Progress in Pyeongchang
Although the foreign prescription has not yet yielded golden results, some historic first-time performances of Chinese Olympians have underlined how it is working out.
A product of foreign coaching, Chinese snowboarder Liu Jiayu won a silver medal in the women's halfpipe on Feb 13 to bring home China's first snowboarding Olympic medal, with a high-flying, multi-twist run honed by Finnish trainer Timo-Pekka Koskela.
Liu's fluent English and easygoing manner also made her a darling for media worldwide after the race.
"This is the culture of snowboarding. Having spent so long training overseas with girls from other countries, I've learned to just enjoy the sport and myself every time I run," said Liu, who finished fourth at the Vancouver Games in 2010.
Foreign know-how has also helped China expand participation to sports it never had entered before, such as sliding event skeleton.
Guided by retired Olympic silver medalist Jeff Pain of Canada, Geng Wenqiang, a former long jumper, became the first Chinese to qualify for the Olympics in this one-man, rudderless sledding discipline and advanced to the final run to finish 13th among 30 competitors in Pyeongchang. China's two-man and four-man bobsled teams also qualified for the Olympics for the first time in Pyeongchang, coached by Australian Heath Spence.
"My coach Jeff really helped me to understand the sport quicker, so I raced at my Olympic debut better than expected," said Geng, who joined the newly established national program through a cross-sport talent selection in 2015.
In freestyle skiing halfpipe, Zhang Kexin, 15, finished ninth in Pyeongchang after winning her first try at a World Cup event in Zhangjiakou, Hebei province, in December with Spanish-Canadian Mauro Nunez nursing the young team only put together in April 2016.
Zhang's victory in Hebei made her the second-youngest female skier in the world to win a World Cup title at 15 years, 200 days old, just one day older than Anais Caradeux of France, who did so in January 2006.
