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Lee Hyeok-jung |
By Kwon Ji-youn
It was Lee Hyeok-jung, 23, and Park Min-soo, 20, who shone through a Yang Hak-seon-sized hole in the men's gymnastics team.
Yang withdrew from competition on Sunday after aggravating a hamstring injury while performing as the national team's second athlete in the team floor exercise. Yang, with teammates Park, Lee Jun-ho, Jo Yeong-gwang and Lee Hyeok-jung, had been confident of a top-three finish at the Universiade. His injury led him to an early drop-out, and with their key athlete absent, it was up to the remaining members to keep hopes alive. Fortunately, only four of the five members were required to perform, and only the top three scores were taken into account, so Yang missing was not entirely detrimental.
In his place, Jo took to the vault and Lee Jun-ho to the parallel bars, in a strategic move that would help compensate for Yang's vacancy. Park, an all-around performer, put on a flawless performance in the horizontal bar event to contribute to a 43.050-point team total in the event. With 44.200 on the vault, 44.300 on the parallel bars, 42.550 on the floor, 41.150 on the pommel horse and 43.300 on the rings, Team Korea collected 258.550 points to take silver.
It was Lee Hyeok-jung and Park who took center stage, however.
Lee sustained a knee injury while landing during his horizontal bar performance, but through gritted teeth, he stood firmly where he landed to secure 14.350 in the event to amass 84.900, which was the second-highest score on the team. He was then hoisted off the mat. Park recorded 85.250 to top the team's scoreboard.
Given that Ukraine took bronze with 258.115 points, just 0.425 points short of Team Korea's total, Lee's performance was pivotal in securing silver. He did not join his teammates on the podium at the medal ceremony, and was unable to perform in the individual finals.
Park put on a stellar act in the preliminary round of his main event, the horizontal bar, to record 14.700 points, sitting in third place going into the finals. He scored 14.700 once more in the final.
"I resolved to do even better because Yang was sidelined," he said after the competition. "I thought we would be able to win a medal, but I didn't think we would win a silver."
Japan, meanwhile, bagged gold with 266.000 points.
Park finished seventh in the individual all-around finals. He fell short of 15 points in four of the apparatus finals, with 14.300 in the floor exercise, 13.050 on the pommel horse, 14.700 in the ring event and 14.525 in the vault. He improved on these scores in his stronger events, the parallel bars (15.050 points), and the horizontal bar (14.900), but this was not enough to turn the tide. Oleg Verniaiev of Ukraine took gold with 92.075, and Japan's Shogo Nonomura took silver with 89.275. Akash Modi of the U.S. took bronze.
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