Korea’s Speed Skating Streak Ends

Korea’s gold medal streak in short track speed skating ended in the men’s 500m on the second day of the World Short Track Speed Skating Championships at Mariucci Arena, Minneapolis yesterday.

Korea’s Lee Ho-seok (Kyunghee Universtiy) won the bronze medal for Korea in the men’s 500m race final. Lee raced against Ahn Hyun-su (Korea Sports Universtiy), Francois Louis Tranblet (Canada), and Lee Hao Nan, and finished fourth in the final race. But Ahn was disqualified, giving Lee Ho-seok third place after Tranblet and Lee Hao Nan. Ahn was disqualified after video analysis found that he went off track at the last corner while passing Lee Ho-seok and Lee Hao Nan.

In the women’s 500m race, Jin Seon-yu (Gwangmun High School) advanced to the semifinal heat, but lost.

On the first day of the competition, Ahn Hyun-su, Lee Ho-seok, and Oh Sae-jong (Dongducheon City) swept the men’s 1,500m race by finishing first, second, and third respectively; while in women’s 1,500m, Jin Sun-yu and Choi Eun-kyung (Korea Sports University) came in first and third.

Sung-Kyu Kim kimsk@donga.com