Liu Xiang taking life one hurdle at a time

OSAKA, Japan, Aug 26 (Reuters) Millions of Chinese may be dreaming about Liu Xiang winning gold at this week's world championships and another at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The high hurdler himself is not one of them.

On the surface at least, the 24-year-old -- who will carry the burden of China's athletics aspirations on his shoulders over the next 12 months -- is remarkably relaxed about it all.

''I never think about gold medals, my goal is just to get to the final. When you get into the top eight, anything can happen,'' he told reporters in Osaka, where he could add the world 110 metres hurdles title to the Olympic gold and world record he holds.

''I just do what I do and I go home to sleep.'' Surely though, after a bronze at the 2003 world championships in Paris and silver in Helsinki two years later, the gold must be a firm target this time around? ''I've got no special expectations. It's not my first time in a world championships, I'm just going to do my best,'' Liu said.

''To me, it's one of the events that an athlete encounters...

takes part in over his life, to me it's all the same.'' Liu made history when he won China's first men's track title at the 2004 Olympics, proving, in his own words, ''that the yellow man can sprint''.

LOST FREEDOM He is his country's only genuine hope of a gold medal in Osaka, a city where he has run four races and won all four. But even that was not cause for encouragement on Sunday.

''I think there were difficult circumstances, I didn't have very strong competitors in the past meets in Osaka,'' he said.

''This time everybody's here.'' So which among his competitors did he think would present the biggest challenge? ''I think everybody is in quite good shape, everybody is close and it just depends on how they perform on the day, how they grasp the opportunity,'' he said Liu, who set a world record time of 12.88 in Lausanne last year, said he would be aiming for a time around the 13 second mark in Osaka.

Through his success on the track, Liu's life off it has been transformed and he now ranks alongside NBA basketballer Yao Ming as his country's most popular sportsman.

''I don't see myself as a hero, I don't know how other people see me,'' he said. ''I'm just being myself, I'm starting to get used to it.

''I have lost some freedom, I definitely cannot go shopping on my own ... I can still go out to eat with my friends but I can't go alone.'' Shopping and expensive restaurants are clearly not a problem for a man who has his fair share of financial endorsements in China, but he did baulk at talk that gold in Beijing next year would earn him 60 million dollars.

''I don't know where you got that from!'' he laughed. ''Everyone knows that athletes don't earn that kind of money.

''Money to me now is just figures, adding a zero or taking one away. Ultimately I just want to keep my normal life, you just need one T-shirt, you can't possibly wear 10 at the same time.'' REUTERS BJR KP1507