China's Gao Tingyu celebrates after winning the Asian Winter Games men's speed skating 500m in Harbin, Heilongjiang province, on Monday. [Photo/AFP]
"Home, sweet home," echoed in the minds of Chinese speed skaters Gao Tingyu and Ning Zhongyan as they stepped into the familiar surroundings of the Speed Skating Oval at the Heilongjiang Ice Training Center, a place where the local pair trained from a young age.
Amid the cheers of the home fans on Monday, Gao won his second gold of the Games, adding to his men's speed skating 100m title from Saturday, with a scintillating run in the men's 500m that saw him outpace Japan's Wataru Morishige and Republic of Korea's Kim Jun-ho.
Ning claimed top honors in the men's 1,500m at the Harbin Asian Winter Games on Saturday. Gao was China's sole gold medalist in speed skating at the 2017 Asian Winter Games in Sapporo, Japan, where he won the men's 500m race.
He also became China's first male Olympic speed skating champion when he clinched the 500m gold at Beijing 2022 in an Olympic-record time of 34.32 seconds. Harbin 2025 marks not just Gao's second journey to the Winter Asiad, but also a homecoming to the place where his dreams had taken root.
On Saturday Gao was again duelling with Kim. Prior to his run, Yevgeniy Koshkin of Kazakhstan was in first place with a time of 9.47 seconds.
Gao, though, remained calm.
"When I saw their results, I felt even more determined and thought I must win this gold medal," he recalled.
As the signal blared, he exploded into motion, his arms pumping furiously at his sides to generate maximum speed. With each powerful stride, his razor-sharp bladed bit into the ice, sending shavings from the frozen surface flying.
China's Ning Zhongyan in action on his way to winning the 9th Asian Winter Games speed skating men's 1,500m gold medal at the HIC Speed Skating Oval in Harbin on Saturday. [Photo/Xinhua]
Despite struggling with injuries on this season's World Cup circuit, Gao managed to defend his title. He clocked 9.35 seconds, setting a new Asian record.
"I am very happy to win this gold medal at home. I trained on this ice rink when I was young, and I also won my first World Cup medal here, so this place holds special meaning for me. I am very happy to give back to the people of my hometown with a gold medal," Gao said.
Ning, a debutant at the Asian Winter Games and one of the Chinese delegation's flagbearers at Friday's opening ceremony, emerged victorious in the men's 1,500m with a time of one minute and 45.85 seconds, followed by two Japanese skaters Kazuya Yamada and Ryota Kojima who finished 1.70 and 2.62 seconds behind, respectively.
For Ning, one of his goals was to break the venue record.
"The current venue record here was set by Dutch speed skater Sven Kramer, and the result is displayed at the entrance. He is certainly a respected athlete, but I hope to see a Chinese name on this venue's 1,500m record," he explained.
And he made it happen. Not only did he break the venue record, but his time of 1:45.85 also set a new Asiad record.
Ning, who was born in Mudanjiang, a prefecture-level city in Heilongjiang's southeast, developed his love for speed skating when he was 10 years old, after a teacher at his primary school poured an ice rink for the children.
Ning, 25, mentioned that Gao is his role model.
"This title is a small dream come true for me, but I have a bigger one," said Ning, who finished fifth at the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games.
"I feel I am more mature now, and I hope to make a greater breakthrough at Milano-Cortina 2026."
"This is an important testing ground ahead of the Winter Olympics. I hope the entire team can find their form during the Winter Asiad and deliver even better results in Milan," Gao added.
Contact the writer at xingwen@chinadaily.com.cn
