Past sins forgotten for China's golden diva

By Emma Graham-Harrison

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's love-hate relationship with Guo Jingjing, an Olympic champion nicknamed the "diving diva" for her antics out of the pool, has swung back towards adoration as she leads her country's medal charge.

A great athlete in a sport that is wildly popular in China, the 26-year-old is just one medal away from becoming the most successful female diver in Olympic history -- a title she hopes to claim on Sunday with a gold in the three-meter springboard.

But she is also glamorous and temperamental, with a high profile love-life and advertising career in a country where sports stars are expected to be modest and self-effacing.

The adulation that her sporting achievements would normally win in China has been tempered with implications from coaches that she is greedy and unfocused and criticism from fans and media that she is rude and obsessed with a celebrity lifestyle.

"Who gave the diving Guo Jingjing special privileges?" the government's normally placid Xinhua news agency fumed earlier this year after she called a Canadian rival "fat" and apparently sulked through a news conference for a title she had lost.

A skinny kid who has said she only took up diving because her worried mother thought the sport might boost her appetite, she won two silver medals in Sydney.

But her celebrity really exploded when she returned triumphant from Athens with two golds, and was romantically linked with "diving prince" Tian Liang.

The two became a magnet for paparazzi and advertising deals, until coaches horrified at how fast their proteges' faces were popping up on billboards advertising everything from hamburgers to computers and cosmetics dropped them from the national team for excessive "commercial activities".

To regain a place for what she says will be her last Games, Guo made a public apology for taking on so much commercial work and give up some contracts, although according to Forbes' she still has an estimated annual income of 11 million yuan ($1.6 million).

Once back on the diving board though, she reminded fans why she had become famous in the first place, leaping to the first diving gold of the Games in the synchronized springboard and apparently banishing memories of past transgressions.

"Flawless joint gold" said the Beijing Times the morning after her victory, while competing tabloid the Global times called Guo and partner Wu Minxia the "diving dream team".

Now, all she has to do is win again on Sunday.

(For more stories visit our multimedia website "2008 Summer Olympics" here; and see our blog at blogs.reuters.com/china)