London time on August 7th.

At 10 o'clock in the morning, after a day of rest, well... it was not considered a rest for Wei En. Because he was too busy yesterday, he seemed a little out of shape today.

The three athletes Wei En, Xie Zhenye and Zhang Peimeng, with the cooperation of Randy, Yuan Guoqiang, Li Qing and other coaching teams, took the express bus in the Olympic Village and entered the London Bowl.

Today is a new round of competition day for the London Olympics track and field events. There were preliminaries and qualifying rounds for several events in the morning, and Wei En and the others were going to participate in the preliminaries of the men's 200-meter event.

The 200-meter event is also a three-gun event, and there are no additional qualifying rounds. No more, no less. There are exactly 56 participants, who are evenly divided into 7 preliminary groups.

Calculated in this way, if the qualifying competition of the men's 100-meter event is not taken into account, the number of participants in the two events is actually the same, there are 7 groups of 8 people, with a total of 56 athletes participating.

It is precisely because there is no qualifying competition that after the men's 200-meter preliminaries are divided into groups, the gap in strength between the groups is even greater than in the 100-meter event.

The a standard for the men's 100 meters in the London Olympics is 10.18 seconds, and the b standard is 10.24 seconds. The Olympic a standard for the men's 200 meters is 20.55 seconds, and the b standard is 20.65 seconds.

But the reality is that for many countries with underdeveloped track and field sports, it is difficult to train 200-meter athletes who can meet the Olympic standards A and B.

The status of the 200-meter event is somewhat embarrassing in track and field. Although it is a sprint, neither the popularity of the event nor the amount of money it attracts can compare with its big brothers, the 100-meter and 400-meter.

The 200-meter event neither pursues absolute explosive power and extreme speed like the 100-meter event, nor does it require super speed endurance like the 400-meter event.

Many times, some of the world's outstanding 100-meter and 400-meter athletes will regard the 200-meter as a "part-time event" to improve their speed endurance or speed ability.

For example, Maurice Green's main event is the 100 meters. His cadence-type running method makes him extremely strong in the front and relatively weak in the back. After doing the 200 meters in both events, his speed endurance ability improved, and he later tried

The effect of the late-course running method is remarkable.

For example, Michael Johnson's main event is the 400m, and the 200m is actually a concurrent event. However, because his speed endurance ability is too abnormal, even though his top speed ability is weak, he can still dominate in the 200m event.

After hundreds of years of development, many sports have their own unique attributes, but the 200-meter event has never escaped its fate - serving as a "spare tire" for the 100-meter and 400-meter events.

This also leads to the fact that the popularity of the 200-meter event is naturally lower than that of the 100-meter and 400-meter events, and track and field is inherently relatively "niche". Under such circumstances, outstanding 200-meter athletes are less popular than the other two events.

For athletes, it is indeed less.

Take the three athletes of the Chinese team as an example. Except for Xie Zhenye who competes in the 200m, the main reason why Wei En and Zhang Peimeng compete in the 200m is to improve their speed endurance.

Of course, there is another purpose for Wei En, that is, he still has room for growth, and he will be enough to challenge Bolt in the future, but if it is just defeating Bolt in the 100-meter event, it is not enough. If it can be achieved in multiple events in the future,

rule, then his historical status will naturally be higher.

The men's 200-meter preliminaries will be held on the morning of August 7, the semi-finals will be held on the evening of August 8, and the final will be held on the evening of August 9. There is a big difference between this and the 100-meter semi-finals and the finals of two hours.

Different.

Even though it was a working day, and even though this morning was all about preliminaries and qualifying matches for various events, the London Bowl was still packed with people!

Most of the spectators came here for one person - Usain Bolt, a man who single-handedly increased the popularity of the 200-meter sport!

Among the nearly 80,000 spectators, even though there may be athletes from their own countries among the upcoming competitors, when they see that tall figure appearing on the track, they can't help but applaud and cheer for him.

His strength has transcended the barriers of country and race.

"Eh? Who is this? Isn't it Wei En?"

In a corner of the auditorium, a middle-aged man asked the Chinese audience around him.

"This is Zhang Peimeng, Wei En is in the seventh group!" Someone immediately answered, "Hey, you said you are a basketball fan, why did you come to watch track and field with us?"

"Damn it, the men's basketball team is terrible! After Yao Ming is gone, I feel unhappy no matter what. Isn't this Wei Enhuo? I also want to experience the charm of red lightning!"

At this time, many people in the London Bowl had not paid much attention to track and field sports before, but they "switched" from other sports because they learned that Wei En won the silver medal in the historic human speed showdown the night before yesterday.

Chinese spectators at athletics.

For this part of the audience, they may have heard the names of Su Bingtian and Zhang Peimeng, but they really don’t know much about them and this sport. They just come to join in the fun.

Zhang Peimeng stood on Lane 7, feeling the cheers from time to time in the stadium, and his heart was surging.

The cheers in the stadium were undoubtedly for Usain Bolt, but occasionally he could hear some faint local accents in the gaps, and he could even hear someone shouting his name.

In the Olympic Games, this is already an honor!

The preliminaries group he is in, due to the presence of Bolt, not only attracts a lot of attention, but also has strong overall strength.

If you want to get a promotion spot, you have to go all out!

Two days ago, he had already heard the second shot of the Olympic men's 100-meter event. There was no reason to stop in the first round of the 200-meter event.

This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! "Track 4, from America - Isaiah Young!"

Here we go, let’s start. The pre-match introduction begins with American player Isaiah Young in lane 4.

Isaiah Young is a very young athlete, born in June 1992, not much older than Wayne.

His personal best time is 20.33 seconds, and he ran a super fast 20.16 seconds in the finals of the National Trials. Looking at the data, Zhang Peimeng feels that it will be difficult for him to beat him.

“Lane 5, from Jamaica – Usain Bolt!”

The host's introduction was quickly overshadowed by the enthusiastic cheers of the audience. Zhang Peimeng was not only envious of this, but also envious.

After being filled with envy, Zhang Peimeng was ready to follow the starter's instructions and get on the starting block to prepare.

But unlike what was expected, the photographer did not leave the track directly, but... came to him!

ne 7,from a——peimeng zhang!”

Zhang Peimeng looked confused. During the introduction of the 200m preliminaries, he was actually given a formal shot?

Zhang Peimeng, who was somewhat flattered, clasped his hands and nodded slightly towards the camera. A burst of cheers suddenly came from the audience. Although it was far different from the enthusiasm when Bolt was introduced before, the audience at the scene also expressed their appreciation for Zhang Peimeng.

Meng showed basic respect.

What Zhang Peimeng didn't know was that his 200-meter preliminaries shot was specially added by the London Olympic Organizing Committee after seeing his performance in the 100-meter event.

The complete list of the first group of men's 200m preliminaries is:

Lane 2, Cuba, Michael Herrera;

Lane 3, Switzerland, Alex Wilson;

Lane 4, America, Isaiah Young;

Lane 5, Jamaica, Usain Bolt;

Lane 6, Nigeria, Noah Aku;

Lane 7, China, Zhang Peimeng;

Lane 8, Khanakstan, Muravayev;

Lane 9, Brazil, Alder Junior.

Among these eight players, Usain Bolt's strength is self-evident. Without him, the other players can only compete for second place in the group.

For Zhang Peimeng, except for the players from Cuba and Kazakhstan, the other four players are quite capable and competitive.

So for this 200-meter preliminaries, Zhang Peimeng was already ready to go all out.

At 11:50, as the starting gun sounded in the London Bowl, the athletes started to compete smoothly. The first group of the men's 200m preliminaries of the London Olympics officially began!

There is no false start. Since the IAAF implemented the "zero tolerance" false start response plan in 2010, there have been much less false starts in sprint and sprint events, and the enjoyment of the competition has also been greatly improved.

Different from the 100-meter event, the 200-meter event is not so focused on starting from the gun because of the distance. Therefore, compared with the 100-meter athletes, 200-meter athletes generally have weaker reaction to the gun.

So this is also a point where Zhang Peimeng can take advantage. His reaction to the gun is relatively good. Maybe a 0.01 second lead in the reaction to the gun can make up for the disadvantage he may face in terms of pure running.

.

Zhang Peimeng really put his best effort into this shot. He actually didn't do much training in the 200-meter event throughout the year. He didn't even participate in a few games. He was indeed a little unfamiliar with the rhythm of the 200-meter race. What he could do

Just without reservation!

However, Zhang Peimeng may have forgotten one thing, and that is that his 100-meter hard power has stabilized at around 10 seconds. Basically, as long as he encounters a good wind speed and his rhythm is not disrupted, he can run into the 10-second mark.

close.

Although there is a big difference between 200 meters and 100 meters, as long as the strength of 100 meters reaches a certain level, 200 meters cannot be any different.

So the process of the game was a little different from what Zhang Peimeng imagined.

When he reached about 80 meters, he was "overtaken" by Bolt, but he had expected this situation. After all, Bolt's cornering ability is really terrifying.

When entering the straight, Zhang Peimeng boldly looked to the right to observe the positions of his opponents and found that he was actually the second one to enter the straight. His confidence was immediately boosted!

Hold on! Hold on!

Zhang Peimeng kept encouraging himself in his heart. In the last 30 meters, his teeth seemed to be bitten to pieces. His mind went blank. He didn't even notice which one he crossed the finish line first.

After the results were released - 20 seconds 39, Zhang Peimeng set a new personal best!

Not only did Zhang Peimeng set a new personal best, he was also the second person in this group to cross the finish line, second only to Bolt's 20.37 seconds!

The promotion rules for the 200m preliminaries are the same as those for the 100m. There are seven preliminaries groups, and the top two in each group advance to the semi-finals. Finally, the three best results will advance to the semifinals.

Zhang Peimeng ranked second in the group and was directly promoted!
Chapter completed!