The China National Volleyball Team lead by coach “Jenny” Lang Ping won three awards at the recently concluded China Central Television’s Sports Personality of the Year 2014 on Feb. 1.
Among the awards handed to the team include the title of being the "Best Team of 2014" and "the Best Rookie award" given to 18-year-old volleyball varsity Yuan Xinyue.
Meanwhile, the team's 54-year-old female coach was crowned by CCTV as the "Best Coach of the Year 2014" after she helped the national women's volleyball team enhance their skills.
Born in Beijing under the Manchu ethnicity, Lang Ping is more popularly known as the "Iron Hammer" and became one of China's pride in terms of sports after she coached the U.S. National Team who subsequently earned a silver medal during the Beijing Olympics in 2008 because of her coaching.
In recognition of her invaluable contribution to the industry, she was inducted under the Volleyball Hall of Fame in Holyoke, Massachusetts.
As a player, she earned several championship titles during the 1980s in sports events such as the 1981, 1982 and 1985 World Cups, as well as the Los Angeles Olympic Games of 1984.
After she retired from playing, she became a volleyball coach during the early 1980s when she earned several other titles, including being in the "Top Ten Athletes of the Year" in China for five consecutive years between 1981 and 1986 and being dubbed as the "FIVB Coach of the Year" in 1996.
Lang was also renowned in other countries including Italy where she was deemed as the "Woman Volleyball Coach in Italy" in 1999 and 2000.