Golden couple carry China’s Winter Olympics hopes

Sui Wenjing, left, and Han Cong of China performing during the pairs free skating figure skating event at the NHK Trophy in Osaka, which they eventually won. (AFP)

SHANGHAI: Figure skaters Sui Wenjing and Han Cong have weathered injury, controversy and rampant speculation about their personal lives. Now all that’s left is to deliver gold for China at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
Plenty depends on the photogenic duo, who are the pairs world champions and Olympic favorites, as victory would go a long way toward igniting Chinese interest in winter sports before the Beijing 2022 Winter Games.
While China is a powerhouse of the Summer Games, they lag behind in winter sports — something they badly want to fix before Beijing becomes the host city in four years’ time.
Sui, 22, underwent such extensive surgery in 2016 that she had to re-learn how to stand, walk and skate. But after she returned to win the world title with Han, 25, last year, she is setting her sights high.
“In terms of the 2018 and 2022 Olympics, since we have won the world championship, our goal is to be Olympic champions,” Sui said, after they topped the podium at the worlds in Helsinki last March.
“The only thing standing in our way is ourselves.”
It’s a bold statement, but Sui’s confidence is not unfounded.
In November alone, the duo won the Cup of China and the NHK Trophy in Japan back-to-back, and then triumphed in Shanghai to add to their bulging medal haul.
Last year they also took gold at the Four Continents Championships at South Korea’s Gangneung — the same venue that will be used for the Olympics.
Sui and Han’s chemistry on the ice has sparked rumors online and in Chinese media that they are romantically involved, but they laugh off the gossip.
“Han Cong and I are only a couple on screen, not in real life,” Sui wrote on Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter, addressing the frequent rumors.
“We are friends or like a Dad and daughter.”
Sui and Han’s ascension to the top of figure skating pairs has had its challenges, and controversies.
In 2016, Sui missed nine months after operations on her right ankle and left foot, and was bed-ridden for three months, unable to even stand.
Her brave recovery made last year’s world championship victory all the more remarkable — and emotional.
As the aptly named “Bridge over Troubled Water” by Simon and Garfunkel came to a rousing denouement in their winning routine, Sui and Han gripped one another in a tight embrace, trembling and fighting back tears — and setting more tongues wagging about the nature of their relationship.
“It was a very moving performance and I think the audience could feel our emotion and our story in this program,” Han said afterwards.
“We have been through many, many difficult things. I hope Sui can stay healthy.”
Reviving those fears in the lead-up to Pyeongchang, the pair pulled out of the January 22-27 ISU Four Continents Figure Skating Championships in Taipei after Sui picked up a minor shin injury.
China’s figure skating association called it a precautionary move.
Both from Harbin, in China’s far north, Sui and Han paired together a decade ago.
But they and China were accused of flouting the rules in 2011 over apparent discrepancies in their ages which suggested that they were ineligible to take part in the junior world championships in 2010, which they won.
Chinese officials said they had made a mistake about their ages, blaming poor record-keeping.