meter hurdles in Paris. In her eyes,
rewriting history "is an unexpected surprise, but it is also expected."
In fact, after breaking the competition record and winning the runner-up in the 400-meter hurdles at the Hangzhou Asian Games last year, Mo Jiadi has been accelerating her "butterfly transformation" - she first ran a personal history of 55.50 seconds at the Zhaoqing Station of the National Track and Field Grand Prix. She then set a new personal best in Shizuoka, and her good form continued into the fifth leg of the National Grand Prix in Chongqing. She ran 52.65 seconds in the women's 400-meter race, setting a new personal best.
"This year's winter training was shorter because of the Youth League, but everything went smoothly." The focus of Mo Jiadi's winter training is to adjust the rhythm between columns so that he can stabilize at 15 steps in the first three columns. "Every year Before winter training, I didn’t know what my state would be like, but after winter training, I felt that this year would be my best year."
Turning points, one victory and three defeats
This Olympic year is indeed the best year of Mo Jiadi's career so far.
successively set personal bests in the 400-meter hurdles and 400-meter events, and she also won Olympic tickets. She has also fulfilled her childhood dream by becoming the beacon of hope for Chinese track and field.
"I remember watching the Olympics when I was a child. I always thought it was the most sacred stage. At that time, I knew that only the best athletes could go to the Olympics. I felt that I was far away from the Olympics. Very far away. "Mo Jiadie had hopes for the last Tokyo Olympics, but in the end she didn't have enough points and could only be a spectator in front of the TV. "This Olympics is the best opportunity, and I want to seize it. "
Mo Jiadie, who was born in 2000, comes from Huaiji County in Zhaoqing, Guangdong. It is a place with a track and field tradition and has produced many track and field stars. Today, the most famous people in the county are Liang Xiaojing, the previous Asian sprint champion and this campaign Mo Jiadi in Paris.
“Liang Xiaojing is my neighbor and senior sister. "Both of them studied under Zhong Shaoting, the head coach of women's sprint in Guangdong Province. However, Mo Jiadie's physical fitness was not good since she was a child. "When I was a child, I was relatively thin, not in good health, and prone to illness, so my family and I felt that practicing sports was good. Enhance physical fitness. "
When the coach of the sports school selected athletes, Mo Jiadie actually failed, but she did not give up. She took the initiative to find the teacher and expressed her determination to practice track and field. In the end, she impressed the coach and entered the professional ranks.
At first, Mo Jiadie She trained in the 800 meters and 1500 meters. Although she won the first place in the county in the main event of 1500 meters, after joining the city team, she was found to be a little anemic and was not suitable for middle and long-distance running events, so she changed to the 400 meters. After entering the provincial team, Mo Jiadi's 400-meter performance was not outstanding, so the coach tried to let her focus on the 400-meter hurdles. He originally hoped to use the 400-meter hurdles to drive her 400 meters, but unexpectedly he discovered Mo Jiadi's real strength. .
At the 2017 National Games, 17-year-old Mo Jiadi stood on the top national stage for the first time. It was a coincidence. Previously, Mo Jiadi could not even run under 59 seconds in this event, but in Tianjin. In the two shots, she first ran 58.68 seconds and entered the finals second in the group. Then she set a new personal best again, running 58.66 seconds and finishing fifth.
Mo Jiadi won at the Hangzhou Asian Games. Silver medal.
"I was only 17 years old at the time. I felt that I was very powerful, so I wanted to work harder to achieve better results in this project and improve myself. In Mo Jiadi's words, that was the first turning point in her 400-meter hurdles career. "Although my results were not that good, that competition made me want to improve my results." "
Mo Jiadi began to have more ideas about the 400-meter hurdles. However, after winning many competitions at home, she encountered setbacks in the international arena.
In 2018, Mo Jiadi has opened 58 seconds, and her best result is 57 86 seconds, but she failed to run under 1 minute at the Jakarta Asian Games and World Youth Athletics Championships that year. Her two results were the worst of the year, 1 minute 0 second 62 and 1 minute 0 second 44. “I was very immature at the time and could always perform at a normal level domestically, but in the international arena my performance was not ideal. "Mo Jiadi regarded the two losses in 2018 as the second turning point in her career, which made her start looking for ways to cope with psychological pressure. "At that time, I felt that I still had fewer games and lacked experience in competitions. "
Fast forward to 2022, and the 22-year-old Mo Jiadie is already the leader of the Chinese women's 400-meter hurdles. However, at the Oregon World Track and Field Championships that year, she lost her chain again after running 55.61 seconds before the game. Finally, the World Championships trip ended in 57 seconds 01.
“I had an idea in my mind at the time, but the results were not followed up, so I lacked confidence. "Mo Jiadi regarded her failure two years ago as her third turning point.
After that, coach Zhong Shaoting conducted a lot of psychological suggestion training with her, and Mo Jiadi finally found a "bad" person. "I found that I was still far behind in international competitions. Instead of going back and forth between pursuing performance and catching up with top players, I might as well settle down or fail and focus on improving my performance."
Paris Olympics, the beginning of butterfly change
Mo Jiadie has the obvious external characteristics of a Cantonese girl-not tall, slender, and her skin has a healthy wheat color due to long-term training; her personality is straightforward and optimistic, which makes her in She has a special temperament when communicating with others.
It is precisely because of this personality that her "bad attitude" became the driving force for her "butterfly transformation"
Mo Jiadi and The Paper reporter. Shared a short story in training: In the 200-meter interval training class every Monday, Mo Jiadie, as the senior sister, is often the second to last or third player in the entire group to complete the training. Then, coach Zhong Shaoting will be there. He chattered a few words with a hint of ridicule, "Look, I've started to be lazy again. If I don't work hard today, I'm going to mess up again, right?" "
When talking about this training session that was the most painful for him, Mo Jiadi couldn't help but laugh, "Actually, I tried my best, but my running endurance is relatively poor. Even when I run many training sessions, my speed may not be good. It was relatively bad. For example, when I ran to the fourth or sixth 200 meters, other teammates rushed up and were very interested, but I really couldn't run that fast. "
Mo Jiadi does not shy away from these "embarrassing things" she has done on the training ground. On the contrary, this is also a manifestation of her "showing off" mentality. As she said, coach Zhong Shaoting also knows that she is in this training project It’s not outstanding, but as long as they perform according to their abilities and achieve training results, the two of them, the master and the apprentice, will be satisfied.
“Coach Zhong Shaoting’s greatest help and influence on me is that she is willing to listen to my ideas. We always discuss and communicate with each other. "Mo Jiadi said that the 200-meter interval training event is like a microcosm. While she is trying her best to complete various trainings, if she feels some fatigue or discomfort in her body, she will immediately report it to coach Zhong Shaoting, and then the coach will respond accordingly. Adjusting training to the situation, "So I haven't had any major injuries in these years, just minor injuries to my posterior muscles, and my recovery has been relatively satisfactory. "
Now, Mo Jiadi will make her Olympic debut in Paris, and coach Zhong Shaoting mostly tells her students to pay attention to their health. "The coach doesn't have many demands on me, but he just tells me to pay attention to my health, because I have had I had a fever and was sick during the competition, so the coach hoped that I could finish the competition healthy and smoothly after going to Paris. Don't think too much and just perform at my normal level. "
Perhaps it is somewhat unrealistic for the current Mo Jiadi to stand on the Olympic podium. Even a personal best of 54.78 seconds, placed in the entire world competition of the women's 400-meter hurdles, is only Ranked 27th this season.
The 25-year-old American star Sydney McLaughlin, who was labeled the "best in history", raised the world record to 50.65 seconds this season, and Mo Jiadie is catching up with her. Before moving forward, we must first win the title of "Asia's No. 1"
Nowadays, Mo Jiadie, who always talks about being "bad", has a stronger and more stable mentality, no longer like the previous Asian Games in Jakarta and the World Championships in Oregon. . She did not set a clear goal for herself, she just expected to run at a normal level and let the Paris Olympics be the beginning of her "butterfly transformation"
"Winning the Olympic qualification this time gave me a lot of confidence. I feel that I can still take another step forward, and I will try harder to see how much breakthrough I can make. "
