00:00When the Olympic record holder stumbled and brutally slammed into the track during the
00:04semi-finals for the 110 meter hurdles, it seemed like China might actually have a chance of getting
00:09their first ever Olympic medal in the event. After he won gold medals in competitions all over Asia
00:15and he broke the Asian record two years earlier, the Chinese fans were out in force for Lu Zhang.
00:21So as the race set off and Lu powered ahead of all the other runners, there really was no stopping
00:26him. Lu thought he'd achieved everything he could ever want. He'd set a new Olympic record and he'd
00:31won China's first ever Olympic gold medal in men's track and field. And as Lu returned home a hero,
00:38it felt like life would just keep on getting better. The Chinese government even gave his parents an
00:42apartment and his dad was given unlimited leave from work to support his son. At first, Lu enjoyed
00:48the attention and the appreciation for what he'd accomplished. He started accepting sponsorship
00:53offers and he started making more money than he'd ever seen in his life. But it didn't really change
00:58much for Lu. After all, with his intense training regime and the expectation that he would continue
01:04to bring glory to China, he never really had much time to enjoy his riches. In the years that followed,
01:10Lu Zhang continued excelling, breaking the world record in 06 and winning the world championships in 07,
01:16making him the first man in hurdles to ever hold all three titles at once. But as China prepared for
01:22the
01:222008 Beijing Olympics, the insatiable fervour around Lu became very uncomfortable. He couldn't go to
01:29the shops without being swarmed, he started losing touch with his family and friends, and his coach
01:33Sun Haiping had dedicated his entire life to training Lu, even being quoted as saying that he regards Lu as
01:40his son and he doesn't even care about his own daughter as much as he does for Lu. Sun was
01:46also reportedly
01:47told by Chinese officials that nothing less than victory would be acceptable in Beijing, and that
01:52if Lu couldn't win, it would make everything that he'd done before completely meaningless. Lu's
01:58incredible success had created an obsession and an expectation from his country that he couldn't
02:04possibly live up to. And as if the pressure wasn't already intense enough, Lu was shaken when just two
02:10months before the games, his world record was broken by a hundredth of a second by Cuban hurdler Dairon
02:16Robles. Lu trained harder than he'd ever done before in the lead-up to the Beijing Olympics. However,
02:22when it came to his preliminary heat, as he lined up, something was clearly wrong. As the starter pistol
02:27fired, there was a false start, and by the time the other runners lined up again for the restart,
02:33Lu was nowhere to be seen. In an interview soon after, Lu's coach explained that Lu had a problem with
02:40his Achilles tendon, and he couldn't go on. He apologized to China for the failure, and he broke
02:44down in tears. Most of the Chinese people were sympathetic, but some were not as understanding,
02:50calling Lu a coward, saying that he stained the motherland and that he should have crawled on his
02:55hands and knees to the finish line. As the hurdles continued in Beijing, Dairon Robles secured the gold
03:00medal, and just like that, he'd taken both the world record and the Olympic championship from Lu.
03:06After Beijing, Lu went into hiding. Part of him thought that this would be the end of the public's
03:11obsession with him. It was almost a relief. Maybe now he'd finally be able to live a normal life,
03:16spend time with his parents, maybe even look for a girlfriend, which he hadn't felt was possible
03:21before. However, China still wasn't ready to give up on Lu. He started getting messages of
03:26encouragement from all over the country. In all honesty, Lu wasn't ready to give up either.
03:31People started to talk about the new king of hurdles, Dairon Robles, and arguments started to
03:36swirl online about who would win in a race between the two if they were both at the top of
03:41their form.
03:42So Lu decided he would give it one more shot, if only to prove himself against his newfound rival.
03:47He searched for specialists all over the world who could help him rebuild his ankle. He discovered
03:52that he had bone spurs on his Achilles, and he got surgery to remove them. He went back to training,
03:57and by 2009 he was competing and winning again in regional competitions. But while Lu was making
04:03his comeback, Robles was facing his own injuries. And the two runners didn't get another chance to
04:08compete against each other for the World Championship title until 2011 at the World Track and Field
04:14Championships. By now, Lu was well and truly back. While he wasn't hitting the same times as he used to,
04:20he was once again a world-class competitor, winning the Diamond League in Shanghai just a few months earlier.
04:25So, as Dairon Robles and Lu Zhang lined up next to each other, it was clear to the crowd there
04:31on
04:31that day that this battle was certainly going to be interesting. As the race took off, Lu and Robles
04:38battled it out, side by side, pushing each other harder than they'd ever been pushed before. As they
04:44approached the second-to-last hurdle, Lu was in front. It looked like he was going to do it. It
04:48looked
04:49like Lu would finally reclaim the World Championship title once again. But Robles wasn't willing to let that
04:55happen, and he was going to do anything in his power to stop it. Robles put his hand out, seemingly
05:00trying
05:01to grab Lu and push him back as they leapt over the hurdles. He missed the first time, but the
05:06second time,
05:07he connected, throwing Lu off balance and causing him to hit the final hurdle. And as they raced towards the
05:13finish line,
05:14Lu was pulled from first place down to third. At the finish line, Robles put his arms up and gave
05:19Lu a hug, as if to offer some
05:21kind of half-hearted consolation. But Lu was understandably furious. Robles had just won the
05:27World Championship, now having stolen all three titles that Lu once held.
05:32I wonder what the Chinese officials might make of that one, because certainly from my way of looking at it,
05:39in the commentary position, it looked as though that gold medal was destined for this man, but instead,
05:45he's got a bronze. China protested the win. It was offensive to see someone so blatantly foul their
05:51hero like that in front of the world. And when the officials reviewed the footage, the appeal was
05:56successful. Robles was stripped of his gold medal, and Lu was upgraded to silver, still losing out on
06:02what seemed like a certain World Championship win. Some say that it was this moment that killed Lu's
06:07passion for his sport. To be that close to greatness once again, just to have it pulled away from you
06:13by a
06:13fellow competitor. It didn't sit right. The following year, in 2012, he won gold again in the Diamond
06:19League. But by this point, Lu Zhang was ready to retire. He was ready to spend time with his family,
06:24to actually enjoy his riches, and to discover a life beyond the endless cycle of training,
06:30performing, and recovering. However, the only problem was the London 2012 Olympics was fast approaching.
06:36And with China watching his recovery and his incredible comeback performances in Shanghai,
06:41the expectations once again started to build. It felt like the cycle was repeating again. Lu imagined
06:47what it would be like if he won Olympic gold again. But as he set off in his preliminary heat,
06:53and he reached the first hurdle, he did something very out of character.
06:57Lu fell to the ground. The commentator on China's central television network CCTV cried at seeing the
07:04heartbreaking moment. And he gave an impromptu, heartfelt speech about Lu and his legacy,
07:09as Lu hopped alongside the track, symbolizing his desire to finish. As he reached the final hurdle,
07:14he kissed it. Later saying, the thought hit me as I approached that last hurdle that this could be
07:19the last Olympics of my athletic career. People all over China were upset. But they praised Lu for
07:25trying his hardest to bring glory to the country. In the months that followed, it was leaked that the
07:30speech given by the CCTV commentator had allegedly been pre-written. It seemed that some higher-ups in
07:36China somehow knew what was going to happen in that preliminary heat. Of course, only Lu Zhang knows
07:41what really happened. But after this moment, he never competed again and nobody expected him to. He
07:47retired and has gone down in history as arguably China's greatest track and field athlete. As for his
07:52rival, Dairon Robles, he made it to the finals of the 2012 Olympics. But karma has a funny way of
07:58showing itself.
07:59The defending champion, Dairon Robles did not make it to the finish. And that's a great, great shame indeed.
08:06Thank you!
08:10Fill in the titre of NEWS
08:11The
08:11The
