The Qingdao Olympic Sailing Center has put on a number of international sailing events, including the 2008 Olympic Sailing Regatta. Hao Guoying / for China Daily

When the city of Qingdao held the Olympic sailing event in 2008, it showed the world a spectacular side of itself, and it now wants to maintain that Olympic city image by becoming the Capital of Sailing, the mayor has said.

In fact, for the past three years, Qingdao has made every effort to keep the Olympic spirit alive by mobilizing everyone to build that 'sailing city' image, Mayor Xia Geng told China Daily in a recent interview.

Qingdao now has the world's first Olympic sailing city museum. And, its Olympic Sailing Center is the country's only seaside tourism-leisure demonstration district and has been designated as a relic protection unit.

"By using the Olympic influence and venues we've popularized the sport of sailing and have become a sailing popularization and demonstration city for the young," Xia went on to explain.

Qingdao now has 28 professional sailing clubs and 165 sailing schools and clubs for young people. More than 5,000 teenagers have taken part in the city's sailing camps and more than 2,000 of them have become licensed sailors.

In addition, more than 100,000 local people have had a chance to sail and the local government has said it will continue to promote the sport.

"We're looking for 300,000 people to get involved in the sport by 2014," Xia noted.

After the Games, in 2009, the city established an annual international sailing week to promote its own local brand of sailing.

That same year, it played host to a world-famous sailing event, the Volvo Global Ocean Race, a real first for Qingdao. It followed that with the world's largest amateur sailing event, the Clipper Global Sailing Race, its third time to host the event.

It also held its first International sailing week, with a deliberate doff of the hat to Germany's Kiel Week competition, which is held annually. More than 200 sailing celebrities turned up for the competition.

Then, in 2010, on the occasion of the Second Qingdao International Sailing Week, it held an Olympic Sailing City Mayors &International Sailing Summit where the Qingdao Declaration on the International Sailing Sport was signed.

Jacques Rogge, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), called the forum a "commendable initiative".

This past May, the city has again showed the world its impressive side when it completed the Qingdao leg of the 2011 Extreme Sailing Series.

The municipal government established an Olympic Sailing City Development Association as the first national management center for the sport of sailing.

It has taken special steps to get sailing and related businesses included in Qingdao's 12th five-year plan (2010 - 2015).

"By branding itself as a capital of sailing, the city has improved its reputation and influence around the world, and is becoming better known," the mayor said.

Qingdao is now a popular spot for several important international conferences, such as the annual APEC Small and Medium Enterprise Technology Conference and Fair, which it has already held for three consecutive years.

Then there was the Fourth Conference of East Asian Economic Exchange and Promotion, held last November, and the BRIC partner cities meeting this past May.

Thanks to its' sailing capital' influence, Qingdao has increased its international exchanges and cooperation, and now has 57 foreign sister cities.

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