The Centennial Games Express
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Xinhua founded its Sports News Department on January 1, 1984.
In the same year Xinhua for the first time sent a team of correspondents to cover the 23rd Olympic Games in Los Angeles. At this Olympiad, Xinhua was the first news agency to report to the world the winning of the first gold medal.
On many occasions later Xinhua sent teams of correspondents to cover major international sports events, such as the Word University Games in Japan and in Britain, the Asian Games in Seoul and in Beijing, the Olympic Games in Seoul and in Barcelona, and the World Cup Soccer Tournaments in Italy and in the United States.
In was at the 10th Asian Games in Seoul in 1986 that Xinhua began to file news dispatches by computers.
In September 1990 Xinhua formed a team of some 180 copy editors, reporters and photographers to cover the 11th Asian Games in Beijing. Based in the Press Center and equipped with a complete set of modern telecommunications facilities, they filed 7,700 news stories in Chinese totalling 1.3 million characters, and some 2,300 dispatches in English, averaging 119 per day, satisfying the demand of the subscribers at home and abroad. Juan Antonio Samaranch, President of the International Olympic Committe (IOC), expressed his satisfaction with the Xinhua coverage during his visit to Xinhua newsroom.
During the coming Olympic Games in Atlanta this summer, Xinhua will send a team of 37 reporters and photographers to cover the event. Xinhua Olympic stories will be filed in Chinese, English and Spanish.
While doing a fine job of news reporting, the Sports News Department has also published books on physical culture and sports and cooperated with China's State Physical Culture and Sports Commission in co-sponsoring the "China Cup International Gymnastics Tournament", "International Chess Tournament for Children", "Great Wall Cup Cycling Race" and other national sports competitions.