Yang Yang (speed skater, born 1976)


Yang Yang is a Chinese sports administrator, retired short track speed skater, and businesswoman. She is a two-time Olympic Champion from 2002 Winter Olympics and a six-time Overall World Champion for 1997–2002. Known as Yang Yang , she was formerly a member of the Chinese national short track team. Yang is one of the most accomplished short track speed skaters of all time having won 34 world titles, including six Overall World Championships. She is the first person to have won six Overall World Titles and won six consecutively. Her victory in the women's 500 m short track at the 2002 Winter Olympics made her China's first-ever Winter Olympics gold medalist. She added a second gold in the women's 1000 m short track at the same Games and has also won two silver and a bronze medal. Yang retired after 2003 World Championships but was persuaded to return as a player-coach during 2004–2005 season to prepare for 2006 Winter Olympics where she won the bronze medal in 1000m race. She retired again after the Games.

Naming

Yang, born in 1976, is sometimes known as Yang Yang, to differentiate her from the speed skater named Yang Yang, born in 1977 and known as Yang Yang. The two share the family name but have distinct characters of their given name. The pinyin romanisation renders the names indistinguishable in letters as well as in tone.
The "" identifier was used as a way to distinguish her from the younger Yang Yang. Originally, the older Yang Yang was known as Yang Yang for "large", as she is older than Yang Yang for "small"; however, she objected to the "L" identifier, changing it to "A" for "August", her birth month. Although the younger Yang Yang is now retired from competition and there is no longer a need to distinguish between the two in results, Yang Yang still used the identifier in competition, considering it a part of her identity.

Retirement

Yang Yang was chosen to be one of 12,000 torchbearers to carry the Olympic torch for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, and on November 22, 2009, she ran a portion of the Prince Edward Island legs.
Yang was elected as an IOC member in 2010 becoming mainland China's fourth IOC member. and founding member of the Chinese Athlete Education Foundation. She held the IOC position until 2018.
In 2013, Yang co-founded the Feiyang Skating Centre in Shanghai, a new double-rink facility with an Olympic-sized rink upstairs and a recreational-sized rink downstairs, built to promote ice sports in China.
On 7 Sept 2019, Yang was elected to vice-presidency of Wada.
In 2021, Yang became a high profile supporter of UNHCR, the UN refugee agency. She amplifies Chinese social media content highlighting the power of sport to transform the lives of people fleeing conflict and persecution.