Hu Liang had won gold in the 400m freestyle event, but was not on the podium to receive the gold. He was replaced by male model, Tian Jia, as he was viewed as being more aesthetically pleasing than Hu.
Hu Liang is well known throughout China as a champion swimmer with a toned body and 'strong' facial features.
Frightening Physiognomy
"He's really quite scary," said a Chinese official. "We had expected him to win and so we had prepared for the ceremony. While he is swimming, you don't notice his unfortunate face, but once he is out of the water, it really hits home. There's no way we could use close-ups for the medal ceremony. If it was Halloween then we could probably get by. We had thought about the camera panning across the swimmers feet instead of head shots or just sticking to showing the flag, but we felt we needed to get an image across that we are great swimmers and damn fine to look at," added the official.
Easy on The Eye
The photogenic Tian Jia conducted post-gold medal interviews with the world's press and was happy to be pictured in a number of seductive poses.
Officials said Hu was proud to be the swimmer behind the face, but sources say he has been spirited away for a year of beauty re-education through hard labour.
