by Sportswriters Liu Yang, Chao Xiao
JINAN, East China, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) ¨C It is confusing how Chinese sports administration calculated the medal standings at the ongoing National Games: different winners top different standings; 0.5 medals are counted; provinces "gained" medals long before the sports event started, to name but a few.
Many have questions, yet only a few can figure out the process. The calculation may need a professional accounting assistant.
For instance, the gold medal standings do not represent how many gold they win at the Games. The leading delegation, the host Shandong Province, gained 47.5 gold medals as of Saturday. However, it has so far claimed only 31 final victories.
"0.5 medals" never appeared in any other international competitions. Yet almost every single delegation at the Games has gained a few ¡°0.5¡± medals, being gold, silver or bronze.
More confusing is that some provinces were listed on the standings one year before the Games started.
It confused all sports fans, yet sports administration officials said it was "for the interests of the nation¡¯s sports development." Some sports experts also believed such a sophisticated ranking system should not be changed as to drive forward Olympic dreams.
COMPLICATED CALCULATION
The philosophy behind the complicated calculation is to balance interests for different sports, different provinces, and, as some officials said, to optimize sports resources.
For example, in eight ball games, such as football, basketball and volleyball, a gold medal is calculated as two on the standings to encourage team works.
Top three winners for men¡¯s football Under-16 division and women¡¯s Under-18 will enjoy more advantages ¨C 2 golds on the standings for the champion, 1 gold for the runner-up and 0.5 for the third.
Apart from that, top eight athletes of the Olympics can bring home delegations extra medals into the national competition standings: one Olympic gold medal is equal to two gold medals; in doubles events, two provinces will split the rewards.
Take the host Shandong Province as an example, Shandong athletes powered home five Olympic gold medals last year, which were converted to eight gold medals at this Games. In addition, weightlifter Liu Chunhong and a few others broke the world records and were thus awarded extra gold on the standings.
As a result, one year before the national competition started, Jiangsu Province "claimed" 16 gold medals, Shangdong 12, and Liaoning also 12.
The system also includes a ¡°joint plan¡±, under which different delegations will "jointly" train young talents and split the honor that the athletes achieve in the future.
OLYMPICS DRIVEN
Such a medal-calculating system emerged from late 1980s, when the nation was thirst for Olympic results while local provinces only eyed on National Games and preferred to reserve the best for the national competitions.
As a result, the General Administration of Sport of China (GAS) permitted local provinces to "bring" the Olympic results into the National Games. The system was first introduced in the seventh National Games in 1993 ¨C one year after the Barcelona Olympics.
It produced quick results. In last year¡¯s Beijing Olympics, China topped the gold medal standings with 51 golds, 15 more than the runner-up, the United States, and 28 more than Russia.
"Such a rewarding system tied together the interests of the nation and local governments," a sports professor from Shanghai Sports institute, Liu Qingzao, said.
"Now local sports administrations are willing to send their best players to the national teams to compete for the Olympics," he said.
From this National Games, the GAS added "overall medal standings" to the exiting gold medal standings and scoreboard as to cover more provinces and thus encourage more local administrations to train young reserves.
¡¡SIDE EFFECTS EMERGE
However, the medal-oriented system was born with side effects, which already affected the Games in many aspects.
In the most widely discussed scandal in the wrestling competition four years ago, the Olympic champion Sun Fuming was pushed down and conceded the game in less than half a minute in the final.
The explanation could be found in the medal standings: if Sun won the game, only Liaoning delegation could take one gold; but if she lost, under the "joint training program" that Sun¡¯s rival took part in, both Liaoning and the Chinese Army could take one gold.
"Complicated programs bring complicated situations. The system came out from good will, but had shortfalls in details," deputy secretary-general of the Game¡¯s organizing committee, Guo Jianjun, said.
"The Olympics are our ultimate goals. We must make full use the National Games to optimize all sports resources. The system, which shows strong Chinese characteristics, is good for the nation¡¯s sports development," he said.
"If our Olympic goals remained unchanged, the systems should not be changed," Liu said.
