Home > Sports > Olympic Sports

Snowboarding prodigy Lee Chae-un slides to Asiad slopestyle gold

Published: 08 Feb. 2025, 16:42 Updated: 08 Feb. 2025, 16:52

PAIK JI-HWAN
[email protected]

Korean snowboarder Lee Chae-un competes in the men's slopestyle snowboarding final at the 2025 Asian Winter Games at Slopestyle Stadium in Yabuli, China, on Feb. 8. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

Korean snowboarder Lee Chae-un won a gold medal in the men’s slopestyle snowboarding final at the Asian Winter Games on Saturday, standing on the podium in his first Asiad alongside countryman Kang Dong-hun, who took bronze.

Lee scored 90 points in the final at Snowboard Slopestyle Stadium in Yabuli, China, surpassing Liu Haoyu of China with 76 and Kang with 74.

Lee’s gold marks another success in a career that has already seen a host of honors earned on the international stage at 18.

He competed at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics as the youngest male athlete in Beijing at 15, before becoming the first Korean to secure gold and the youngest ever to top the podium at the FIS Snowboarding World Championships in 2023, at just 16 years and 10 months old.

He also grabbed two gold medals in the halfpipe and slopestyle disciplines at the Winter Youth Olympics in Gangwon last year.

For fellow 18-year-old Kang, the bronze is his first medal at the Asiad and first of any honor on the international stage.

Team Korea continues its success in snowboarding thanks to the two medals at the Asiad, where the country had claimed eight medals in the sport in previous competitions.

Korea is one of three countries to have medaled in snowboarding at the Asian Games alongside Japan and China.

This year’s Asian Games has already seen Korea medal in multiple other sports such as short track speed skating, speed skating and curling, with nearly a week of action still scheduled through the end of the competition on Feb. 14.

BY PAIK JI-HWAN [[email protected]]