Korea fails to win medal at Short Track World Tour in Netherlands

Skaters compete in the semifinals of the women's 3,000-meter relay at the International Skating Union Short Track World Tour event at the Optisport Sportboulevard in Dordrecht, the Netherlands, Saturday. EPA-Yonhap

Korea did not produce any podium finish on the first day of medal races at the final International Skating Union (ISU) Short Track World Tour event of the season in the Netherlands.

Countries are vying for quota places at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics based on results at four World Tour competitions this season, and Korea will not likely earn a maximum three spots in the men's 500 meters after failing to win any medal in the distance during the World Tour.

Rim Jong-un and Hwang Dae-heon were eliminated in the quarterfinals at the Optisport Sportboulevard in Dordrecht, the Netherlands, on Saturday (local time), while Shin Dong-min was knocked out of the repechage phase.

Olympic quota places will be allocated based on the three best results out of four in each distance at the four ISU World Tour competitions.

For both men and women, there are 32 quota places up for grabs in the 500m and 1,000m, and 36 quota places for the 1,500m. The men's 5,000m relay and women's 3,000m relay will each offer eight quota places, and the mixed 2,000m relay event will have 12 quota places.

Each country can earn a maximum three quota places per individual event and one quota place per relay event. Teams can each register three men and three women for individual races, and four men and four women for the relays. For the mixed relay, countries that have at least two male and two female skaters already qualified in individual races will be given priority.

At the 2014 Sochi Winter Games, Korea missed out on a quota place in the men's 500m and the men's 1,000m. Korea was represented fully in every event as the host country of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, but then only had two skaters each in the men's and women's 500m at the 2022 competition in Beijing.

The women's 500m final in Dordrecht is scheduled for Sunday, as Korea will try to earn its second medal of the World Tour following Choi Min-jeong's bronze in Gdansk, Poland, a week ago. Choi and Kim Gil-li have made it to the quarterfinals in Dordrecht.

In races other than the men's and women's 500m, Korea will likely earn maximum quota places, though it failed to add to its medal tally Saturday.

In the men's 1,500m, Rim and Lee Jeong-min couldn't make it out of the semifinals, while Shin, the only Korean in the final, finished sixth.

Choi and Kim failed to survive the semifinals in the women's 1,000m. Their women's 3,000m relay team, which also included Shim Suk-hee and Noh Do-hee, finished fourth behind the Netherlands, Italy and the United States in the final.