(Olympics) S. Korea claims 1st table tennis medal in 12 years, adds bronze in judo

South Korea extended its medal-winning streak to four days at the Paris Olympics on Tuesday, picking up a bronze medal each in table tennis and judo.

The first medal of the day was a drought buster, as Lim Jong-hoon and Shin Yu-bin captured the bronze medal in the mixed doubles table tennis event for South Korea’s first ping pong medal in 12 years.

They defeated Wong Chun Ting and Doo Hoi Kem of Hong Kong 4-0 (11-5, 11-7, 11-7, 14-12) in the third-place contest.

The South Koreans took the first three games with relative ease, but Chun and Doo pushed back and held a 10-8 lead in the fourth game, a point away from extending the match.

But South Korea won the next two points for the deuce, and closed out the Hong Kong team at 14-12 on a long return by Wong.

The North Korean team of Ri Jong-sik and Kim Kum-yong won silver in the mixed doubles for their country’s first medal in Paris.

South Korea also earned a bronze medal in judo, with Lee Joon-hwan defeated world No. 1 from Belgium, Matthias Casse, in one of two bronze medal contests.

Lee grabbed his decisive “waza-ari,” or a half point, 48 seconds into the sudden-death extra period to win bronze in his Olympic debut.

South Korea has so far won five golds, three silvers and three bronzes to rank fifth in the medal table.

Elsewhere on Tuesday, South Korea settled for fourth place in the 10-meter air pistol mixed team event on Tuesday, after Lee Won-ho and Oh Ye-jin lost to Sarabjot Singh and Manu Bhaker of India 16-10 in the bronze medal contest.

Oh, the women’s 10m air pistol champion, missed out on her second medal of the Paris Games. This was Lee’s second fourth-place finish after the men’s 10m air pistol event.

The men’s 4×200-meter freestyle relay team finished sixth in South Korea’s very first appearance in an Olympic swimming relay final. The team of Yang Jae-hoon, Lee Ho-joon, Kim Woo-min and Hwang Sun-woo finished the 800m competition in 7:07.26, nearly six full seconds worse than their national record.

The women’s epee fencing team lost to France 37-31 in the quarterfinals, as its bid for a second straight medal came crashing down in the first match.

The team of Song Se-ra, Kang Young-mi, Lee Hye-in and Choi In-jeong won the silver medal together at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. They were reunited for Paris after Choi came out of retirement earlier this year, but couldn’t recapture their magic from three years ago.

The women’s handball team lost to Norway 26-20 in Group A. This was South Korea’s second straight defeat, as its hopes of qualifying for the quarterfinals took another blow.

Im Ae-ji reached the quarterfinals of the women’s 54-kilogram boxing, after defeating Tatiana Chagas of Brazil by a 4-1 decision in the round of 16.

This was Im’s first career Olympic victory. She was eliminated in her first match at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

She is now within a victory of giving South Korea its first medal ever in women’s boxing.

If Im beats Yeni Arias of Colombia in her quarterfinal match to reach the semifinals, she will be assured of at least a bronze medal. Boxing doesn’t hold third-place fights and hands out bronze medals to both losers of the semifinals.