(Olympics) Park Hye-jeong wins silver in women’s weightlifting

Park Hye-jeong captured silver in the heaviest weight class in women’s weightlifting Sunday for South Korea’s final medal of the Paris Olympics.

Park finished with the total of 299 kilograms, with 131kg in the snatch and 168kg in the clean and jerk in the women’s +81kg event at South Paris Arena 6 in the French capital.

Both the snatch mark and the total weight are new South Korean national records.

Park, 21, became the first South Korean medalist in the women’s super heavyweight division since Jang Mi-ran in 2012.

Li Wenwen of China claimed her second straight gold medal with 309kg total, from 136kg in the snatch and 173kg in the clean and jerk.

Emily Campbell of Britain, who won silver behind Li at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, got the bronze this time at 288kg, with 126kg in the snatch and 162 in the clean and jerk.

This was South Korea’s 32nd medal of the Paris Olympics, one shy of its record for most medals at a Summer Games.

With the spotlight on her as the last medal hopeful for South Korea in Paris, Park admitted she had felt the weight of expectations.

“I was worried about what would happen if I didn’t win a medal,” Park said. “I knew this was the last medal event for us, and I felt the pressure to live up to expectations. I had a ton of support from my coaches to make it this far.”

She said she had been banged up before the Olympics but she felt better during the warmup.

“I tweaked my elbow a bit during the snatch, but I managed to get this silver medal,” Park said. “I didn’t get to hear the national anthem but still saw our flag go up during the ceremony. I am really happy with that.”

Park was flawless in her snatch, going from 123kg to 127kg and then the national record weight of 131kg with relative ease. Li lifted 136kg with her second snatch attempt and didn’t even go for a third attempt, taking a 5kg lead over Park into the clean and jerk.

Given Li’s dominance in this event as the defending champion and the world record holder, it seemed to be a foregone conclusion that Park and others would be battling for second place. Li’s successful second attempt of 173kg virtually guaranteed the Chinese the gold medal at that point.

And Campbell couldn’t keep pace with Park. She trailed Park by 5kg after the snatch, and fell back further after Park’s successful lift of 168kg and Campbell’s failure to lift 169kg in their respective second attempts.

Park finished at 299kg total after she was unable to get 173kg over her head. Needing a huge comeback, Campbell went for 174kg, which would have put her ahead of Park at 300kg total. But Campbell didn’t come close, and Park earned her first Olympic medal in her debut.