Roaring While Pointing at the Taegeukgi on Their Forearms... Defending the Pride of the 'World's Strongest'

[Anchor]

Our 8 O'Clock News Asian Games special starts with gold medal news from our national team. Gold medals came from archery for two consecutive days. Although a sweep of all recurve events fell through due to fierce challenges from competing nations, the men's national team defended the pride of being the world's strongest by winning the team event for the second consecutive time.

Reporter Jeon Yeongmin has the story from the venue.

[Reporter]

The recurve national team's goal of sweeping all events went off track from the beginning.

The women's national team, which had maintained the top spot at the Asian Games for 28 years, suffered the shock of having their streak of eight consecutive titles shattered after being caught off guard by India in the team final, and had to settle for a bronze medal after losing to China in the mixed team semifinals.

Facing a crisis of leaving the team events without a single gold medal for the first time in 48 years since the Bangkok Games in 1978, when archery became an official event,

[Republic of Korea!]

Kim Woo-jin, Lee Woo-seok, and Kim Je-deok, who teamed up to win the men's team gold medal at the Paris Olympics, protected the pride of South Korean archery.

After thoroughly defeating Chinese Taipei by winning three consecutive sets in the semifinals, they secured the lead in the second set of the final against India amid a tight balance by hitting all of their first three arrows right into the center of the target.

The demoralized Indian team committed a fatal mistake by shooting their fourth arrow into the 7-ring in the third set, and Kim Woo-jin sealed the victory by landing the final arrow into the 9-ring, where an 8 or higher would secure the win.

Having completed two consecutive men's team titles at the Asian Games, the players roared while pointing at the Taegeukgi (South Korean flag) on their forearms,

[Fighting!]

and relished their joy standing at the highest spot on the podium with a celebration signifying back-to-back championships.

[Kim Woo-jin / National Recurve Archer: (In international competitions) Because we have continuously achieved good results and only won, I felt a lot of pressure heading into this year's Asian Games. I feel like I've finally shaken all of that off.]

Having protected their pride with the men's team gold medal, South Korean archery will now aim for joint gold medals in the final men's and women's individual events tomorrow.

(Reported by Kim Se-kyung | Video editing by Hwang Ji-young | Design by Kang Yun-jung)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.