Yao Ming rejoined the Chinese National Team on Wednesday after a busy week involving the Yao & Nash Charity Gala and Basketball game, as well as a few commercial activities.

In an interview with Wang Meng, Yao said he realizes he can still improve his conditioning. He’s fine on offense with the ball in the low post, but he is still 1 or 2 steps slow on defense as seen by getting beaten by Yi Jianlian and Zhang Songtao during scrimmages.

He plans to make use of the next two weeks where the Chinese will play seven exhibition games against teams from Italy, Russia, and Australia.

Because of a commitment he has to be part of the Opening Ceremonies of the Special Olympics in China on October 2nd, he will miss the first 2-3 days of the Rockets training camp in Austin.

I don’t have a problem with that. He will have played seven of those games already, much more than his Rocket teammates. And being a global ambassador of the Special Olympics, it would be a big deal if he missed those Opening Ceremonies.

Thanks to Raymond in China for the scoop, and for these photos he posted in the YaoMania! forum of Yao with his Chinese teammates in practice.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 19th, 2007 at 6:13 pm and is filed under Rockets' off-season. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.