▲ The women's national team wins the bronze medal in the track cycling team pursuit.
The South Korean national men's and women's track cycling teams have both secured bronze medals in the team pursuit event at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games.
The women's team, consisting of Kim Min-jung, Jang Su-ji, Noh Yoon-seo, and Shin Ji-eun, defeated Uzbekistan in the women's team pursuit bronze medal match held this morning at the Izu Velodrome in Shizuoka Prefecture, claiming third place.
The South Korean women's team pursuit won the silver medal at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games and the gold medal at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games, but finished without a medal at the previous 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games.
With this bronze medal, they have returned to the Asian Games podium for the first time in 8 years.
Shin Ji-eun, who previously placed third in the women's 24.2 km individual time trial to secure South Korea's first medal of these Games, has now captured her second bronze medal.
The team pursuit is an event where two teams of four riders start on opposite sides of the velodrome track and race over 4 kilometers.
▲ Scene from the men's track cycling team pursuit bronze medal match
A team wins by crossing the finish line ahead of the opposing team or by catching up to them during the race.
The team's time is measured based on the third rider among the four to cross the finish line, and if a team completely overtakes the opposing team during the race, the match ends immediately and victory is declared for the overtaking team.
The women's team advanced to the first round after finishing third in the preliminaries with a time of 4 minutes and 30.311 seconds behind Japan and China, but unfortunately missed out on the final yesterday when they were caught and overtaken by China before finishing in the first round.
However, regrouping for today's bronze medal match, they showcased dominant skills by catching and overtaking Uzbekistan on the track before the finish line, securing the bronze medal early on.
The men's team, consisting of Park Sang-hoon, Hong Seung-min, Kim Hyun-seok, and Min Kyoung-ho, also defeated Kazakhstan in the subsequent men's team pursuit bronze medal match, claiming bronze for the second consecutive tournament following the previous 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games.
The men's team advanced to the first round in fourth place with a preliminary time of 3 minutes and 35.338 seconds, but was blocked by host nation Japan in the first round and pushed to the third-place playoff.
Having reorganized their ranks for the bronze medal match, the national team crossed the finish line with a time of 3 minutes and 55.933 seconds to capture the bronze medal.
(Photo courtesy of Korea Cycling Federation, Yonhap News)
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