Lu Li was fifteen years old — or so the record showed — when she mounted the uneven bars at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics and earned a perfect 10.0, becoming the first gymnast from Hunan province to win an Olympic gold medal and the second Chinese female gymnast to do so, following in the footsteps of Ma Yanhong.
The interview below, published in August 2006 by the Hunan Daily and translated here from Chinese, finds Lu Li fourteen years later — living in Gilroy, California, coaching alongside her husband, and reflecting on her career and her relationship to the sport: driven by curiosity rather than obligation, and by a stubbornness she wears as a point of pride. She crossed half of Changsha alone at age six to sneak into a gymnasium. She arrived at Peking University having never attended regular school and insisted on being treated like any other student. The interview is, among other things, a portrait of that temperament — and of what became of a champion after the spotlight moved on.
One detail is worth noting before reading. The article lists her birth year as 1977. With a late-August birthday, she would have still been fourteen at the time of the Olympics, turning fifteen weeks later. Her official competition record, however, lists a birth year of 1976, making her fifteen in Barcelona, turning sixteen weeks later. Why her birth year was altered is unclear, particularly since her real birth year of 1977 would have made her age-eligible for the 1992 Olympics. (It is my understanding that she uses a 1977 birth year in the United States.)
At any rate, enjoy the interview below!
