get that many. Yes, Weifang is a city of
unemployed professional athletes, but
it’s low on people who want to pay for
training. Even the fitness gym I wound
up joining — the nicest one in the
city — never had more than 10 clients
in-house at a time. Paying to exercise
is still a new concept in China. Paying
to fight is so inconceivable that I
generally had to explain it several
times before people understood. And
even then, they often thought I was
making it up.
AFTER A COUPLE OF WEEKS of train-
ing in the fundamentals at Weifang
Sports School, it was time to move
to Changle, the even more remote
district where I’d be working. Des-
perate to find people to train with, I
visited a san da gym that was open
only on Saturdays. The coach turned
out to be a heavyweight judo and
Chinese-wrestling major from Wei-
fang Sports School.
He said that apart from teaching
san da to children, he hadn’t trained
since he graduated and that he’d
gained 65 pounds. I paid him to train
with me, but even though his skill
level was much better than mine,
after just a few minutes, he collapsed
on the floor. Why? Because most men
in rural China, including elite ath-
letes, smoke. Once they stop training,
they often add alcohol and overeat-
ing to the mix. Consequently, they
get out of shape.
I hoped he’d be as excited as I was
to connect and therefore would be
motivated to get back in shape, but
he wasn’t. He just needed to earn
money. Training with me was like
hardship duty — he’d rather do any-
thing else for the same pay.
AT THE GYM, I learned that a former
national wrestling team member
who also trained there had sent word
that he wanted to work out with me.
I was excited when I heard that he
weighed 240 pounds because it’s
rare to have someone that big to
wrestle with in China.
We did five rounds of pummeling
and technique practice. After that
short session, he was exhausted, but
at least he said he wanted to train
with me again. He seemed to have
good, although not phenomenal,
After coming to Weifang, however,
I really soured on the system. I saw
firsthand how it chewed people up
and spit them out.WHEN WE FINISHED TRAINING one
day, I took Zhengtong and his
brother out for dinner and asked
them why they believed Chinese
parents would send their kids to a
sports school. They cited two com-
pelling reasons.
Zhengtong’s brother said it was
because when they
were young, Weifang
was still a third- or
fourth-tier city.
Everyone was poor,
and the parents
often had no educa-
tion. They saw very
little opportunity
for their children, so
why not just send
them to a sports
school and play the
Olympic lottery? If
the child made it to
the Olympics, the
family would be rich.
If not, the child could
return home and
take the same menial
job he would have
had if he hadn’t gone
off to a sports school.
Zhengtong added
that when they were
young, he and his
brother were ter-
rible students who
misbehaved horribly.
If they hadn’t been
sent to a sports school, they might
have become criminals and dropped
out of school anyway.
It made sense, and in some way,
I wish we had sports schools in the
United States because a lot of kids
are just not suited for academics. On
the other hand, it made me feel sad
for my friends there. My monthly sal-
ary now exceeded the average annual
income in Weifang, and as sports
graduates, they might never even hit
that average.Antonio Graceffo’s book
Warrior Odyssey is available
at blackbeltmag.com/store.strength, which I thought was odd
for a former heavyweight. When I
asked him for details, it turned out
that when he was a national cham-
pion, he weighed 140 pounds. It’s
insane to think that an athlete could
gain 90 pounds simply because he
stopped training.
His strength was good as he
wrestled, which is as much a result
of muscular development as it is of
technique. If you’ve ever grappled
with a 70-year-old Brazilian jiu-jitsu
black belt or an old
silat or kung fu mas-
ter, you know what
I mean. In the exact
pathways of their
accustomed move-
ment, they retain
their strength well
into old age.EVENTUALLY, I
SETTLED my training-
partner issues by pay-
ing Zhengtong and
his brother to drive
up to Changle several
times a week and
work with me. Zheng-
tong also helped me
hire coach Wang, a
graduate of Weifang
Sports School whose
only source of income
was teaching boxing
to 20 students on the
weekends.
Just like all the
other ex-fighters
I met in Weifang,
Wang had gained 45
pounds since graduating. He smoked,
drank, overate and never trained. To
get through a training session of 16
rounds, I found that I needed to have
at least two paid coaches who would
alternate rounds — or else one of
them would suffer a heart attack.
When I was at Shanghai University
of Sport, I had a fairly positive opin-
ion of the Chinese school system.
All my teammates had told me how
happy they were to have grown up
in a sports school. One of them said,
“From age 9, I got to live with my
friends, and all we ever did was eat,
sleep, play and wrestle. What could
be better?”Paying to
fight is so
inconceivable
that I
generally had
to explain it
several times
before people
understood.
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