ABSTRACT
The system of cultivating elite athletes is a complex systematic project involving politics, culture, education, economy, and society, etc. Competitive sports play an essential role in the development of the Chinese sports system. The traditional competitive sports talent mechanism has cultivated many excellent athletes for China; however, there are many challenges in this new era. The elite athlete training system began in the 1950s and has trained thousands of elite athletes and has made significant contributions to the development of competitive sports in China. Since 1984 when the People's Republic of China participated in the Olympic Games for the very first time, most of its Olympic champions have been trained by various sports schools. Swimming is the foundation of competitive sports, but for the gold medal of the Olympic Games, the number of gold medals was lower than that of track and field.
