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Guo Jingjing
 |
| Personal information |
| Full name |
Guo Jingjing |
| Born |
October 15, 1981 (age 33)
Baoding, Hebei, China |
| Residence |
Beijing |
| Height |
5'4" |
| Sport |
| Country |
People's Republic of China |
| Event(s) |
3m springboard,
3m synchro |
| Partner |
Wu Minxia |
| Former partner(s) |
Fu Mingxia |
| Retired |
Guo has recently announced that she will retire after helping China sign major sponsorship deals. |
|
|
Guo Jingjing (
Chinese:
郭晶晶;
pinyin:
Guō Jīngjīng; born October 15, 1981 in
Baoding,
Hebei) is a female
diver from the
People's Republic of China. Guo is tied with her partner
Wu Minxia for winning the most
Olympic medals (6) of any female diver
[1] and she won the 3m springboard event at five consecutive World Championships. She announced her retirement in 2011.
Career
She took up diving when she was six years old at the Baoding Training
Base. She started training in competitive diving in 1988, and was
selected to dive for the Chinese national team in 1992. Guo first
competed at the Olympics in
1996. Her coach leading up to the 2008 Olympics was Zhong Shaozhen.
During the
2004 Summer Olympics She won a gold medal in the 3 meter women's synchronized springboard along with
Wu Minxia, before winning her first individual Olympic gold in the 3 meter women's springboard.
[2]
After the 2004 Summer Olympics, Guo became a Chinese national sports figure in the public eye, with a contract with
McDonald's,
as well as multiple other endorsement contracts. She was later banned
by the national team for excessive commercial activities, but was
accepted back to the team when she agreed to focus on diving and give up
many promotional activities.
[3]
She was also made to surrender nearly 4 million dollars to the Chinese
government, money that she had earned while doing these endorsements.
Tian Liang, a fellow Olympic gold medalist offered the same deal as Guo,
however declined to pay back the money to the government, and was
excluded from the Olympic games. Guo is the leading member of the
Chinese national women's diving team, and is known in China as "The
Princess of Diving". Guo announced on November 23, 2006, that she would
retire following the
2008 Summer Olympics.
[4]
Guo won two more gold medals at the 2008 Olympic Games in
Beijing. At the end of the Beijing Games, Guo became the most decorated female Olympic diver,
[5] and tied fellow Chinese athlete
Fu Mingxia, and Americans
Pat McCormick and
Greg Louganis with the most gold medals (four).
[6] Guo won the gold medal in the women's 3-meter springboard with a total of 415.35 points. The silver medal was awarded to
Yuliya Pakhalina of Russia, whose score was 398.60, followed by Wu Minxia of China with 389.85 for the bronze medal.
[7]
In synchronized diving, the defending champions Guo, and Wu, who won
the event in the 2004 Athens Olympics and three World Championships, had
led the entire competition in Beijing, winning the gold medal, with
Yuliya Pakhalina and Anastasia Pozdnyakova of Russia, who posted 323.61,
winning Silver.
[8][9]
It was confirmed in January 2011 that Guo has decided to retire, and she will not compete in the
2012 Summer Olympics.
She was quoted as saying, "I think I have fulfilled my task, so the
London Games is not what I have in mind now. The chances should be left
to other talents in the team."
[10]
Personal life
Guo's social activities after the Athens Olympics were the subject of
scrutiny in Mainland Chinese and Hong Kong media news outlets.
[11] Guo made entertainment headlines in China when the
paparazzi published a photograph of her dining with Kenneth Fok Kai-kong, the grandson of the late Hong Kong business tycoon
Henry Fok. Guo did not deny the relationship, and has been photographed many times with Kenneth Fok in public.
[12] The couple married in Hong Kong on November 8, 2012.
Guo, along with other divers on her team, suffers from diving-related health problems such as poor eyesight.
[13]
Major achievements
- 1995 World Cup – 1st Synchronized Platform & 3m Synchronized Springboard
- 1996 Olympic Games – 5th Platform
- 1998 World Championships – 2nd 3m Springboard
- 1999 World Cup – 1st 3m Synchronized Springboard; 3rd 3m Springboard
- 2000 World Cup – 1st 3m Springboard; 2nd 3m Synchronized Springboard
- 2000 Olympic Games – 2nd 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2001 World Championships – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2002 World Cup – 1st 1m & 3m Springboard; 2nd 3m Synchronized Springboard
- 2002 Asian Games – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2003 FINA Diving Grand Prix (Australia/China) – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2003 World Championships – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2004 World Cup – 1st 3m Synchronized Springboard; 2nd 3m Springboard
- 2004 Olympic Games – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2005 World Championships – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2006 Asian Games – 1st 3m Synchronized Springboard
- 2007 World Championships – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
- 2008 Olympic Games 1st Women's 3m Synchronised Springboard
- 2008 Olympic Games 1st Women's 3m Springboard
- 2009 World Championships – 1st 3m Springboard & Synchronized Springboard
