Shaking off the aftermath of his “team kill,” men’s short track ace Park Ji-won (Seoul Metropolitan Government) topped the first qualifying round. Hwang Dae-heon (Gangwon-do) was disqualified after receiving a penalty for another crash the day before.
Park Ji-won won the men’s 1,000-meter final of the 2024-2025 season’s first short track national team trials at the Mokdong Ice Rink in Yangcheon-gu, Seoul, on Sunday with a time of 1:24.865, beating Kim Tae-sung (Seoul Metropolitan Government – 1:24.981) and Jang Jang-woo (Korea University – 1:26.157).
Meanwhile, Hwang Dae-heon, who had collided with Park Ji-won the day before, was disqualified after being penalized for pushing Park again in the second heat of the men’s 1,000 meters.
Park added 34 ranking points to her total of 55 ranking points, giving her the final first-place finish at the National Team Trials. Second-place finisher Kim Gun-woo (Sportsoto) also tied Park with 55 points, but was behind in the ranking calculation for each event. Third place went to Lee Jung-soo (Seoul Metropolitan Government – 39 points).
The controversial Hwang Dae-heon earned five ranking points for his final and fifth place finish the previous day, and his ninth-place finish earned him a spot in the second round of selection, which is reserved for the top 24 athletes.
The first and second rounds of the qualification process for next season’s national team will be decided by the combined ranking points of the six individual events. The top three men’s and women’s individual qualifiers for the international competition will be awarded first. With national team qualification for next season at stake, the three days of the first round were intense.
In particular, much attention was focused on whether the world No. 1 Park Ji-won, who won back-to-back IOC World Cup Series overall titles in 2022-23 and 2023-24, would be able to win the title. At the 2024 ISU World Championships in March, Park missed out on a medal after being edged out by Hwang Dae-heon in the men’s 1500m final and 1000m final. Hwang was penalized and disqualified for pushing Park in those two events at the World Championships.
As a result, Park failed to win an individual medal at the World Championships, which would have qualified her for the next season’s Taegeuk mark, and was forced to compete in the domestic trials.
And then it happened again. On the opening day, Park Ji-won cruised to a second-place finish in the men’s 1500 meters. But on the sixth, in the semifinals of the men’s 500 meters, he clashed with Hwang Dae-heon again and failed to advance to the final. Referee Alexandro Mauri, who officiated the semifinal, did not award a penalty for the collision between Hwang and Park. Hwang crossed the line in second place in the semifinals and went on to finish fifth in the final.
It was a shocking turn of events for Park Ji-won, who had started the day on a high note by taking first place in her 500-meter heat. In fact, this is the fourth time this season that Park Ji-won has lost a medal to Hwang Dae-heon due to an obvious foul or collision.
In the previous three matches, Hwang Dae-heon, who collided with Park Ji-won, was found to have committed a foul and was penalized and eliminated from those matches. However, Park Ji-won also lost her pace and was forced to either drop to last place or abandon the match on her own. The situation was the same in the fourth game. This 카지노사이트 time, Hwang Dae-heon was not penalized. However, Park Ji-won crashed in heat 2 of the semifinals and hit the fence, finishing last in her heat with a time of 1:16.175 and failing to qualify for the final.
In the end, she overcame it all. The next day, in the 1000 meters, Park Ji-won bounced back from the previous day’s troubles with a dominant performance to take first place in the first heat.
On the other hand, Hwang Dae-heon failed to advance to the semifinals after committing a foul in the second heat of the men’s 1,000 meters at the same venue on Sunday. Hwang, who was racing alongside Kim Gun-woo, Park No-won (Hwaseong City Hall), Shin Daen (Gyeongju), and Hong In-gyu (Korea Gymnastics University), led the race early on.
However, midway through the race, he lost the lead to Kim Gun-woo and then allowed Park No-won to pass him on the in-course. Hwang then drove from the outside to the inside of the curve and collided with Park No-won. The shocked Park was pushed back, and Hwang crossed the finish line in second place behind Kim Gun-woo, but the referee applied a penalty and disqualified Hwang. For the second consecutive day, Hwang had to settle for ninth place in the first round with five ranking points for his fifth-place finish in the 500 meters.
As mentioned earlier, this is not the first time Hwang Dae-heon has been in such a conflict. In the first round of the selection process alone, he collided with Park Ji-won and Park No-won on consecutive days, and Park Ji-won in particular has been accused of intentional team-killing in three consecutive competitions.
First, Hwang received a yellow card (YC) and forfeited all points for pushing Park Ji-won from behind in the second 1,000-meter race final at the first International Ice Sports Federation (ISU) World Cup last October.
On March 17, a similar collision occurred in the men’s 1,500-meter final at the ISU World Championships. Hwang Dae-heon overtook Park Ji-won, who was running in the lead, with three laps to go. Hwang managed to pass Park Ji-won with his body and crossed the finish line in first place. Park Ji-won, who lost her balance, fell to last place.
However, the referee ruled that Hwang made a “late overtake at the end of the straightaway” and penalized him. In the end, Hwang was denied the gold medal and second-place finisher Sun Rong (CHN) took the gold. It was the worst result for South Korea, with world No. 1 Park Ji-won falling to last place.
The next day, in the men’s 1,000-meter final, Park Ji-won, who was running second to Hwang Dae-heon, who was leading the race late in the race, came around a curve and into the in-course. Suddenly, Hwang, who had lost the lead, pushed Park with his hand. As a result, Park Ji-won lost her center of gravity and was unable to finish the race.
The referee awarded Hwang a penalty after the race. As he pushed Park Ji-won with his hand, he was penalized for foul play. As a result, Hwang was unable to win an individual medal.
The second round of the short track men’s qualification, which Park Ji-won and Hwang Dae-heon will participate in, will be held at the same venue on Nov. 11-12, and the final ranking will be determined by combining the ranking points from the first and second rounds. The top eight athletes will make the national team, with the top three earning priority qualification for next season’s international individual competitions.