On the first weekend of December, Chongli, known as the “snow capital,” will receive more than 6,000 skiers and amateur enthusiasts from around the world daily. According to the overall plan for the joint bid by Beijing and Zhangjiakou for the Winter Olympics, the “Zhangjiakou competition zone” in Hebei Province may produce 50 gold medals in snow events. The photo shows the early morning scene at Wanlong Ski Resort in Chongli. Photo by Chen Jian.
The Genting Ski Resort, jointly invested in by Malaysia’s Genting Group and Excellence Group, has introduced high-speed chairlifts from Austria’s Doppelmayr. With a speed of 5 meters per second, the over 1,800-meter-long cableway can reach the top in just 8 minutes. The seats in the cabins are equipped with instant heating. In cases of strong high-altitude winds, the lift can automatically suspend operation. Photo by Shi Jiasheng.
China News Service, Zhangjiakou, December 5 (Reporter Chen Jian) For Zhangjiakou City in Hebei Province, which neighbors Beijing, December 2014 is all about skiing and the Winter Olympics bid. On the 6th, the FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup, Far East Cup, and the 10th China Chongli International Ski Festival will kick off. On the first weekend of December, Chongli County, with a population of 126,000, will see over 6,000 skiers and amateur skiing enthusiasts from around the world every day.
During recent interviews, China News Service reporters found that the “Zhangjiakou competition zone” plays a crucial role in the overall plan for the Beijing-Zhangjiakou joint bid for the Winter Olympics and may award 50 gold medals in snow events.
Natural Advantages Rooted in Snow
In the first week of December, a strong cold front swept through North China. Chongli, located at the western end of the Yanshan Mountain Range and at the transition zone between the North China Plain and the Inner Mongolia Plateau, also experienced sub-zero temperatures during the day. Since early November, several winter snowfalls have occurred in Chongli.
With clear skies overhead, the snow on the slopes reflects the sunlight. At Wanlong Ski Resort not far from Chongli County town, snowmaking machines have been spraying fresh snow onto ski runs since the early morning. Under the glow of the rising sun, fine snow fills the air like pure white mist, swirling among the rolling mountain ranges that look like ocean waves.
Obata Junji, 56, leads 280 Japanese skiers who arrived early at Wanlong Ski Resort for training.
Born in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan, Obata told reporters that he learned to ski at age 5 and began competing at age 10. After 2006, for eight consecutive years, he led Japanese athletes to Chongli for pre-season training ahead of the FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup.
“Especially from November to December each year, the temperatures at ski resorts in Japan are not low enough, and the snow is relatively soft, failing to meet the requirements for competitive training,” explained Obata, who serves as the strengthening committee chairman of the All Japan Ski Association.
He said that for international top-tier skiing competitions such as the Winter Olympics, World Cup, and World Championships, ski runs need to be hardened. While Japan receives more snowfall than North China, in early winter, higher temperatures and humidity in Japan prevent the creation of sufficiently hard snow surfaces required for competitive events.
The Indispensable “Zhangjiakou Competition Zone”
In July 2014, Beijing officially became a candidate city for the 2022 Winter Olympics; in January 2015, it will submit a “bid report” to the International Olympic Committee. The final decision will be announced by the end of July 2015. Although the bid report has not yet been released, reporters found during interviews that the overall planning layout of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou bid is becoming increasingly clear.
According to the plan, ice events for the 2022 Winter Olympics are scheduled to be held in venues within Beijing’s urban area. Snow events will be divided between the Yanqing and Zhangjiakou zones. Apart from bobsleigh, luge, and alpine skiing events, which will take place in the “Yanqing competition zone” located in the suburbs of Beijing between Beijing and Zhangjiakou, all other snow events will be held in the core competition area centered around the Taizicheng Ice and Snow Town in Chongli County, Zhangjiakou City. This includes 2 major events, 6 sub-events, and 50 individual events. In other words, the “Zhangjiakou competition zone” will host over half of the total Winter Olympics events and award 50 gold medals. Moreover, the ski resorts in Chongli hosting snow events are highly concentrated, with each resort within a 10-minute drive of the others.
Li Li, the young and graceful Party Secretary of Chongli County, never misses a chance to talk about why Chongli is a natural choice for the Winter Olympics. Her confidence is palpable.
— Chongli typically sees snowfall starting in mid-to-late October, with ski resorts opening in early November and remaining operational until early April of the following year. The snow season usually lasts over 150 days, with snow accumulation often exceeding half a meter. The average winter temperature is around -12°C, with an average wind force of level 2, making it suitable for winter sports.
— The mountain slopes in Chongli are moderate, mostly ranging between 5 and 35 degrees, ideal for competitive skiing. It is home to Asia’s earliest-opening ski resorts and boasts four fully functional and uniquely featured ski resorts: Genting, Wanlong, Dolomiti, and Great Wall Ridge. There are 82 ski runs of varying difficulty levels, 24 lifts and magic carpets with a total hourly capacity of 40,000 people, earning it the reputation of being “one of the most ideal natural regions in China for developing the ski tourism industry.”
— The journey from Chongli to Beijing is a direct 220-kilometer drive via expressway. The Beijing-Zhangjiakou high-speed railway is set to begin construction soon, and once operational, the trip from Beijing Qinghe Station to Zhangjiakou Taizicheng Station will take only 50 minutes.
A Mountain Life Centered Around Snow
Yue Zhiyun, 54, has dark skin and is not one for small talk. In 2004, this middle-aged man responded to the call and built his own homestay-style guesthouse right in his yard, just two kilometers from Wanlong Ski Resort, offering both food and lodging.
Yue named his farmhouse “Huangtuzuoyihao Courtyard.” Stepping into the “reception hall,” you’ll find a roughly 100-square-meter space equipped with treadmills, pull-up bars, a pool table, and a ping-pong table. Further inside, quiet corridors on both sides lead to standard guest rooms typical of northern farmhouses: a large double kang bed takes up most of the room, heated by natural gas, keeping it warm and cozy, with snow-white sheets. In front of the window sits a simple, single-person wooden table and chair set. The private bathroom is fitted with a flush toilet and an electric water heater for showers. Such a “kang-bed standard room” costs 150 yuan per day.
Is business good? Yue answers with a hint of pride: “Weekends are fully booked in both summer and autumn—you have to make a reservation by phone.”
Does running a farmhouse make money? “I employ eight or nine people year-round, and my annual income is two to three hundred thousand yuan—always.”
As if afraid of showing off too much, he adds: “The profits go into renovations and expansions. We started with just six rooms, and now we have 37. I’ve invested over 3.8 million yuan so far, and all debts are finally paid off!”
Yue smiles contentedly and says he plans to build a karaoke room in the yard after next spring. “Most of the tourists and skiers are young Beijingers who love to have fun.”
“My yard is only this big. If we get even more guests in the future, I’ll have to tear down the bungalows and build a three-story building. With the Olympics right at our doorstep, even more people will come.” He looks around his little world with confidence.
Social Capital Showing Its Strength
In fact, Wanlong Ski Resort, which Yue Zhiyun is optimistic about, is just one of the “pioneers” that have gradually gained international recognition for Chongli’s ski industry over the past decade.
Long before that, there were already people who, with naivety and determination, pursued their own "snow and ice dreams." His name is Shan Zhaojian, China's first national champion in alpine skiing competitions at altitudes of 3,000 meters.
In 1996, Shan Zhaojian and his friends came to Chongli, hiring local farmers to carry snow up the mountain in bags priced at three or five jiao each. They manually built a 300-meter ski slope. "Ski enthusiasts" would ski down the makeshift slope and then take a 212 jeep back up the mountain, repeating the process over and over.
That was Chongli’s first ski resort, named "Saibei," which means "beyond the frontier, north of the Great Wall."
The year 2008 marked a turning point in the deep bond between the Olympic movement and the Chinese people. That year, Beijing successfully hosted the Summer Olympics. It was also in 2008 that Malaysia’s Genting Group and Excellence Group decided to invest in building the largest single ski resort in China—Genting Secret Garden Resort in Chongli. This laid a "milestone" for the major development of Chongli’s ski industry.
Recently, reporters boarded the fully enclosed cable car at Genting Ski Resort. A sign inside the cabin indicated that the equipment was provided by Doppelmayr, the world-leading Austrian company. The cable car travels at a speed of 5 meters per second, and the entire 1,800-meter-long cableway can reach the top in just 8 minutes. The seats in the cabin are instantly heated. In cases of strong high-altitude winds, the cable car can automatically hover in place.
Genting Secret Garden Ski Resort not only offers competitive skiing but also includes services such as sports and leisure, health and wellness, summer retreats, and conferences and exhibitions. According to the Beijing-Zhangjiakou bid plan for the Winter Olympics, nearly half of the 50 snow events in the "Zhangjiakou competition zone" are located within the planned area of Genting Ski Resort.
Zhao Qiong, who moved to Australia with his family at the age of 12, also joined the Excellence Group’s Australian office in 2008. Last October, he was transferred to work in "a place I had never heard of before"—Chongli—where he serves as the marketing director of Genting.
This young man, who wears Hermes perfume, speaks with a Beijing accent, and is sharp yet approachable, said that in 2013, the Genting Group and Excellence Group brought in at least 15 senior executives from around the world, covering departments such as construction, finance, human resources, and marketing, all coming to work in Chongli together.
Currently, the first phase of the Genting Secret Garden Ski Resort covers a construction area of 155,000 square meters, including a 130,000-square-meter five-star hotel, 35 ski runs, and 3 cableways. But Zhao Qiong said, "This is just the first phase of the five-phase investment." For winter skiing alone, the group plans to develop 80 ski runs, totaling about 70 kilometers in length, along with 22 high-speed cableways, totaling approximately 30 kilometers.
At Genting Ski Resort, employees in departments such as coaching and ski equipment rental are "seasonal workers," hired for about five months each year. But even for new employees, the pre-job training lasts a full month. Isn’t that costly? Zhao Qiong insists that it’s "absolutely necessary": Genting and Excellence Group are service-oriented, so they must strengthen management and cultivate talent. Pre-service training is just the first step.
The "Great Wall Museum" by the ski runs
Andrea Coatti, 30, was born in a small town at the foot of the Italian Alps, a two-hour drive from Milan. When he recalls starting to ski at the age of 5, a smile spreads across his face. By a stroke of fate, reporters recently met the slender, bearded Andrea in Chongli.
He is now a ski resort designer, providing consulting advice to resort owners on planning and constructing ski resorts—for example, how to design ski run layouts based on the unique mountain terrain of a location; what technical specifications must be met for ski runs used in different competitive events, such as giant slalom or moguls (freestyle skiing ski skills); where jump platforms should be built and how to integrate them perfectly with other facilities...
For the past nine years, Andrea has come to Chongli to work every ski season. At the same time, he has also taken on ski resort planning and design projects in northeastern China, Xinjiang, and other regions.
Andrea said, "I love snowboarding. There’s nothing better than turning this hobby into a career!" He has noticed that attitudes toward skiing among Chinese people have changed greatly in recent years. In the past, many people would ski only once a winter, for just two hours, treating it as a one-time experience. Now, more and more Chinese people see skiing as a way of life.
This ski season, Andrea invited his personal friend, Italian freestyle skiing athlete Manuel Dioli, to visit Chongli for sightseeing and travel.
Andrea said that when foreign athletes come to China to compete, they always hope to experience the region’s unique cultural traditions and local customs more deeply. Pointing to Manuel beside him, he said, "He loves being able to see the Great Wall while skiing here."
Zhangjiakou City, Hebei Province, where Chongli is located, has since ancient times been a place where Han, Mongolian, Hui, and Manchu cultures intersect. It is home to sections of the Great Wall built during eight dynasties—Yan, Qin, Han, Northern Wei, Northern Qi, Tang, Jin, and Ming—totaling 1,476 kilometers, with over 1,000 beacon towers. As a result, Zhangjiakou is also known as the "Great Wall Museum."
The "Zhangjiakou-Khalkha Road," as famous as the Silk Road and the Ancient Tea Horse Road, began in the Ming Dynasty and flourished in the Qing Dynasty. Starting from Zhangjiakou, it led to Khalkha—now Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia—and extended to Kyakhta in Russia, forming an ancient trade route over 1,400 kilometers long, known as the "Grassland Silk Road" and the "Grassland Tea Road."
Zhang Chunsheng, a Ph.D. graduate from Tsinghua University’s Department of Civil Engineering, is still in his 70s but has already served as the executive deputy director of the Zhangjiakou Operation Center of the Winter Olympics Bid Committee.
This gentle-spoken young man from Heilongjiang told reporters softly: For Chongli and Zhangjiakou, bidding for the Winter Olympics is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. If seized well, it can help the region achieve industrial transformation and upgrading, form an Beijing-Zhangjiakou sports tourism and leisure industry belt, and benefit the people. At the same time, it can also help more people understand the area’s profound cultural heritage and promote winter sports among hundreds of millions of people. "But the challenges are also huge. If not handled well, the opportunity could be fleeting."
Wu Weidong, executive vice mayor of Zhangjiakou City, told reporters: "Currently, Zhangjiakou should start with hardware and step up supporting construction. But bidding for and hosting the Winter Olympics is not the end goal. Our aim is to promote coordinated development in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and build Zhangjiakou into an ecological hinterland of North China and a leisure home for the Chinese people."
According to the air quality status report of 74 cities released by the Ministry of Environmental Protection, Zhangjiakou ranks first north of the Yangtze River in comprehensive air quality index[1.71%]. Chongli County has the best air quality of any county in Hebei Province. At the ski resort, the concentration of fine particulate matter PM2.5 in the air remains around 10 year-round; the concentration of negative oxygen ions in the air reaches 10,000 per cubic centimeter, several times or even more than ten times higher than in general urban areas, making it a "natural oxygen bar." (End)