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Yuan Wenqing
Personal information
Nickname	武术王子 "The Prince of Wushu"
Born	1966 (age 58–59); Shanxi, China
Occupation(s)	Martial artist, athlete, coach
Sport
Sport	Wushu
Event(s)	Changquan, Daoshu, Gunshu
Team	Shanxi Wushu Team
Coached by	Pang Lin Tai and Zhang Ling Mei
Retired	1994, 1997
Medal record
Representing China
Men's Wushu Taolu
World Championships
Invitational World Championships
Asian Games
Asian Championships

Yuan Wenqing (Chinese: 原文庆; pinyin: Yuánwén qìng; born 1966) is a retired professional wushu taolu athlete from Shanxi, China. Nicknamed 'the prince of wushu,' he was known for his explosive speed and power, and is still widely regarded as one of the greatest wushu practitioners of all time. It has been said that in the sport of wushu, the 1970s belonged to Jet Li, the 1980s to Zhao Changjun, and the 1990s to Yuan Wenqing.^[1]

Career

Early career

Yuan started practicing wushu around the age of eight. At the age of 10, he entered his city's amateur sports school and in 1977, he joined the Shanxi Provincial Wushu Team and began to train under Pang Lin Tai and later Zhang Ling Mei.^[2]^[3]

Rise to stardom

In 1982, he won his first national championship gold medal which was in shuangdao.^[4] After having several more national championship victories, he was chosen to compete in the 1989 Asian Wushu Championships where he achieved a gold medal sweep to win the men's all around title. Yuan was then chosen by the Chinese Wushu Association to aid them in choreographing the first set of compulsory routines to be used by the International Wushu Federation.^[5] The CWA used his changquan and gunshu routines and made minor adjustments to make them easier to execute, and the routines were later recorded by Yuan the same year.

A year later in 1990, Yuan competed in the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing, wushu's inaugural debut at the Asian Games, and won the gold medal in men's changquan.^[6] Yuan then competed in the 1993 National Games of China with much success. Later that year, he competed in the 1993 World Wushu Championships and became the world champion in men's daoshu.^[7]^[5] He returned to the 1994 Asian Games in Hiroshima, Japan, and won once again in men's changquan despite a recent injury.^[4]^[8]

He briefly retired from competitive wushu and acted in Iron Monkey 2 alongside Donnie Yen in 1996.^[3] He returned to competition in 1997 by request of his coach, Pang Lin Tai, who wished to have a successful competitive season during his last year as coach of the team. Yuan was chosen to compete in the 1997 World Wushu Championships in Rome, Italy,^[9] where he became the world champion in changquan. His last competition was the 1997 National Games of China where he won gold medals in changquan and daoshu/gunshu combined.^[5] He finally announced his formal retirement from wushu at the age of 31.

Teaching

In 2004, Yuan opened a wushu school in Shanxi.^[10] His students competed and achieved many victories at the Hong Kong International Wushu Grand Prix in 2007 which marked the 10-year anniversary of the return of Hong Kong to China.^[11]

Competitive history

Year	Event	CQ	DS	GS	AA
1983	National Championships
1984	National Championships	?	?	?	5
1985	National Championships	?		?	4
1986	National Championships
1987	National Games	?	?	?
1988	International Championships
1989	Asian Championships
1990	International Championships
1990	Asian Games	1	1	1
1993	National Games		?	?
1993	World Championships
1994	Asian Games	1	1	1
1995	Retired
1996	Retired
1997	World Championships
1997	National Games		?	?

Legacy

In the World Wushu Championships, Yuan's changquan and gunshu routines were used from 1993 to 2001. His routines are still used by Group B athletes who compete in the World Junior Wushu Championships since the event's conception in 2006.^[12]

Film

Yuan Wenqing co-starred alongside Donnie Yen in the 1996 film Iron Monkey 2, directed by Yuen Woo-Ping. In the film, Wenqing played the character Jin, a peasant with extraordinary martial prowess who gets embroiled in an arms smuggling plot.