Zhou Songbai, a local resident in his 70s, felt really excited when he got out of the water of minus 5.2 degrees centigrade. "Yes, it's a bid chilly, but I enjoy the excitement," he said, after a 10-minute swim in the Yellow River.

This chilly excitement has brought the number of local winter swimmers from merely a handful 20 years ago up to over 200 now.

"It's really uneasy for these die-hard swimmers to keep on exercising and participating," said Zhang Changsheng, secretary-general of the Lanzhou Winter Swimming Association. Zhang, a worker in his 40s, was the founding member of the association.

Most of the association's "die-hard" members keep swimming four to five times per week, at least 10 minutes each time for an average distance of several hundred meters, according to Zhang.

Helped by the municipal government, the association has set up six starting points along the river banks, where an average number of 30 swimmers practice at each location.

Winter swimmers in this Northwestern Chinese city range from 70s down to teenagers in age, with 16-year-old Li Lei the youngest activist. Encouraged by his swimming-crazy father, Li began practice at the age of 12.

"Some might think it's interesting and lucky to swim in the Yellow River, but winter swimming in this river is not as easy as it seems like," said Zhang. "The river looks quiet and calm, but the bumpy river bed makes the water flow really swift and the sandy water makes swimming even more difficult," he said.

With a length of 5,464 kilometers, the Yellow River is China's second longest river, second only to the 6,300km-long Yangtze River. The river flows across Lanzhou in winter at a speed of 2.23 meters per second, with a volume of 500 cubic meters per second, as measured in Lanzhou on Tuesday.

The Yellow River is named for the color of its water and it is known for the water's high content of sand, which is the highest in the world.

The association has made constant efforts to secure safety, the secretary-general said. Winter swimmers must be teamed into groups of three, with at least one veteran swimmer as the leader.

No incident has occurred in activities sanctioned by the association ever since the organization was established in 1989 to turn the sport better organized. And many association members have volunteered in rescue operations along the river when needed.

Leading members of the association are busy these days preparing for a swimming show on the New Year's Day. And they are selecting swimmers to take part, at the invitation of the local organizers, in an international winter swimming show during the annual Ice and Snow Festival to be held in the Northeastern Chinese City of Harbin.

"Winter always comes as a busy season for our association. But we all like it," Zhang added.

(Xinhua News Agecny December 18, 2002)