Whereas Hu has starred in one TV commercial -- racing a subway train to retrieve the cap he left lying on his seat -- Liu's face covers billboards across Beijing. While Liu holds the world record, Hu has been plagued by injuries and is unlikely to ever manage this in the 100m.

But could he beat Liu in a one-on-one sprint? "I've never thought about that before," he told China Daily. "I wouldn't like to say. It would be close."

Nicknamed the "Flying Spectacles," the 24-year-old college student clocked a personal best of 10.27 in the 100m at the 2005 National Athletics Championships, 0.1 seconds slower than the Chinese record and still a way off the Asian record of 10.00.

"But I twisted my thigh at the 70m mark, so 10.27 isn't really my best," he said after an afternoon training session at Tsinghua University last month.

After arriving on the scene by becoming the first Asian man to win the prestigious sprint event at the World University Games in August 2005, then winning again at the East Asian Games in the same year, misfortune struck last December.

Expected to tear ahead of the competition at the end-of-year Doha Asian Games, a key tune-up for Beijing 2008, Hu failed to live up to the hype when a strained thigh muscle saw him clock 10.75 and miss the final heat.

"Injuries are obviously an athlete's biggest enemy," he told China Daily. "Before my injury, I achieved new heights, so now I believe that when I recover, I will still have a good chance to run close to or break my records. It depends on how good I can be -- and how lucky I can be."

The graduate student in business management, who oozes charisma and has to lug a brain full of Isaac Newton quotes around the track, needs to clock 10.21 by June 15 next year in order to qualify for the 100m at the Beijing Games.

Coach Li Qing is confident he can do it. "Hopefully he'll be able to achieve that sometime late this year or early next year," he said. "Otherwise, if he can make 20.59 in the 200m, he'll get to compete in that event at the Games." Hu was unfazed either way, saying he is focused on anchoring China's 4x400m relay team, assuming it qualifies.

"If we can qualify, I think we have a chance for the medal if we prepare very well," he said.

Hu, who at 24 is the same age as 100m co-world record holder Asafa Powell of Jamaica (9.77 seconds), knows he is in a highly competitive field, but he has already faced some of the world's best sprinters, including Justin Gatlin at an athletics meet in Shanghai two years ago.

"That was the only time I raced Gatlin. He's a really great sprinter, with the gifts of Carl Lewis and Morris Green. He's a rare genius, but a pity he lost to doping," he said.

Hu puts a lot of his speed down to genetics - his father can still run 100m in 11.9 at age 41 - but said that Asian athletes are hampered from the outset by a poor diet.

"That's why Asian athletes lose to Westerners at the very beginning when it comes to sports talent. For athletes, Chinese cuisine is too 'light'."