As the only cyclist to attend two editions of the UCI top-notch World Tour's Tour of Guangxi, China's Wang Meiyin is called "No.1 Brother" by his fans, mainly because of the "No.1" records that he created in road cycling.

After five stages in the 2018 Tour of Guangxi, Wang won the "Popular Award", and is ranked 70th out of the 120 entrants. In the same contest last year, Wang won the "Brave Award".

Although there's still a gap between Wang and top European cyclists, the "No.1 Brother" could still be the best Chinese representative of this sport.

Wang Meiyin joined Bahrain-Merida Pro Cycling Team, the world's top-ranking cycling team in 2016, and is the third professional Chinese cyclist to qualify for the world's top events after Xu Gang and Ji Cheng.

After transferring from Hengxiang Team to Bahrain-Merida, Wang at first went through a long adaptation period. He was either knocked out, had to withdraw, or simply could not finish a single race during the past two years, but, after a lot of hard work, Wang finally qualified for the Tour of Guangxi.

As the Tour of Guangxi is the last station of this season's World Tour, Bahrain-Merida didn't demand anything particular of Wang. However, Wang believed he needed sprint, regardless of his position in the peloton. He said he would continue to try hard in the last stage, the Guilin Circles.

Since joining Bahrain-Merida, Wang mainly competes in Europe. Dating back to his early days in the group, Wang said that he couldn't follow the pace of the competition: "Their speed was so fast that I couldn't catch up with them."

The training with Bahrain-Merida has allowed him to be more independent; the team gave him tasks, and then he worked towards accomplishing them.

“The coach of a professional team is not like the domestic ones, who are willing to press you to finish the work,” Wang said. “If you want to stay alive, you have to complete the training assignment, otherwise you will lose the opportunity to compete in the high-level events.”

Wang believes that that, currently, cycling is progressing fast in China, as more and more ordinary people learn about and fall in love with the sport. That will benefit future cyclists more than the current generation.

"China's cycling won't rise that quickly, but there are an amount of rising cyclists who serve for second-tier or third-tier clubs in the World Tour in Europe," Wang said.

With the expanding of mega cities and the popularity of private vehicles, the space for bicycles in China is lessening, objectively impacting the growth of road cycling as a sport.

Besides, the sport is currently dominated by sports schools in China, and the long process an athlete has to take from a provincial team to national one would weed out a lot of participants regardless of if they are talented or not. So, the development route for professional cyclists in China is decidedly narrow.

Originally, Wang practiced long-distance running when he was a teenager. When he entered Qufu sports school in Shandong Province, he started to learn about cycling – his love for the sport came later than most other professionals.

Wang thinks the high amount of professional cyclists in Europe is a natural consequence of their cycling culture. For example, the Tour de France and Giro d'Italia have a history of over 100 years, and their cycling facilities are more mature.

“The more high-level cycling events held in China, the more foreign teams will come to take part. The high anticipation for the Chinese market will also make European teams import more Chinese cyclists,” said Wang, showing his confidence in the future of China's cycling.

“That will make Chinese cyclists to improve as well, and we will develop better and better,” he said.

As for what advantages come from being on a high-level team, Wang said, “This season, most of my competitions were in Europe, and my performance is better than last year's.” 

He added, “Recently, I did well in a classic competition in Italy, last year I didn't even finish it. This year, I not only finished the race but helped my teammate win.”

In the next couple of years, the nearly 30-year-old Chinese cycling pioneer aims to take part in the big, historic tours such as the Tour de France and Giro d'Italia.