Following Deng Xiaoping’s domestic and foreign policies, which was based on economic reformation and opening up to the outside world, the 1980s saw a profound transformation of Chinese society. China’s ambition was to achieve modernisation and to catch up with the Western capitalist world. Chinese sport played an important part in stimulating the nation’s enthusiasm and in motivating the Chinese people towards modernisation. It began with the restoration of China’s International Olympic Committee (IOC) membership in 1979. Subsequently, other international sports organisations recognised the membership of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Chinese athletes began to compete at major international sports events where they achieved some noticeable successes.1 China’s sports success at international sports competitions became a symbolic means of catching up with, and even overtaking some strong Western powers. Chinese athletes were freed from the Cultural Revolution, but they undertook new political commitments in the new era as the politicisation of sport continued.