On February 27, 2025, IWUF announced winners of 2024 Athlete of the Year. After a month of public voting, 15-year-old Zhixuan Deng won the Female Wushu Taolu Rising Star of the Year 2024 award with 65,480 votes among 7 candidates.
Zhixuan was born in a family with rich cultural heritage, and at the age of six she began her wushu journey, learning under the guidance of several renowned taiji masters. As a middle school student, she achieved outstanding results in major competitions with her deep passion for taij and relentless training. In the 4th World Taijiquan Championships in Singapore, Deng won two gold medals in Women's Simplified 32 Movements Taijijian and Women's Wu (Hao) Style Taijiquan (46 Movements), demonstrating the strength and vigor of China's new generation athletes. Beyond practicing taiji, she also studies calligraphy, painting, and gu zheng, winning prestigious awards in these fields.
After winning the Wushu Taolu Rising Star of the Year award in the IWUF Athlete of the Year voting, and receiving a warm welcome and love by the global audience, Zhixuan Deng expressed her great honor and excitement. "I feel extremely proud that through my performance, more people around the world have come to know and love taijiquan. This is not only an affirmation of my personal efforts but also a recognition of the global influence of taijiquan. Taijiquan carries profound cultural heritage and spiritual connotations, and it has long transcended the sports arena to become a bridge connecting different civilizations. Taijiquan is not only about 'knowing' but more about 'doing'. I will show my gratitude for everyone's support and love through my actions."
Taijiquan has not only been listed in the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, but is also been included in the official competition programme of the 2026 Dakar Youth Olympic Games. Deng believes that taijiquan is a traditional yet modern and fashionable sport that has attracted countless enthusiasts worldwide, especially among young people. When speaking of the promotion and dissemination of wushu, she has made various attempts in many cultural and sports activities. In the future, she hopes to lead more people to engage in this sport through television, movies, the Internet, and high-tech media, setting an example and sharing her own experiences. She is full of confidence in the development of wushu, especially in the taijiquan event. "As global cultural exchange deepens, taijiquan will not only occupy an important position in competitive sports but will also become an important way for people to exercise their body and mind and improve their self-cultivation in daily life."
In 2024, Zhixuan Deng achieved a great deal. Her debut on the international stage was astonishing, and she was even named one of the Top Ten Chinese Athletes of 2024 by the Sports Department of Xinhua News Agency. In 2025, Deng's goal is not only to continuously improve her skills but also to focus on enriching the cultural connotations carried by taijiquan. "At the same time, by serving as the ‘Ambassador of Loulan Culture', I hope to showcase more of the historical and cultural connotations of taijiquan and continue to help more people, especially children in remote areas, understand and learn taijiquan. In addition, I also plan to combine traditional taijiquan with modern sports science to explore new training methods and forms of expression."
In the end, this rising wushu star wants to share a word with other friends who are constantly striving: "Never be afraid of losing, and never fear about how the outcome will be. Where there is light ahead, there is hope. The magnificent, extraordinary and rare views in the world are often found in dangerous and distant places. We must keep climbing upward to see them!"
