Lining: Three Minutes Of Ignition And Twenty Years Of Business.

Lining is not only a symbol of higher, faster and stronger sportsmanship, but also a symbol of the Chinese spirit of unyielding and indomitable spirit in the past 30 years of reform and opening up.

He has successfully become a sports businessman from a retired athlete, and this change has just explained the changes in China in the past 30 years.

Who will ignite the main torch of the Beijing Olympic Games will become the biggest suspense on the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games.

This means what kind of image China will show to the world: young, upward or mature and even more.

This suspense makes Chinese and foreign media and ordinary people addicted to it.

At 23:55 on August 8th, a middle-aged man who was not tall and had a thick face took the torch of Sun Jinfang, the former captain of the National Women's volleyball team.

This is a person who can represent the twentieth Century global sports, like Ali and Jordan. 14 gold medals and 106 medals also make him unable to contribute to China's sports. At the same time, he is a successful businessman who sponsors Chinese sports. He and his family have more than 67% of the largest sporting goods company in China.

He is Lining.

It is his dual identity that adds to the suspense of the torch bearer.

According to people familiar with the matter, four months ago, when the famous director Zhang Yimou decided to adopt the "flying running" ignition ceremony, the list of the State Sports General Administration provided Lining with the highest ranking, while the unique ignition method made Lining the best candidate, but the final clash was still in July 7th.

The Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee and the general public have obviously noticed the possible commercial conflicts between the company named after Lining and Olympic sponsor Adidas.

Fortunately, the breathless run of 3 and a half minutes resolved this concern.

"At that time, we only saw Lining running, saw the spirit of Chinese sports, instead of running Lining shoes, and did not think why Adidas shoes and Nike shoes were running around the nest."

Fan Chengling, a gymnast of Guizhou province in the same period with Lining, said this.

However, Lining will not pay no attention to details. In accordance with the International Olympic Committee requirements, he first wore Adidas's clothes from competitors, and even on the wrist of the camera that he could not shoot, there was no "Lining" logo.

Before the opening ceremony, he practiced in the bird nest for a month, and his white hair was dyed black.

In July, Xie Tiehua, headmaster of Lining gymnastic school in Foshan, Guangdong, met Lining's former teammate. Lining also asked him, "how long is dyed black hair?"

In 1988, after the Chinese gymnastics team defeated Seoul, Lining became the first retired athlete to run his own company. After 1993, Xie Tiehua joined the Li Ning Co.

The middle and late 1980s was the sprouting stage of many private enterprises in China. Ren Zhengfei founded HUAWEI in Shenzhen, Zong Qing opened Wahaha in Hangzhou, and Wang Shi went to real estate. Liu Chuanzhi abandoned Lenovo's identity as a IBM dealer with Lenovo.

Like them, 20 years later, Lining has also become an excellent private entrepreneur in China.

3 days after the opening ceremony, the Wall Street journal wrote: "although it is not known internationally, Lining not only represents China's past sporting achievements, but also symbolizes today's economic reform. It is this kind of reform that has changed China and made Lining among the richest people in China."

Soar up into the sky with one start

The emergence of Lining did not end all suspense.

All of a sudden, Lining, who holds the torch in his right hand, holds his waist in his left hand and flies up. He rises vertically and then stops in front of the huge Xiangyun curtain wall.

In August 9th, Lining said in an interview with the media: "I felt like I was back on the podium."

For Lining, it was a glorious moment 24 years ago.

The 3 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze at the Losangeles Olympic Games have set a record of medals and gold medals in the single Olympic Games, and it is only 4 years since Lining won medals in the world series.

The Chinese gymnastics began in 1970s. It has been relying entirely on its own exploration and rapidly climbing from zero to the top of the sports arena. It has also been flying all over the sky, which is almost the only exception in Chinese sports.

Only when the parties know how to fly to the sky at that speed, what kind of pain will it be if they fall?

"In this world, I suffer more than anyone else."

After the defeat of the Seoul Olympic Games in 1988, Lining sat on the lawn outside the Olympic village. In his sentence, Lu Guang, editor in chief of the China sports daily, said he could still see the blood of his six brothers crying.

"After retirement, my sports life is over, and I will never make up for this loss."

Holding up the heat in the bird's nest and watching Lining lift off, the 72 year old Lu Guang thought of Lining's "waved hands, hard to say goodbye" at the farewell party in Shenzhen in 1988.

"He thought he could never make up for it. He did not expect it to happen again 20 years later, and it was held at the Olympic Games held in China."

Can you understand Lining?

"Let some people who originally sent Lining to" hang the rope "and" bullets "began to understand Lining, but in Lining's view," the Chinese in that era needed gold, not sports themselves. The sports committee needed the champion, not the athlete. "

This made him very frustrated at that time.

In extreme circumstances, Lining, who had stopped flying in the sky, abandoned the usual choice of retired athletes. When he was in politics or became a coach, Lining chose to turn around.

Lining, who stopped, pulled a body on his body and turned his body to the clouds.

The handicap of the machine makes the "Prince of gymnastics" turn around, which is less stable, but it is very stable.

The next "turn around" in Lining's life has been told numerous times by the media.

Li Jingwei, general manager of Jianlibao, who had been popular throughout the whole 1990s, was also a director of the local sports committee. He was almost an athlete. The sports complex was very heavy. He asked Lining to be a special assistant to the general manager, responsible for publicity, advertising and so on.

In 1990, when Lining said he wanted to do gymnastics school, Li Jingwei suggested that he should "make a brand named after himself, earn money to do gymnastics school again".

At first Lining didn't want to be afraid of smashing his signboard, but later he thought he would never try to go abroad when he had never worn a Chinese brand sportswear and Li Jingwei had repeatedly persuaded him.

At the beginning of 1990s, when Lu met Lining in Shenzhen, he asked why he didn't learn to paint. Lining laughed and said, "draw money first and paint again."

Wu Dongkui, a painter from the painter Lining, has great talent for art.

In that agitated age, people who chose to do business came from almost three hundred and sixty lines. Lining's story was remembered only because of the title of "gymnastic Prince" once.

Lining, like most businessmen, runs government agencies to write certificates, write project plans, and study the market; and, like many other companies, he has a natural red hat.

After 8 years of national retreat, privatization and property rights reform, a long list of companies and entrepreneurs disappeared from failing to deal with the red hat problem, including Lining's business leader Li Jingwei, Pan Ning of Kelon, Zhu Shijian of Hongta tobacco and so on.

Luckily, Lining met Liu Jipeng, Professor Liu Jipeng of Capital University of Economics and Business, for 4 years in advance. He insisted on paying 3 yuan for 16 million yuan in his insistence.

After the sidewalk, Lining stepped forward, and the cloud curtain gradually opened around the bird's nest.

The Li Ning Co, which separated from Jianlibao group, has been developing for four years at the speed of doubling sales revenue every year. Until 1996, it earned 670 million yuan and was firmly in the first place in China's sporting goods industry.

This may be the period when the "Prince of gymnastics" plays the most important role and the star effect.

The first battle to open up the situation was the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing. Lining found the familiar national sports committee officials, persuaded them to abandon the $3 million foreign company sponsorship with patriotic enthusiasm, and chose Lining who could only produce 2 million 500 thousand yuan.

After the Hiroshima Asian Games and the 25 Olympic Games, until the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, Chinese athletes did not cross the clothing of other sports brands when they won the prize.

"After that 1990, Lining began to fight for sponsorship fees."

In 1996, Zhang Qing, the former director of public relations who entered Li Ning Co and served for 7 years, recalled that "the patronage category has become the biggest advantage."

Sports sponsorship is the "magic weapon" of the sports giant Nike company. The early Li Ning Co did more probably because of the complex of entrepreneurs.

This unwritten goal and emotion lurk in the company's personality. Even after several years, Lining gave way to the professional manager team, which still affected the company's decision-making at different times or large or small, and formed a complex corporate culture, which led to the fact that the sports and sports industry should complement each other and sometimes restrict each other.

Although some management methods come from the ideal, the effect is beyond doubt.

But all good momentum stopped abruptly in 1997.

Over the past 4 years, Li Ning Co's sales revenue has been hovering around 700 million yuan.

Interestingly, many people also noticed that after a short 3 minutes' journey, Lining did not run very easily.

After all, this is not a real runway, but also contrary to the earth's gravity.

At the end of the good momentum, Lining began to realize the company's management system and human resources.

Lu Guang visited the early Li Ning Co and saw many people who knew sports.

When the blood pfusion started, Zhang Qing was brought in as fresh blood at that time.

Before long, Zhang discovered that the faces that had been familiar with television were missing or adjusted.

Finally, Lining's sister-in-law, the elder of the company called "party elder sister", was also asked to leave the company. At the same time, he left Chen Yihong, the general manager's brother, who was also one of the top executives of the company.

The faces that Lu Guang once knew were only two left this year - Lining's former teammate Li Chunyang and Bi Wenjing.

"No matter whether they left or not, they were arranged very well.

Lining's greatest characteristic is tolerance, loyalty and know-how.

Since retiring in 1992, Li Chunyang has never left. Now his work can give full play to his own advantages, communicate with the General Administration of sports and attend some public welfare and publicity activities in the capacity of sports stars.

Lining, President of the Foshan gymnastics school, has also remained in office until now. Xie Tiehua.

In 1998, 5 years after working in the Li Ning Co, Lining realized his original dream.