After the 100m preliminaries, the event was followed by the 110m hurdles final.
When Su Zhe left the field, the 110m hurdles final was about to start, Su Zhe only had time to receive a bottle of water from his father, he simply drank a few mouthfuls and then quickly rushed to the participants’ preparation area.
Zhou Tianjue, Ye Jun and the others had already been in the preparation area for their own preparations, seeing the hurried Su Zhe, Ye Jun’s eyebrows wrinkled a little, he took out a dry towel from his own bag and handed it to Su Zhe, so he’d wipe the residual rain on his body.
When a large amount of rainwater stayed on the surface of an athlete’s body, it made the heat of the body pass faster, which made it harder for the players to protect their physical fitness.
“Xiao Zhe ……” Ye Jun looked at Su Zhe’s slightly tired face, he hesitated before speaking: “Your preliminaries have run into the World Championships participation standards, giving us a seat in World Championships. Later you have the 100 meters final …… you can consider withdrawing this time, so you ……”
Hearing Ye Jun’s suggestion, Su Zhe was slightly surprised, although Ye Jun had a good character, he had seen some information about Ye Jun, he knew that his love for the 110m hurdles was very serious, he was tenacious and persistent.
Ye Jun must have seen that he wasn’t in good shape and had lost a lot of fitness, so he was really thinking about him.
Su Zhe thanked Ye Jun gratefully, but still shook his head: “This game, I must run well.”
It was unusual for Zhou Tianjue to stay silent, but from his slightly serious face and tense aura, he could see that he was also determined to win this final tonight.
Whether it was Zhou Tianjue or Ye Jun, or the other athletes present.
They all had a strong desire to win, not only for their own desire to win, but also to represent the glory of their respective teams, the glory of the national team, in order to be able to fight for one more seat for the country in the World Championships, they were ready to fight tonight at all costs.
The atmosphere in the preparation area was somewhat cold for a while.
After cleaning the rain from his body, Su Zhe also began to re-activate his body – the rain made his physical state a little cold, and the anaerobic state under the high-speed outbreak of strength in the 100-meter race consumed muscle energy too quickly. Up to now, it had only taken less than ten minutes, and the heavy feeling of physical consumption had spread on him, but his instinct to win still made him feel eager for the next race.
The more difficult it was, the more it was worth the challenge.
Under the momentum of Su Zhe and the others, the athletes’ preparation area was filled with strong battle spirit, and all of them were seriously preparing for the battle and showed unrelenting momentum.
This intense pre-battle atmosphere, made the blood of every athlete on the scene begin to boil!
The live broadcast had been turned on, and on the commentary platform, commentators Zhang Jing and Wang Miaochuan were introducing the significance of tonight’s competition for the viewers watching the live broadcast.
Wang Miaochuan: “110m hurdles used to be our country’s strong event, but after Song Chen retired, our 110m hurdles has lacked a strong force in the international arena.”
Zhang Jing: “Yes, since this year’s season, the best record of domestic 110m hurdlers in the international arena is the third place in the Asian Championships from Ye Jun, which is a rather regrettable thing, I must say.”
Wang Miaochuan: “I hope that in tonight’s 110m hurdles final, there can be new players to take two more seats for us at the World Championships.”
……
A program backstage.
The stars participating in the program recording were chatting in twos and threes, one of them noticed Shao Xingchen sitting aside for a long time without moving, so he walked over and said hello to him.
“Brother Shao, what are you looking at? Huh? Is this some kind of game?”
The phone Shao Xingchen held in his hand was playing the 110m hurdles final live on the sports channel, and the commentators had already introduced the athletes who were about to take the stage.
“Ah, it’s a race, huh? Brother Shao, you like to watch these races?”
The exchange attracted the attention of other stars around, Shao Xingchen nodded to the crowd and pointed to the phone after greeting, “The final is about to start.”
……
On the field of the comprehensive sports center, the runners had already made their appearance and stood on their tracks and began to quickly adjust their starters while jumping, stretching and kneading their muscles on their bodies to try to get their bodies into a relaxed state.
The rain continued to fall, and the lights of the field had come on, making the whole field as bright as daylight.
In the grandstand area, many track and field fans had already seen Su Zhe standing on the field again, and many of the older men were a bit worried.
“Xiao Zhe is going to have four races in one day today, right?”
“Yes, three high-intensity races tonight, how can his physical ability keep up? It will affect his performance, right?”
The crowd looked at each other and was very worried about the intensity of Su Zhe’s races tonight.
“He just participated in the 100 meters preliminaries, and is wet from running, with the state of his muscles, how can he recover so quickly? He definitely won’t be at his peak like in the morning.” One of the men who had been here all day said.
“How can this be done? The race committee’s schedule is too brutal.”
“You can’t say that, this is our domestic event, if it was a well-known player, then the schedule would certainly have a leeway, but Boss Zhe isn’t so well-known. And wasn’t Boss Zhe’s participation in the 110m hurdles project sudden? The organizing committee didn’t know earlier that there was someone participating in both ah.”
Even though the crowd complained, they all knew how the actual situation, but after watching the last run, and seeing Su Zhe re-enter the field and join other players in good shape to compete together, they became worried for Su Zhe.
The “Philosopher” sisters gathered around were also worried about the state of Su Zhe, they had watched so many competitions for Su Zhe. There were also many sisters in the “Philosopher” fan group who had specially studied sprint-related knowledge, and there were also many track and field fans present to give them explanations, which made them clearly realize how many challenges Su Zhe would face tonight.
“The cub got a seat in the World Championships this morning, this final isn’t important for him tonight, right?” A young girl said with a little hesitation.
“It isn’t wrong to say so ……” another little girl clutched the banner in her hand, she looked at Su Zhe on the field, and quickly shook her head: “Look, the cub is still preparing so seriously, I think he should be very serious about wanting to win this game.”
For a while, the emotions of the spectators in the grandstand area also gradually tensed up.
Ye Jun’s supporters hoped he could run at his best level and get a spot in the World Championships for his country.
Zhou Tianjue’s supporters also hoped he could surpass his PB [Personal Best] and get into the international arena, seeing the level of international competition would be of great benefit to the young player.
Just as the crowd waited anxiously, the final of the 110m hurdles was about to start!
Zhang Jing and Wang Miaochuan were also standing by, after the introduction of all the players, the two also made an introduction and explanation for the audience about Su Zhe’s situation.
Wang Miaochuan: “Su Zhe has successfully run into the requirement of the World Championships in this morning’s preliminaries. At the same time, as a participant in both the men’s 100m sprint and 110m hurdles, today he is facing four races, calling this the devil’s race isn’t exaggerated.”
Wang Miaochuan: “Just 15 minutes ago, Su Zhe just entered the final of men’s 100m sprint with the first place in the second group of the 100m sprint preliminaries, and after that, he quickly returned to the field to participate in the current 110m hurdles final, which will be a huge test for his physical ability in this race.”
Zhang Jing: “Yes, not only that, after the end of this 110m hurdles final, after 50 minutes, Player Su Zhe will join the men’s 100m final, this race may have a great impact on his individual performance.”
With the end of the commentators’ introduction, all the people on the field had also prepared, Zhou Tianjue, Ye Jun and Su Zhe were located in the third, fifth and sixth track respectively, and all the players on the field had been in their starters in a tight position.
Finally, the referee made a serious preparatory sound.
Immediately after that, the starting gun sounded!
“Bang!”
The race officially started!
In the drizzling rain, the runners’ feet stroked off the starters and let their bodies rush forward as far as possible!
As they started, Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun’s posture were very similar, both of their fierce eyes were staring ahead, at this moment, the end was the goal they were chasing!
In listening to the gun start, Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun were on par, both within 0.15 of the start reaction speed, Su Zhe was slightly exhausted, even though he had concentrated, he still failed to beat them both in the moment of the start reaction.
With all the runners stomping away from the starter, they began to step forward, attacking the first hurdle.
The fastest to reach the first hurdle was Zhou Tianjue, and his speed was comparable to that of Ye Jun, who was also sprinting forward with all his might.
In the process of attacking the first hurdle, the two of them were almost rushing to kill with the strength of a tiger and wolf, and their raging momentum even affected the players behind them, causing the rhythm of the opponents sprinting behind them to stall for a moment.
Although Su Zhe wasn’t affected by them, at the moment, his state wasn’t good, he started to pedal away from the starter, had a slight lack of explosive power on his right leg, this was the overall impact of the decline in his physical fitness.
In the pre-bar stage, his height was a restriction, so he originally didn’t have an advantage, coupled with the decline in fitness, which prevented him from using the fastest and strongest sprint speed, in the starting phase to the pre-bar stage, he was only located in the fourth position, he could only barely maintain the upper middle sequence.
When Su Zhe reached the first hurdle, he was ready to start attacking the hurdle, while Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun had already jumped over the first hurdle!
He couldn’t lose!
He had to be faster!
Su Zhe’s eyes were also fixed on the finish line ahead, the heavy feeling of physical energy loss was suppressed by him, and he did his best to mobilize the remaining strength in his body and control his forward rhythm.
Since the initial sprint burst was missing, then in the next running rhythm he had to get back the lost advantage!
Running forward was also a process of accumulating momentum and energy, as long as the entire process of mastering the rhythm was achieved, borrowing the potential energy generated in the process, he could make his forward sprint speed gradually increase!
What was more, Su Zhe had enough confidence in his endurance and his ability to accelerate on the backstretch!
And although Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun were fast enough in the initial sprint stage, this would also consume a lot of their physical energy, the two of them didn’t have as much of a rhythm advantage as Su Zhe between the bars, which gave Su Zhe a glimmer of hope of catching up with the two.
The spectators in the grandstand area had already shouted until they were hoarse, the sound of horns and shouting were indistinguishable, all of them were vociferously supporting their favored players, hoping that they could get the most excellent results in the competition!
“Cheer up, Boss Zhe! I will always support you!
Many men were waving small flags frantically in their hands, shouting loudly to cheer for Su Zhe.
Su Zhe, who wasn’t dominant from the start, made their hearts tighten and all of them were in a state of tension.
“Boss Zhe charge ah!!! F*ck! You can win!!!”
Perhaps it was the inspiration received from the spectators in the stands, or the forward momentum in the process that allowed him to use a little momentum.
After crossing the first hurdle, Su Zhe felt that his strength was slightly restored, and the explosive power of his right leg when he stomped forward was more powerful than when he started the race!
After crossing the first hurdle, Su Zhe began to subconsciously speed up his pace, under such circumstances, he had to maximize his advantage, even if his pace control had weakened, this event was more concerned with the rhythm between hurdles.
The rain in the sky didn’t stop, and the boiling battle on the field also didn’t stop!
The hot battle made the cold rain feel hot.
Zhou Tianjue’s expression, which had always been light, became serious and cold on the field, his eyes stared sharply ahead, his mind recorded his rhythm control, and he put all his attention on the fast pace.
He was confident in his control of his body’s stability, even the rain and slippery track couldn’t stop him from sprinting forward.
Since he was found by Lu Fei and accepted as his disciple, hurdling had always been an ability he was proud of, even if he just crossed over from the youth group to the adult group this year, it took him some time to adapt to the new height of the hurdles, but he always believed that his strength in hurdling was enough to crush everything!
Even his master Lu Fei once said that he had the strength to enter 13:40 at any time, and 13:46, the standard for the World Championships, wouldn’t be an obstacle for him.
Only, sometimes the breakthrough in performance also needed a certain state and luck.
He felt that his state today was just right, at this time his momentum was enough to let him smash all the obstacles in front of him!
Ye Jun’s momentum was also like that.
As a top domestic hurdler, Ye Jun had both good and bad times.
When he was a newcomer, Song Chen had just retired, and the 110m hurdles was still one of the hottest events in track and field industry, many newcomers stepped into the hurdles with a longing go against Song Chen.
But when Song Chen retired, there was a sudden emergence of a talent gap in the country, so this once dominating sport gradually declined, the quality of domestic players even in Asian events was difficult to suppress the players of other countries.
It was in such an environment, Ye Jun by virtue of his own efforts and talent gradually emerged, he began to slowly stand in the domestic hurdles project of the highest level, but his achievements today, was extremely far from the national record set by Song Chen, even so far that he doubted that he could cross the distance in his life.
The emergence of Zhou Tianjue and Su Zhe had given him hope that this event would rise again and even stand on the peak – but before that, before the two of them really grew up, would he, a top hurdler, have to admit defeat because of the enemy’s strong talent and potential?
That wasn’t possible!
The appearance of Zhou Tianjue and Su Zhe once again ignited the fighting spirit in Ye Jun’s heart, a fighting spirit raised by the brand new hope for the hurdling event and the will of a hurdling veteran who was unwilling to concede defeat.
He wasn’t old yet, he still had enough strength to continue to fight!
Above the field, Su Zhe, Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun were as bright as the sun.
Su Zhe had long surpassed Qian Mingsheng, who was briefly ahead of him, and at this time he gradually caught up with Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun by virtue of his own advantageous rhythm between the hurdles.
From the starting sprint to the first three hurdles, he sprinted between the hurdles as his potential energy became more and more full, his boiling blood also offset his body’s fatigue and slightly heavy limbs.
At this point, the battle became a white-hot tussle!
Zhou Tianjue, Ye Jun and Su Zhe always maintained a very small gap between their columns, the former relying on the advantage created in the sprint phase, while the latter relied on their own rhythm and pace to force up their speed.
On the commentary stage, Wang Miaochuan and Zhang Jing were both in a very excited mood.
Wang Miaochuan: “Their speed at this point is on par with each other, who will take the final championship?”
The spectators in the grandstand area had long been in a frenzy of emotions, and the battle situation of the three people sticking to each other made their hearts tighten up, and they could only vent their emotions through constant shouting.
“Go Jun!!! The championship is yours!!!”
“Master Jun charge!!! Give them hell!!!”
“Long live Boss Zhe!!! Charge!!!”
The beeping of the horn and the rattling of the flag waving made the entire spectator area seem incredibly agitated, the chanting even gave the illusion that everything around them was vibrating, but no one had any doubts about the situation.
This, was the most enthusiastic moment on the playing field.
From the fourth hurdle frame onwards, Su Zhe quickly caught up with his rhythmic advantage and forcibly improved pace, and five hurdle frames later, the three were already neck and neck, and Su Zhe’s advantage hadn’t run out!
None of the three paid attention to the situation around them, their goal was to rush to the finish line in front of them.
The first person to cross the tenth hurdle was Su Zhe, but Zhou Tianjue’s speed was only a hair’s breadth away from him, except for Ye Jun who was slightly delayed by his own technical flaws on the hurdles, but the gap between him and Su Zhe was only a fraction of a second.
In the final sprint leg, all of them exerted their strongest sprinting power.
Su Zhe’s upper body leaned forward, relying on his own endurance and back-end acceleration ability, with the potential energy accumulated between the bars, he started sprinting forward. At this time, there was no hurdle limit, so he pulled his stride frequency to the limit that he could control at the moment, and his sprinting body cut through the rain curtain in front of him.
Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun weren’t far behind, even if the rain was washing their bodies, it felt as if their bodies were still burning with blazing flames.
When the three people, led by Su Zhe, crossed the finish line, the remaining momentum of the sprint still allowed them to rush forward for more than ten meters before they gradually stopped.
On the commentary stage, Wang Miaochuan shouted loudly, “The winner is Su Zhe! He, Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun are the first, second and third in this 110m hurdles final!”
Zhang Jing was also very excited: “This is amazing! This is already his third high-intensity event today, and up to this moment, Su Zhe is ranked first in all three events today! 110m hurdles preliminaries, 100m preliminaries results overall first, 110m hurdles final first!”
Wang Miaochuan: “Su Zhe showed us his strong competitive strength today, let’s look forward to the men’s 100m final in 50 minutes! I wonder if there will still be a miracle then!”
The championship, it was his!
With a sigh of relief, the exhaustion of shedding energy instantly rushed to his whole body, as he jogged, the fatigue made him unable to control the pace of his feet, the soles of his feet slightly slipped, then he couldn’t help but fall to the side.
The good thing was that Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun were on his side, the two of them grabbed him at the same time, knowing that his physical ability had been exhausted, one of them held one of his arms, holding him aside to avoid the rain, while they waited for the final race results.
After Su Zhe recovered a little, he looked at Ye Jun and Zhou Tianjue, he couldn’t help but remember the scene after the 110m hurdles final of the National Championships.
Obviously, Ye Jun and Zhou Tianjue two also remembered the scene at that time.
Zhou Tianjue immediately said with a disgusted expression: “You little sheep, you don’t have much physical fitness yet you run so crazily, I think we should call you crazy sheep instead.”
Hearing the word sheep, Su Zhe and Ye Jun immediately looked at Zhou Tianjue with an extremely complicated expression, and then with the same expression, they reminded him – baa baa baa.
Zhou Tianjue got annoyed and was ready to drop him and leave, when the commentator finally began to broadcast the final results belonging to this game.
Wang Miaochuan: “The final results of this 110m hurdles final, first place, Su Zhe: 13:43 (0.4), second place, Zhou Tianjue: 13:44 (0.4), third place, Ye Jun: 13:45 (0.4).”
Zhang Jing’s voice was full of joy: “Congratulations to the three runners! Also congratulations to Zhou Tianjue and Ye Jun for running into the World Championships participation standards, our country has won two precious seats in the World Championship!”
Instantly, hot applause rang out wildly on the field, and the stands were in a state of cheering and jubilation.
I really love the sportsmanship in this novel. The two helping support Su Zhe when he stumbled is such a sweet moment! Thanks for your translation 🙂