News

• Nanning Gymnasium in Nanning, China, is
  one of many ruthless training camps in China
• Here children, some as young as five, battle to complete the demanding routines on bars,
  rings, and mats

 

Her face etched with pain, a child trains for Olympic glory while her gymnastics trainer stands on her legs.

The
cartoon space rockets and animal astronauts on her tiny red leotard are
a stark and powerful reminder of this little girl's tender age as she
trains as hard as any adult athlete in the Western world.

Nanning
Gymnasium in Nanning, China, is one of many ruthless training camps
across the country to which parents send their children to learn how to
be champions.

But while training techniques appear
extreme to Western eyes, they provide an insight into why China's
athletes at London 2012 seem so easily able to swim, dive, lift and
shoot their way to victory.

Gymnastic stars are known for starting
at an incredibly early age, and this group of children appear no
different as they battled to complete the demanding routines on bars,
rings, and mats.

Boys and girls who looked no older than
five or six-years-old were tasked with swinging on beams, hanging from
pairs of rings and bounding across floor mats during the physically
strenuous training sessions.

The youngsters at the s... >>>