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Olympic short track champion Shim Suk-hee to skip Asiad 500m to focus on longer events

Published: 06 Feb. 2025, 15:38 Updated: 06 Feb. 2025, 17:48

Korean short track speed skaters Shim Suk-hee (right) and Noh Do-hee during a training session for the Asian Winter Games at Heilongjiang Ice Events Training Center in Harbin, China, on Feb. 3. [YONHAP]

Korean Olympic short track champion Shim Suk-hee has pulled out of the women's 500-meter race at the Asian Winter Games in China to focus on longer-distance events and relays, a national team official said Thursday.

Shim, who helped Korea win consecutive women's 3,000m relay gold medals at the 2014 and 2018 Winter Olympics, will only compete in the 1,000m, 1,500m, the 2,000m mixed relay and the 3,000m relay.

On the men's side, Kim Gun-woo also made the same decision to withdraw from the 500m to concentrate on longer-distance races and relays.

The winter Asiad opens Friday evening in Harbin, China, but the heats and quarterfinal races in short track will be held earlier in the day. All short track finals are scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, with Korea looking to win six out of nine gold medals up for grabs.

Based on performances in the national team trials in April last year, the top three male and female skaters each qualified for individual events in Harbin, with those finishing below them eligible for relays.

With Shim and Kim out of the 500m, Lee So-yeon and Kim Tae-sung will compete in the women's and the men's 500m instead.

The national team will be hoping Shim and Kim Gun-woo will conserve their energy — the 500m heats are set for Friday morning — and push for a medal in the 2,000m mixed relay, whose semifinals are Friday afternoon, followed by the final Saturday morning.

Kim is three months removed from surgery to repair a broken right ankle. He had been considered doubtful for Harbin after suffering the injury in November but returned in time for the Asian Winter Games.

He fell a couple of times during training sessions earlier this week at Heilongjiang Ice Events Training Center Multifunctional Hall, though he emerged unscathed on both occasions.

Yonhap