After the team time trial, the mood among the Zhejiang Team cyclists was clearly somber as they ate dinner that evening.
The reason was obvious: if not for Huang Chong's exceptional individual strength, which saw him pulling them against a headwind for nearly 50 kilometers, the other five members' abilities would have landed them in dead last place among the ten competing teams.
After the day's grueling race, they had finally come to a stark realization: without Huang Chong as their fig leaf, their skills were, on a national level, utterly pathetic.
Seeing everyone's silence at the dinner table, Xie Kun didn't know what to say.
In truth, having a cyclist on the team whose abilities so vastly outstripped the others was a mixed blessing for him as the head coach.
The upside was that with Huang Chong as his safety net, he had already secured a gold medal. His performance record had exceeded the bureau's requirements, and he had already received the championship prize money.
