SI.com - More Sports - China, U.S. Olympic Committees sign sports pact - Friday June 9, 2006 9:05PM IRVINE, Calif. (AP) -- China and the United States on Friday signed a groundbreaking document that will increase athlete and coaching exchanges and anti-doping cooperation between the nations in the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Games.Photos later... I'm bushed.
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History in the making
China, U.S. Olympic Committees ink sports agreement
Posted: Friday June 9, 2006 9:05PM; Updated: Friday June 9, 2006 10:16PM
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IRVINE, Calif. (AP) -- China and the United States on Friday signed a groundbreaking document that will increase athlete and coaching exchanges and anti-doping cooperation between the nations in the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Games.
The three-page agreement was signed by U.S. Olympic Committee Chair Peter Ueberroth and Liu Peng, president of the Chinese Olympic Committee, at the United States Olympic Committee's international office about 30 miles southwest of Los Angeles.
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"We are honored today to have the minister here to sign with us an accord between two cities, our two Olympic teams and our athletes. There is nothing better to make friends between nations than their athletes," Ueberroth said just before signing the documents.
Among other things, the agreement requires that each country receive at least one high-level sports delegation every two years and calls for greater cooperation in the fight against doping.
The agreement could also mean that the U.S. Olympic Committee will help China with its marketing plan for the 2008 Games, both men said.
The document, written in both English and Chinese, also calls for an increase in coaching and media exchanges, more joint training opportunities and exchanges between local sports clubs and other professional leagues.
Liu said China could help U.S. Olympic teams train in pingpong, badminton and diving, while China could learn from the U.S. in aquatic sports. Ueberroth said the United States might also ask for China's assistance in developing an Olympic shooting team.
"Let's go back to 1971, that's when the pingpong diplomacy first started and that's when we became friends. So our two greatest countries should keep cooperating and make our cooperation even stronger," Liu said.
China and the United States began their Olympic relationship in Lake Placid in 1980, but China won its first gold medal in the Los Angeles Games in 1984, in men's free pistol.
Ueberroth said that when 100 nations agreed to a retaliation boycott of the Los Angeles Games, China refused, and later all but six of the nations who had refused attended the Los Angeles Games. China is largely credited with bolstering the Los Angeles Games, which followed the U.S.-led boycott of the 1980 Moscow Games.
"I am grateful to China for making the 1984 Games so successful, and I would do anything to help make the Beijing Games successful," Ueberroth said.
After the signing ceremony, the U.S. Olympic Committee presented Liu a torch from the 1984 Olympics that was signed by Rafer Johnson, who lit the torch at those Games. Ueberroth said it was one of six torches that remained from those Games.
Liu presented Ueberroth a small banner bearing the logo of the 2008 Beijing Olympics before the two had champagne together.
Also at the signing ceremony was Chinese volleyball star Sun Junfang, former captain of the women's national team and a participant in the 1984 Olympics.
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