China's latest high-speed trains between Beijing and Shanghai usually run at speeds of up to 380 kph.

The achievements of the Wu-Guang high-speed network were backed by hard work and persistence represented by Xu and his team a decade ago.

"I was amazed by the news of the late leader Deng Xiaoping traveling in Japan during a visit on the Shinkansen bullet train in the late 1970s. At the time, trains in China could only run at speeds of a few dozen kilometers an hour," says Xu, now deputy chief engineer of a Chinese railway survey and design institute.

After Xu graduated from Changsha Railway College in Hunan province in 1982, he worked as a technician in a company in Wuhan. He then took part in surveys and design work of several railway projects, including the high-speed railway link between Beijing and Shanghai.