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December 2, 2020

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‘Birdman’ Zhang flying high to make sport cool

Zhang Shupeng appears untroubled as he surveys the jagged mountains of a national park in central China — before diving head-first off a cliff to bullet down at 230 kilometers an hour.

Any potential disaster is averted when he opens a parachute and drops gently to the ground, Asia’s top wingsuit athlete in his element.

Zhang is among a different breed of Chinese sports star that is inspiring the next generation.

Zhang’s sport — one of the most extreme in the world — sees practitioners jump into the void from a mountain, a plane or a helicopter wearing a flexible, wing-shaped suit that allows ‘human flight’ in the form of a high-speed glide.

“When I walk up to the top, my pulse is racing. But during the flight I am super-serene,” 34-year-old Zhang said with a smile, seconds before jumping off the majestic Tianmen Mountain in Zhangjiajie in Hunan Province.

Custom-made in the United States, his red Batman-style suit cost more than 70,000 yuan (US$10,000) and is emblazoned with a picture of the Great Wall.

Unlike the rest of the world, where many athletes are stuck at home due to anti-COVID restrictions, China has brought the virus almost completely under control.

That means Zhang has been able to return to training.

During a jump, the air rushes into the suit whose material goes rigid and generates lift, allowing him to glide in a more horizontal trajectory.

“I feel like a bird,” explains the former world paragliding champion, who has carried out more than 3,000 wingsuit flights.

“It becomes one with my body. By changing my posture, I can turn, speed up or slow down.”

Wingsuit jumping arrived in China in 2011, when American star Jeb Corliss glided through the “Gate of Heaven”, a 130-meter-high natural arch in Tianmen Mountain, in front of local TV cameras.

Zhang attended the first edition of the world championship the following year, held at the same location, and was hooked.

He left China to train in Europe and the United States and by 2017 was among the best in the world.

“The current environment in China allows and supports the emergence of sports which give more space to the personality of the athletes. It is my dream to make the image of Chinese athletes cooler.”

The sport inevitably comes with risks, including soaring too close to a cliff edge or a sudden strong gust throwing the jumper off course.

But Zhang is sanguine in the face of danger.

“There is no dangerous sport. There are just dangerous people, who want to go beyond their capabilities or challenge themselves with every jump,” he said.




 

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