From ping-pong diplomacy to the Beijing Olympics, the importance of sports has a constant throughout China’s epic societal transformation.

But just like nearly everything else in Chinese society, contradictions have emerged in the sports scene and politics perhaps plays a bigger role than it should. We’ve seen record gold medal hauls, but also world-class athletes begging in the subway.

Li Na was able to “break the system” and reach the highest levels of tennis success, but China still can’t pull a respectable soccer team together out of 1.3 billion people.

In today’s episode, we explore the wide world of PRC sports with Stuart Wiggin, a sports reporter and columnist for China Radio International, and Shao Zhijie, a reporter for Goal.com and a former staff editor for Sports Illustrated China.

Have a question you’d like to hear discussed in a future episode? Record a brief Mp3 and send it to chinahangup@gmail.com.

Click here for the stand alone Mp3.

Click here for past episodes.

Click here to subscribe on iTunes.

Click here for RSS.

Click here to like us on Facebook.