Korea hits gold medal target at Milan-Cortina Olympics with late push by short track skaters 작성일 02-22 22 목록 <div class="ab_photo photo_center ab_zoom"> <div class="image"> <span class="end_photo_org"><img src="https://imgnews.pstatic.net/image/640/2026/02/22/0000084708_001_20260222132814647.jpg" alt="" /><em class="img_desc">Kim Gil-li of Korea, center, jumps onto the podium after winning the gold medal in the women's 1,500-meter short track speed skating event at the Winter Olympics at Milano Ice Skating Arena in Milan, Italy, on Feb. 20. Kim is flanked Choi Min-jeong of Korea, left, the silver medalist, and Corinne Stoddard of the United States, the bronze medal winner. [KIM JONG-HO]</em></span> <span class="mask"></span> </div> </div> <br> Thanks to some late push from its short track speed skaters, Korea met its target of taking home at least three gold medals from the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics this month. <br> <br> With its last athletes in action, a pair of four-man bobsleigh teams, well out of medal contention entering the final day of the Olympics on Sunday, Korea will likely finish with three gold medals, four silver medals and three bronze medals. <br><br>Korea won two golds, five silvers and two bronzes at the 2022 Beijing Winter Games. For the 2026 competition in northern Italy, the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee (KSOC) had set out to win at least one more gold medal than in Beijing. <br> <br> Short track speed skater Kim Gil-li delivered that third gold medal with her women's 1,500-meter title Friday night over teammate Choi Min-jeong. Earlier Friday, the men's 5,000-meter relay team raced to the silver medal. <br> <br> Once again, short rack speed skaters did the heavy lifting in the medal race. They accounted for two golds, three silvers and two bronzes — compared to two golds and three silvers in Beijing. <br> <br> Kim Gil-li was the lone double gold medalist for Korea, as she anchored the women's 3,000-meter relay team to the title before winning the 1,500-meter gold. Kim also won bronze in the 1,000-meter and led all Korean athletes here with three medals. <br> <br> Choi finished with the relay gold and the 1,500-meter silver. With seven career medals, Choi became the most decorated Korean Olympian, winter or summer. <br> <br> <div class="ab_photo photo_center ab_zoom"> <div class="image"> <span class="end_photo_org"><img src="https://imgnews.pstatic.net/image/640/2026/02/22/0000084708_002_20260222132814859.jpg" alt="" /><em class="img_desc">Kim Gil-li of Korea is seen draping a Korean flag and reacting after winning the 1,500-meter final at the Winter Olympics at Milano Ice Skating Arena in Milan, Italy, on Feb. 20. [KIM JONG-HO]</em></span> <span class="mask"></span> </div> </div> <br> On the men's side, the 18-year-old Rim Jong-un won bronze in the 1,000-meter and then combined for silver in the 5,000-meter relay. Hwang Dae-heon grabbed silver in the 1,500 meters to become the first Korean male short tracker to win a medal at three consecutive Winter Olympics. <br> <br> The short track team had a particularly inauspicious start. Korea crashed out of the semifinals in its first medal event, the mixed team relay, when Kim got tripped up by Corinne Stoddard of the United States. Korea was also shut out of individual gold medals until Kim broke through in the women's 1,500 meters, the very last individual race in Milan. <br> <br> But by the time Korea wrapped things up with three medals on Friday, those early misses were mostly forgotten. <br> <br> With Choi announcing this was her final Olympics, the torch has been passed to the 21-year-old Kim, the first Korean short tracker in 12 years to win at least three medals in an Olympic debut. <br> <br> <div class="ab_photo photo_center ab_zoom"> <div class="image"> <span class="end_photo_org"><img src="https://imgnews.pstatic.net/image/640/2026/02/22/0000084708_003_20260222132814938.jpg" alt="" /><em class="img_desc">Members of the Korean men's 5,000-meter short track speed skating relay team celebrate on the podium after winning the silver medal at the Winter Olympics at Milano Ice Skating Arena in Milan, Italy, on Feb. 20. From left: Shin Dong-min, Hwang Dae-heon, Rim Jong-un, Lee June-seo and Lee Jeong-min. [KIM JONG-HO]</em></span> <span class="mask"></span> </div> </div> <br> Relative to expectations, Korea's snowboarders had a much more memorable Olympics than short track speed skaters, finishing with one gold, one silver and one bronze. Before this year, Korea only had one snowboard medal in its Olympic history, a silver by Lee Sang-ho in the men's parallel giant slalom in 2018. <br> <br> This year, Lee's lesser-known teammate, Kim Sang-kyum, grabbed silver in the same event for Korea's first medal of the Milan-Cortina Games. <br> <br> Kim's unexpected silver was aided by some lucky breaks, as his opponents in both the round of 16 and the quarterfinals fell before the finish line in the knockout phase. <br> <br> The 18-year-old Yu Seung-eun soared to a surprise bronze medal in the women's big air, and then another teenager, 17-year-old Choi Ga-on, capped it all off with her awe-inspiring gold medal in the women's halfpipe. It was Korea's first gold at these Winter Games. <br> <br> Choi took a huge fall during the first of her three runs in the final. She later revealed she barely had any strength left in her legs, but somehow found extra energy to pull off a clean third run for the title. <br> <br> <div class="ab_photo photo_center ab_zoom"> <div class="image"> <span class="end_photo_org"><img src="https://imgnews.pstatic.net/image/640/2026/02/22/0000084708_004_20260222132815046.jpg" alt="" /><em class="img_desc">Korean Snowboarder Choi Ga-on bites onto her gold medal during a press conference at the Korea House in Milan on Feb. 14, after winning the gold medal in the women's halfpipe snowboarding event at the Winter Olympics at Livigno Snow Park in Livigno, Italy. [NEWS1]</em></span> <span class="mask"></span> </div> </div> <br> Choi denied Korean American superstar Chloe Kim her third straight Olympic gold while also breaking Kim's record as the youngest Olympic snowboard champion. <br> <br> Korea hoped for a medal in the women's curling tournament, but skip Gim Eun-ji's team fell one win shy of a trip to the semifinals. A 10-7 loss to Canada in the final round-robin match sealed Korea's fate, when a victory would have sent Gim and her teammates into the medal round. <br> <br> Korea took place without a speed skating medal for the first time since 2002. Chung Jae-won had a close call in the men's mass start, where he finished in fifth place, 0.18 seconds behind the bronze medalist, Andrea Giovannini of Italy. <br> <br> Korea enjoyed a victory away from the fields of play, as the 2018 bobsleigh silver medalist Won Yun-jong was elected to the Athletes' Commission of the International Olympic Committee. <br> <br> <div class="ab_photo photo_center ab_zoom"> <div class="image"> <span class="end_photo_org"><img src="https://imgnews.pstatic.net/image/640/2026/02/22/0000084708_005_20260222132815140.jpg" alt="" /><em class="img_desc">Won Yun-jong of Korea is seen posing for a photo during a press conference at the Korea House in Milan, Italy, after being elected to the Athletes' Commission of the International Olympic Committee on Feb. 20. [YONHAP]</em></span> <span class="mask"></span> </div> </div> <br> Won led 11 candidates, garnering 1,176 votes from 2,393 athletes who cast ballots during the Olympics. <br> <br> He is the third Korean to have been elected to the commission, following the 2004 Olympic taekwondo gold medalist Moon Dae-sung and 2004 table tennis champion Ryu Seung-min, current KSOC president. <br> <br> Korea has previously won nine medals at the 2022 Beijing Winter Games, with two golds, five silvers and two bronzes. At the 2019 PyeongChang Winter Games, Korea, as the host country, won a total of 17 medals, including five golds, eight silvers and four bronzes. <br> <br> This was the most medals that Korea had won at the Winter Games since joining the winter competitions for the first time at the 1948 St. Moritz Winter Games in Switzerland. <br> 관련자료 이전 이동통신 3사, MWC26에서 대한민국 인공지능 알린다 02-22 다음 '잽으로 끝냈다' 전 UFC 챔피언 스트릭랜드, '8연승' 에르난데스에 TKO승 02-22 댓글 0 등록된 댓글이 없습니다. 로그인한 회원만 댓글 등록이 가능합니다.
