Feature: China's Zhou bags gold as her birthday gift at Asian Para Games

HANGZHOU, Oct. 23 (Xinhua) -- After winning the women's wheelchair race 1,500m-T54 at the 4th Asian Para Games here on Monday, 26-year-old Zhou Shaoqian from China said it's her best-ever birthday present.

In the leading group from the start, Zhou followed the first two athletes closely, who are also from China. She accelerated in the last 300 meters, and finally sealed the victory with 3 minutes and 31.43 seconds, just 0.02 seconds ahead of the silver medalist.

In the wheelchair race, athletes do not rotate the wheels with their hands. Instead, they grip their hands like fists and "hit" them on the wheels to make them run at a high speed.

"This event relies entirely on upper limb strength, and we train physical fitness and core strength through the bench press and horizontal bars," Zhou explained.

In addition to maintaining center of gravity balance, they also need to quickly tap the steering wheel to make the wheelchair turn without speed decrease.

"This event has similarities with sports such as swimming and cycling," she added.

"The 1,500m is not my strongest event. I was lucky enough to win a gold medal at the Tokyo Paralympics, and this time I think I won with luck again." No matter how much she emphasizes fortune or tries to show humility, the calluses in her hand let people know the effort she has put in.

Born in Hebei province in 1997, Zhou had a happy childhood until a car accident caused her right leg to be amputated at the age of 5.

However, she showed very strong contending conscience rather than just yielding to the unfair fate, with support and encouragement from her family. She didn't give up to go to school and even went to college to study computer maintenance.

In 2012, Zhou began her career as an athlete. Nevertheless, after four years of hard training, she failed to qualify for the Rio Paralympic Games. Subsequently, she regrouped, adjusted her skills, and trained even harder. She successfully returned to the top ranks in the country in 2017.

Ever since then, Zhou started to shine in almost all competitions and made rapid progress.

Zhou, who has already qualified for the Paris Paralympic Games, will also participate in the wheelchair races of the 100m, 400m, and 800m events at Hangzhou.

"I hope to improve my form by participating in more competitions," she said.

As this is her first time visiting Hangzhou, which has left a very deep impression on her, Zhou gave a thumbs-up and said, "The scenery and people here at Hangzhou are even better than expected, absolutely amazing!"