A few days ago, four icemakers from Shougang Park Sports, Liu Yongliang, Yuan Xinghui, Hao Zhiguo and Zhang Zhenjun, were invited to start the “Journey to the Winter Olympic Games” at the Capital Indoor Stadium, ensuring the ice surfaces for events including figure skating and short track speed skating. At the scheduled time, they will provide icemaking services for the exquisitely skilled athletes of the Winter Olympic Games from all over the world, show the elegant demeanor of Shougang people once again and polish the golden business card of Shougang’s services with the spirit of craftsmanship.

To outsiders, icemaking means freezing water into ice. In fact, the process of making ice surfaces is very complicated. Some say that icemakers are craftsmen who “finely craft” ice, which is no exaggeration. Errors must be strictly controlled at every step, with accuracy at the level of millimeters or even microns. There are even strict requirements for the technique, use level and speed of sprinkling water, as well as the ground temperature and indoor humidity. At the Capital Indoor Stadium, the reporter saw Liu Yongliang and his colleagues discussing ice surfaces. Liu Yongliang told the reporter, “During the Winter Olympic Games, three venues in the Capital Indoor Stadium will undertake the task of guaranteeing ice surfaces for competitions including short track speed skating and figure skating, as well as the training of athletes from all over the world during the competition. Since the service objects are different, the requirements for icemaking are also different. For example, for short track speed skating and figure skating, there are certain differences in the hardness and smoothness of the ice surface. In order to better serve the athletes of the Winter Olympic Games, the most important task at present is to perfectly master the icemaking equipment as soon as possible so as to ensure the icemaking quality.” Since he arrived at the Capital Indoor Stadium in December, Liu Yongliang and his colleagues have sorted out and familiarized themselves with the tools and painting equipment used for ice-making at the venue, and practiced the standard ice pouring method of the Winter Olympic Games with two cars. On December 24, they began to clean up the ice surfaces of the figure skating training gym and Winter Olympic competition venues, preparing for the ice-making by French ice makers in January.

The four ice makers from Shougang who were invited to serve the Winter Olympic Games said, “It is an honor and a rare learning opportunity to serve ice and snow in China and the Winter Olympic Games. We will learn from foreign icemaking professionals with open minds, improve our business level, do our duty, go all out, complete the service guarantee tasks in accordance with high standards and make the due contributions of Shougang people to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games.”