Rio 2016 Fu Yuanhui: China falls in love with Olympic swimmer and her 'mystic energy'
Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui hoped she’d wow the world with her backstroke. Instead she is breaking the Chinese internet with her hilarious post-swim interviews.
“Whoooaah! I was so fast!,” explained Fu after she clocked 58.95 seconds, coming in third in the women’s 100m backstroke semifinal on Monday. “I didn’t hold back…I used all of my mystic energy!”
That clip quickly went viral in China and beyond. Her legions of fans have since been creating emojis, videos and cartoons in her likeness. Her followers on Weibo, China’s main social media platform, have climbed from about 550,000 before the Olympics started to nearly 4 million as of Wednesday.
“I have completely fallen in love with you,” said one commenter on Weibo.
“Everyone will love her after seeing the interview,” said another.
China’s netizens were up in arms earlier in the week when Australia’s Mack Horton labelled Chinese swimmer Sun Yang a “drug cheat.”
