South Korea retains men's archery crown
JAKARTA (JP): Think of nothing. Let everything runs as light as the arrow flies. That Zen-like philosophy is the winning formula of South Korea's new world champion, Lee Kyung-chul.
Lee beat Chinese Taipei's Wu Tsung-yi 109-105 in the gold medal race of the men's individual Olympic division of the 38th World Archery Championships yesterday.
While South Koreans celebrated their face-saving win, 13-year- old American Angela Moscarelli stole the spotlight when she upset Petra Ericsson of Sweden, 110-108, for the women's individual compound gold medal. The bronze went to another American, Inga Low.
"I'm very surprised to win the competition," buoyant Moscarelli said.
Lee's victory not only confirmed South Korean supremacy in the prestigious men's Olympic division. It was a "very sweet compensation", as head coach Lee Ki-sik put it, for the loss of the women's crown on Friday to the Moldavian archer.
"Our female archers have maintained domination for almost 13 years simultaneously and had to lose it for the first time. It's too bad," head coach Lee Ki-sik told The Jakarta Post.
"I was empty. Everything was at ease. I didn't even think of winning the competition, nor was I ever worried when my scores trailed. I just shot the way I should," an elated Lee said.
The 24-year-old physical education university graduate trained seven to eight hours everyday during the last three months before coming to the Jakarta meet.
"It was his best performance," coach Lee noted. The new world champion, who came fifth in the Asia Cup championships in Ujungpandang, South Sulawesi, in 1993, has been serving in the army for almost two year now. He trains four hours a day from Monday to Friday.
"Serving in the army is the best time for him to train. He can practice everyday," Ki-sik said. He added that his boy is planning to work after completing his two-and-a half-year conscription period.
"If Kyung-chul realizes his plan, however, he might lose his chance to go to the Olympic Games in Atlanta next year because he won't have much time to train himself."
Ki-sik said that currently South Korea has 20 teams of archers whose quality is more or less the same as the quality of his present world championship team. He added that his country has 1,500 archers in all. As an archer, they are paid US$1,500 a month, Ki-sik said.
Ki-sik acknowledged that this time it was pretty hard for his archers to notch up a victory in the world championships.
"Han Seung-hoon's victory over Richard McKinney (three time world champion of the United States) at the 16th final was very important," Ki-sik said.
"We regarded McKinney as our toughest opponent because he was at his best here. I could only be assured of our victory after Han beat him."
Han's win over McKinney was perhaps nerve-wracking for Ki-sik. The world number 19 managed to tie Han 169-169. Han broke the tie in the shoot-off. Han scored 10, Kinney 8.
While Kyung-chul attributes his victory to his self-emptying strategy, Chinese Taipei's Wu Tsung-yi refers his climb from the number 21, in the qualification round, to the world number two to a focused mental state.
"Every time I shoot, I try to keep my mind totally focused on the target," the 23-year-old university student in Chinese literature and culture, who also made his first debut at the Jakarta meet, said.
The Hiroshima Asian Games bronze medalist told the Post he was a bit out of control when shooting his second arrow for only a seven. Wu cleared his toughest hurdle in the semifinals as he edged Oh Kyo-moon, who was regarded as the best South Korean archer by Joe Lin, vice president of the Chinese Taipei Archery Association. (arf)