[AG/english]`Unification Laurel` Finale of Lee Bong-Ju

Ham Bol-Sil! I did too.

Lee Bong-Ju won a gold medal in Marathon Men Final of 14th Busan Asian Game.

He crossed the finish line in a time of 2 hours, 14 minutes and four seconds throughout the 42.195㎞-course of Busan Asiad Main Stadium~Seomyeon~Haeundae~ BEXCO~Dongrae and the Main Stadium in the marathon Men Final of 14th Busan Asian Game. Lee Bong-Ju won the consecutive gold medals after Bankok Asian Games in 1998, and South Korea has claimed gold in the men’s marathon event for four consecutive Asian Games since 1990. The two consecutive victories of Lee Bong-Ju is the second after Gamihara Genzi of Japan (In 1966 and 1970). SHIMIZU Koji of Japan crossed the finish line in a time of 2 hours, 17 minutes and 47 seconds and ranked second.

Running a full marathon course 26 times, Lee Bong-Ju was different. At that day, The weather of Busan was 23.5 degree. TAKEI Ryuji who was the favorite didn’t outdistance, and so Lee Bong-Ju led the race.

Running with a leading group of 4 marathoners including SHIMIZU Koji and TAKEI Ryuji of Japan and Lim Jin-Su of South Korea at a point of 14.5㎞, Lee Bong-Ju outdistanced in 20.5㎞. He followed an order of Oh, In-Hwan (Coach) saying “If the pace is too slow, you will have a hard course at the last moment. If other marathoners don’t outdistance, you have to run forward at the point of 20km.”

It was almost defined that Lee Bong-Ju outdistanced SHIMIZU Koji at the point of 30km. He felt tired at the point of 35km, the hardest point out of races because of continuous ascents. However, he crossed the finish line of ‘One accord race of South-North Korea’ after Ham Bong-Sil who won the gold medal in the woman’s marathon yesterday. Crossed the finish line, Lee Bong-Ju lifted up the Taekuk flag and ran the track of the stadium.

Jong-Koo Yang yjongk@donga.com