Seoul: South Korea added three gold medals at the Asian Winter Games on Thursday to lock down second place in the medal race with one day remaining. With gold medals from the men’s and women’s singles in figure skating, and from the men’s snowboard halfpipe Thursday, South Korea now has 15 gold medals, one shy of its Winter Asiad record set at the 2017 competition, along with 14 silver medals and 13 bronze medals. The ninth Asian Winter Games will end Friday, with finals in men’s and women’s hockey, and men’s and women’s curling scheduled before the closing ceremony.
According to Yonhap News Agency, Japan sits in third place with nine gold medals and will not be able to catch South Korea in the gold medal count with only four more gold medals left up for grabs. China is safely in first place with 32 gold medals. South Korea will look to add to its gold medal total Friday, as both the men’s and women’s curling teams advanced to the final Thursday.
South Korea pulled off a historic double in figure skating, as Kim Chae-yeon and then Cha Jun-hwan won gold medals in the women’s and men’s singles events, marking a first for the country. Kim and Cha were both in second place after the short program behind Japanese stars, Kaori Sakamoto in the women’s event and Yuma Kagiyama for the men, but the South Koreans rallied with flawless free skates on Thursday. Sakamoto and Kagiyama, on the other hand, labored through programs marred by mistakes.
Kim finished with a personal-best 219.44 points, and Cha won the gold with 281.69 points. Earlier in the day, Kim Geon-hui was awarded the gold medal in the men’s snowboard halfpipe after the final was canceled due to severe winds. Kim, 16, had been the top performer in the qualification round from Wednesday with 78.00 points, and the top three from the early phase were awarded the medals. Another South Korean, Lee Ji-o, won the bronze medal.
Also on Thursday, South Korea won the silver medal in the women’s 4×6-kilometer relay event. Ekaterina Avvakumova, a Russian-born athlete naturalized as South Korean, picked up her second medal of the competition, after winning gold in the 7.5km sprint event Tuesday.