Olympic Athletics in Chinese History: Horse Race and Equestrian Sports
By admin on 2014-12-15

Beijing Olympic Games was filled with elements of Chinese culture. The Beijing Olympic Games emblem, golden medal with inlaid jade,  design of 'lucky clouds torch', the magnificent Chinese culture portrays on opening ceremony, green flower porcelain and embroidery decorated in subway stations , and so on…… China has a long history of sports from thousands of years ago. many historical allusions are Olympic events and is inextricably linked.  And all kinds of historical allusions link inextricably with Olympic Games.

The fourth century B.C,  during the Warring States period, horse race was one of the most favourate aristocratic games for entertainment in Qi state. Best horses and riders were assigned to took part in the race represent to their masters, the king and ministers. Aristocrats spent lots of money in gambling the race. 

General Tian Ji was one of the gamblers always in bad luck. One day he lost the race as usual and went to meet his friend Sun Bin. Sun comforted him and said, "Please sent a message to me before your next race. I'll attend it and perhaps I could do something helpful. "

When the race came again, Sun Bin came to the racetrack where were full of crazy audiences with Tian Ji. Sun learned that the horses offered by each aristocrat will be sorted in 3 classes by speed while horses and riders dressed in different colours according to different classes. Then, horses in same class will be assigned in one competition. And the Aristocrat who win 2 competitions of the total 3 will be the winner.

Sun said to his friend Tian, "General, please be assured that I can let you win. " This made Tian Ji delightly. So he invited the king, who even had never lost in any race,  as his opponent with stake of a thousand gold. 

Before the race begining, in accordance with the idea of Sun Bin, Tian Ji dressed his third-class horse into first class and compete with the king's first class horse. Without any question, the king's horse win the first competition in obvious advantage while Tian's "first-class" horse lagging far behind. In the second game, Tian arranged his first-class horse dressed in second class and won the game hardly. And in the last game, to all the audiences' surprise, Tian's horse exceeded the king's again. And then 2-1, Tian defeated the king and won the competition.

This story tell us,under direction of accurate stratagem, you can defeat your opponent when both sides in same conditions, or reduce loss when you were in absolutly inferior position.

In modern Olympic competitions, athletes also need to apply appropriate strategy in gaining the victory. Many projects have to go through  apply the appropriate strategy to be successful. Many projects set preliminary contest which athletes must go through before the final. Generally, an player is too difficult to reach another peak in the final if he(she) perform very good in the first round. For example, in projects like gymnastics or diving, it is important to control the difficulty quotiety of the performance in scientific order when the player face to different opponents. In other competition as soccer or basket ball, coach's strategy and guiding always effect the team's destiny directly.