00:00As she crossed the line and secured a medal, she thought that she would be celebrated.
00:04But instead, the crowd was silent, and her own country had abandoned her.
00:08But why?
00:09Well, in 1994, Wang Leping's coach, Wang Kui, told her father that he could train Wang to win on the
00:16world stage.
00:17And her family believed him.
00:18After all, Wang Kui was famous across the country for his ability to train some of the greatest athletes to
00:24ever come out of China.
00:25However, he was also known by his nickname, the Devil Coach.
00:29Due to his intense training regimens.
00:32So, in the lead up to the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, only one month before the national qualification race,
00:38Wang was pushed too far during training, and she sustained a debilitating knee injury.
00:43Wang was understandably devastated, but she rested up and she cheered from the sidelines as her teammates competed in Atlanta.
00:50But after the Olympics, when her knee was strong enough for her to return to training,
00:54her coach insisted that she was a lost cause, and she had missed her window of opportunity.
00:59Wang's father was furious, and he insisted that the coach make good on his promise to help her reach her
01:04potential.
01:05And the coach eventually, reluctantly, agreed.
01:08As the Sydney 2000 Olympics arrived, Wang qualified, but she wasn't considered to be a leading medal contender.
01:14And she was overshadowed by Lu Hongyu, China's world champion race walker at the time.
01:19However, as Lu and the other two favourites from Italy and Australia surged ahead through the first half of the
01:25race,
01:25they each started accumulating warnings for not maintaining contact with the ground, which is a violation of race walking's rules.
01:32So, when China's champion, Lu, received a red card for her third violation, and she was disqualified from the race,
01:39the Chinese team and officials gave up on their hopes of winning, and they left the stadium, leaving Wang behind.
01:45As the race came down to the last few kilometres, Wang thought she was in third place, and it seemed
01:49like bronze was the best she could do.
01:51However, what Wang didn't know was that the Italian Elisabetta Peroni had already been disqualified.
01:57She just refused to believe it.
01:59I can't imagine why the judges haven't pulled Peroni off the course.
02:02This woman has been disqualified as far as we know.
02:05So, as Peroni eventually accepted the harsh truth and she fell away,
02:09all Wang had to do for a silver medal was keep up the pace and not get disqualified herself.
02:15However, as Wang followed the Australian Jane Seville into the Sydney stadium,
02:18with only 200 metres left in the race, that's when she looked up and saw the one thing that all
02:24athletes in race walking dread, a race official holding up a red disqualification card.
02:30But it wasn't for Wang.
02:33Wang pulled into first place, she hurried to the finish line,
02:37and as she crossed the line to a devastated Australian crowd,
02:40securing the only gold medal that China would win in track and field for that year,
02:44she desperately looked around for a Chinese flag to celebrate,
02:47but she couldn't find one.
02:49Her country had abandoned her.
02:51In the years that followed, Wang went on to become a coach.
02:53She specialised in training and rehabilitating injured athletes,
02:57vowing to never give up on her athletes.
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