Almost Lost Bronze Medal: South Korean Relay Team Shocked by Japan's Protest

The South Korean men's 400m relay team, which crossed the finish line in third place while setting a new national record, almost lost their bronze medal.

Seo Min-jun (Seocheon County Office), Namadi Joel Jin (Yecheon County Office), Lee Jae-sung (Gwangju Metropolitan City Hall), and Bewesa Daniel Casama (Ansan City Hall) crossed the finish line third with a new national record of 38.43 seconds at the men's 400m relay final of the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games held at the Mizuho Park Athletics Stadium in Nagoya, Japan, on September 28, following China (38.17 seconds) and Chinese Taipei (38.32 seconds).

However, the official tournament website listed Thailand, which finished fourth with 38.49 seconds, as the bronze medalist.

The athletics national team, who had been sharing the joy of their achievement, was thrown into chaos.

Ha Kyung-soo, head coach of the men's sprint national team, said in a phone interview with reporters, "I heard that the Japanese national team raised an objection," adding, "The organizing committee did not provide a clear explanation, and hard-to-understand results appeared on the website."

The tournament organizing committee even announced Thailand as the bronze medalist in the medalist notices.

The national team strongly protested, and the organizing committee readjusted and announced South Korea as the bronze medalist long afterward.

This tournament has been heavily criticized for its amateurish operations.

On September 23, the official tournament website erroneously listed Kim Young-beom, who did not even compete in the men's 800m freestyle relay, as a bronze medalist.

Comprehensive problems are being exposed across various areas, including accommodations, transportation, and training environments, as well as officiating and medal tallying.

South Korean athletics has struggled through three different refereeing controversies at this tournament.

The men's 400m relay team was disqualified during the preliminaries on September 28 for allegedly leaving the baton exchange zone, but successfully overturned the decision through an appeal process.

The mixed 400m relay team was initially disqualified in the preliminaries on September 29 due to a foul play by another team's athlete, but also managed to overturn the decision through an appeal and competed in an additional race.

Compounding this, incomprehensible situations repeated themselves during the men's 400m relay final.

(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.