Du Zhaocai, director of China’s Athletics Administrative Center (CAAC), told China Daily … ”We lack overall depth. Even in our strong events, such as race walking, there were only 10 athletes competing at the National Junior Championships last year, which shows we lack young talent.”
To deal with the situation, Du said the CAAC had set up about 100 training bases throughout the country to identify talent.
“We have to face reality and take measures to solve the problem,” Du said.
This year, the Continental Cup in Croatia in September and the Asian Games in China’s Guangzhou in December loom as the two most important events for the Chinese team, which started its winter training camps last month.
Foreign coaches have been invited to join the camps and the walkers and women's middle and long distance runners will train in Italy and Kenya later this month.