Can she become the "female version of Ding Junhui" in the future?, She is the first person in the history of the Snooker Shanghai Masters

After finishing her first trip to the Shanghai Masters World Snooker Championship, 20-year-old Shaanxi girl Bai Yulu recently returned to Dongguan, Guangdong and started training again. Next, she will fly to the UK to participate in the women's championship, continuing her dream of becoming a professional athlete competing alongside male athletes.

In the wild card round of the 2023 World Snooker Shanghai Masters, Bai Yulu became the first female player in the history of the competition. When facing Milkins, who ranked 13th in the world, Bai Yulu, who did not have a professional ranking, lost the match with a huge disparity in strength. However, she won the next game and hit a 75 run single, which was enough to increase her valuable experience points.

Slightly pink, with a neat ponytail, Bai Yulu stands out in the snooker world known as the "gentlemanly movement". Exquisite tie and fitted vest, she competes with male players on the field all year round, making her every move and gesture in front of the table very confident.

After losing the game in the morning, Bai Yulu and coach Li Jianbing entered the audience again in the afternoon. In the evening, there was also a game for O'Sullivan, which was a rare learning opportunity. Jiefang Daily's Shangguan News reporter also conducted exclusive interviews with Bai Yulu and Li Jianbing during the break from the competition, outlining a girl's snooker journey through communication.

[1]

Dongguan, a major snooker city in China, is where Ding Junhui set off. The Dongguan Youth Billiards Association is also the only youth billiards association in China. Many children come here with dreams in mind to find the key to Ding Junhui's success.

Li Jianbing, current national team coach and former professional snooker player, runs a billiards academy named after himself. Children often come from all over the country, with the youngest being only six or seven years old.

Parents pay tuition fees, which are about 30000 yuan per year. Li Jianbing is responsible for teaching, providing accommodation, and three meals a day.

At 8 o'clock in the morning, the children began their day's training. Li Jianbing will develop a training plan based on the situation of each child. Practicing for 6 to 8 hours a day and swinging the club thousands of times is a routine for children's daily lives, which can be tedious but inevitable.

Due to her parents working in Dongguan, Bai Yulu came to Dongguan to study at the age of 8 from her hometown of Weinan, Shaanxi. Father Bai Shuangjian is a staunch fan of "Billiards Emperor" Hendry. He bought a second-hand billiards table and left it at home to play with himself in his free time. Bai Yulu also followed her father to watch Hendry's game and was deeply influenced. The other girl's toy was a doll, and billiards became her only toy when she was a child.

The second-hand sports table that my father bought was a childhood toy for Bai Yulu.

Seeing his daughter's interest in billiards, Bai Shuangjian wanted to find a pool room to take her to practice. By chance, Bai Shuangjian discovered Li Jianbing's billiards academy and brought his daughter there. As a result, only snooker was practiced here, and most of them were boys. "Let's practice and give it a try first," Bai Shuangjian said without hesitation

In this way, my father's unintentional action opened the way for a female snooker player to grow.

Bai Yulu started training at the age of 10 and started participating in competitions in Guangdong Province a year later. Although it's just a youth competition, Bai Yulu can always be the focus wherever she goes, "Why is there a girl playing snooker?"

Bai Yulu participated in the filming of the CCTV documentary "Becoming Ding Junhui"

"At the beginning, there were all kinds of losses." Bai Yulu played games with boys since she was young. Although she had feelings of winning or losing, and even shed tears after losing, she recovered quickly. The next day, she picked up the club as if nothing was wrong. "Because I believe that as long as I train, one day I will win against them."

"From the age of 11 to 15, she didn't win much. Even if she won one or two games, the opponents were boys who had just learned how to play," Li Jianbing recalled.

"If someone else scores 100 goals, I would ask Yulu to score 110 goals." Li Jianbing believes that the most important skills in billiards are basic skills and logical thinking. "Girls can play snooker completely, and their skills are not much different from boys. The key is to simplify the game solving ability, which is called ball intelligence, which is related to innate intelligence and acquired training."

Bai Yulu participated in the filming of the CCTV documentary "Becoming Ding Junhui"

During the primary school stage, Bai Yulu completed her cultural studies in the evening at the ball room. After finishing elementary school, she wanted to drop out and devote herself wholeheartedly to snooker training. Parents did not block this much.

In fact, giving up reading because of playing ball is the choice of most children. How much of this is related to Ding Junhui dropping out of school early and achieving success in playing basketball. Time has passed, and Ding Junhui's training model is still being replicated. As a non Olympic sport of billiards, if you want to make a name for yourself, you will ultimately face the choice of playing or studying, which is also a difficult path that cannot be achieved simultaneously.

The only thing Li Jianbing can do is to lay a solid foundation for the children. And for Bai Yulu, he hopes to help her become the first Chinese female snooker.

[2]

Although there were pioneers like Ding Junhui in China's snooker industry, for female players, Bai Yulu has no experience to follow from her predecessors.

When Bai Yulu was about 13 years old, Bai Shuangjian chose to resign and wholeheartedly accompanied his daughter in training and going out for competitions. Only Bai Yulu's mother was still working. Li Jianbing learned about Bai Yulu's family situation and saw that she trained hard, so he finally waived her training fees.

"The cost of going out for competitions still has to be covered by oneself." Occasionally, Bai Yulu can also win some bonuses, but compared to daily travel expenses, it is still a drop in the bucket. "What can be won is usually a small domestic competition, with a prize money of around 10000 yuan for the champion. In large competitions, the prize money for the champion can be 30000 to 50000 yuan, and the competition is also fierce, making it difficult to win."

In the 2017 Chinese Youth Snooker Series Finals Youth Group, Bai Yulu once again made it to the finals. In the showdown with Xing Zihao, Bai Yulu was counterattacked by her opponent while leading 2-0, falling behind 2-3 at one point. At a critical moment, Bai Yulu remained calm and equalized the score, winning the final game against her opponent and winning her first championship in the youth group of the China Youth Championship.

Over the course of three years, from third place, runner up, to champion, step by step every year, Bai Yulu gained fame in the Chinese snooker industry.

"Sometimes I feel that day after day training is quite boring. Coach Li has also talked to me that if I give up now, such as working in the ball room, playing football will become a livelihood job; but if I persist, it is a process for a female snooker player to achieve her dreams, and the significance is completely different."

In 2014, Bai Yulu came to watch the Shanghai Masters and did not expect to one day stand on the stage of the Shanghai Masters.

Li Jianbing's circle of friends has entrepreneurs who love billiards and are optimistic about Bai Yulu's development. Starting with a sponsorship of 100000 yuan per year, Bai Yulu has a strong economic foundation to persist and her idea of career development is also more firm.

In the following years, as the runner up of the IBSF World Junior Snooker Championships, the champion of the Asian Women's Table Tennis Invitational, the runner up of the Chandigaria Championships in India, and the champion of the IBSF World Junior Snooker Championships, Bai Yulu also accumulated energy to advance to professional competitions.

[3]

In February 2023, Bai Yulu went to Thailand to participate in the World Women's Snooker Championships, which was also her first time participating in a women's snooker tour with a ranking of points.

"There are two main ways for female players to advance to the World Snooker Tour, which is a professional competition where top male players from around the world participate. One is to win the women's world championship, or win the annual women's world ranking first, with two spots available each year to advance to the World Snooker Tour. Currently, female players from the UK and Thailand are participating in the World Snooker Tour, but due to their lower rankings, Chinese fans are hardly aware of it." Li Jianbing planned for Bai Yulu, striving to spend two years to achieve her professional goals.

Almost, Bai Yulu can achieve a historic breakthrough in February.

Standing on the stage of the Women's World Championships for the first time, Bai Yulu performed outstandingly. She first scored a high score of 127 in the first round, breaking the 20-year-old world record for the highest score in a women's snooker single. Afterwards, she defeated defending champion and Thai athlete Nucharut Wangharutai, also known as the "Queen" of snooker, English general Renee Evans. In the final, Bai Yulu faced the host player Slippon, an opponent who was on par with her own strength. Unfortunately, she did not seize the opportunity and could only watch her opponent win the championship.

Bai Yulu won the championship of the Asian Championships this year

Although there were regrets, this experience opened the door to a new world for Bai Yulu and gave her more confidence in her heart. After representing the Chinese team to win the Asian Championships for the first time in March, Bai Yulu went to the UK in May and defeated the legendary female snooker player Evans in the final of the UK Women's Open, winning her first individual world women's snooker ranking championship. Her women's world ranking has also risen from 37th place to 17th place.

For almost a whole month of May, Bai Yulu trained and competed in the UK. This is also the longest period of time she has spent abroad.

First, she went to Birmingham to participate in the British Women's Open, and then to Leicester to participate in the Q School snooker audition. Bai Yulu was accompanied by her father throughout the entire journey. "We rented an apartment in Sheffield as a transfer, with a monthly rent of £ 1200, which is not cheap. Eating out is quite expensive, and sometimes my dad goes to the supermarket to buy groceries and cook his own food to save money. For training, he goes to Ding Junhui Billiards Club, and I have also learned a lot of experience from Ding Junhui."

Under the wings of Bai Shuangjian, her daughter walks steadily and steadily with every step. Bai Yulu is also very obedient. The winning prize money is all kept by her father, and she only takes some pocket money to buy cosmetics and small things that girls like. Her leisure life outside of playing basketball is chasing Korean dramas.

It is precisely this regular and simple life that allows Bai Yulu to concentrate without distractions. According to her words, "I have been training and getting used to playing ball every day since I was young." Now, she is more aware of the importance of learning English. "Every time I compete abroad, I can improve my speaking ability a bit."

[4]

The Q School snooker selection tournament is open to snooker players from all over the world and is also the main way for amateur players to become professional players. The male players of the Chinese Legion all started from here.

Participating in Q School for the first time allowed Bai Yulu to experience the "big scene". "Even if it's a world championship, the scale of women's competitions is very small. They only compete in a pool club, with only a dozen or so participants. The snooker selection competition is held in a regular sports stadium, with hundreds of players. Last season's relegated professional players will also come, and the scene is very big, and the competition is also very fierce."

This year's Q School snooker selection tournament will have one stop in Asia and two stops in the UK, each generating 4 professional spots. Bai Yulu participated in two races in the UK, with the first race ending in the second round and the second race ending in the fourth round. "If you win six consecutive rounds, you can get a professional qualification. This time you've experienced what's going on, and if you participate again, you'll have to wait until next year."

Li Jianbing and his disciples Bai Yulu and Deng Haohui

Li Jianbing pays attention to every match of Bai Yulu. "Only by playing against high-level players can we continuously gain experience, learn and improve. If we want to enter the male professional sequence, female players must go for it and struggle against male players."

At this year's Shanghai Masters, Bai Yulu won a wild card with her ranking in domestic competitions, truly experiencing the atmosphere of a top-level professional competition. "The opponent has a strong scoring ability and high stability. Whenever there is a chance to get started, they can win the game. There are several games where I have a chance, but I couldn't grasp them. If they perform well, they will definitely not only win one game."

At the age of 20, one is full of energy, no longer ignorant, and has a plan for their own life. From October to the end of the year, there will be women's ranking competitions every month. Bai Yulu plans to travel to Australia, the United Kingdom, and Belgium, trading time for space and playing as many matches as possible to accumulate points. "After all, breaking through in women's competitions is easier to achieve."

On the Tiktok platform, Bai Yulu has more than 400000 fans, most of whom are snooker fans. They have generously given the title of "female Ding Junhui".

In the past, there were not no female snooker players in China, but due to the lack of female snooker matches, some switched to nine ball players, and some simply gave up.

In Li Jianbing's view, if Bai Yulu could qualify for the World Snooker Tour, her historical significance would be comparable to Ding Junhui. "If she were to be trained as the first Chinese female snooker player to play with the same skills as boys, then the outside world's perception would also change. If Ding Junhui became famous in the first battle, it would at least drive the growth of Chinese snooker sports for ten years, but the spring of female players has not yet arrived..."