On the evening of February 13, the short track speed skating event of the Beijing Winter Olympics entered the final of the fifth competition day, and the gold medals in the women's 3000m relay and the men's 500m were decided successively. Unfortunately, in these two projects where China has won the championship, the battle at home, the Chinese short track speed skating team has folded and missed the gold medal. Especially in the men's 500m event, Wu Dajing, as the defending champion, ranked third in the group with a difference of 0.016 seconds in the semi-finals, missed the final of Group A, and finally won the first place in the final of Group B. In addition, in the women's 3000m relay final, the Chinese team lost to the Netherlands and the South Korean team, ranking third, and won a valuable bronze medal.
When the Chinese short track speed skating team missed the gold medal, another Asian team, South Korea, also failed to win the gold medal. In the men's 500m 1/4 final, Hwang Dae-hyun became the only seedling in South Korea, advancing to the semi-finals with a second place in the group. As a result, he was in the same group as Wu Dajing, and there was a controversial ice knife interference in the competition, and he also interfered with the Canadian opponent, so he was convicted of fouling, and also stopped in the semifinals, and even the B group final was not eligible to participate. In the women's 3000m relay final, they did not take advantage of the overall strong Dutch team PK, and could only watch the latter win the championship with an Olympic record-breaking performance, and the South Korean women's team won a silver medal again.
In fact, in the previous four competition days, in addition to winning the mixed team 2000 meters relay and Ren Ziwei's men's 1000 meters gold medal, the other events, have not won the gold medal, even in the women's 1000 meters, no one can advance to the semifinals. In the men's 1500m competition, no one from the Chinese team advanced to the final, not to mention the gold medal, not even qualified to compete for the medal. The South Korean team was even more bleak, except for Hwang Daehyun, who won the men's 1500m, and in several other events that have been completed, the Korean team also failed to win the gold medal, only Choi Min-jin and the women's relay won two silver medals. This is lower than their results in previous Olympic Games.
Once upon a time, the ceiling of short track speed skating was ruled by China and South Korea, and in the various events of the World Series, the vast majority of the finals were players from the Chinese and Korean teams, so for a long time, "Sino-Korean grievances" became a topic of discussion in the outside world. In recent years, the short track performance of China and South Korea has obviously declined, which has a lot to do with the talent gap between the two teams, and the rapid improvement of the strength of European and American teams is also a direct impact. At this Winter Olympics, the Netherlands, Italy, Hungary and Russia in Europe, Canada in the Americas and other teams, the strength of athletes has increased significantly, Fontana defended the women's 500 meters, Shultin broke the Olympic record to win the women's 1000 meters gold medal, the Netherlands team once again broke the Olympic record to win the women's relay gold medal, Shultin achieved double champion. Hungary's Liu Shaoang rode the dust and won the men's 500m championship, once again achieving a breakthrough in the individual gold medal for the Hungarian short track.
While the China-South Korea short track is still tit-for-tat, European and American teams have risen rapidly, seized the commanding heights, and divided up the gold medals in multiple events, leaving only the stunned Chinese and South Korean teams. It is undeniable that the Chinese short track, especially the Korean short track, occupied an absolute dominant position in the world, but with the introduction of high technology into the refereeing and punishment system, the upgrading and upgrading of training technology made the hegemon of the year show signs of decline, but the latecomers had more opportunities to impact, and even achieved a monopoly.
Perhaps it is time for the Chinese and South Korean teams to put down their bodies, even grievances, deepen exchanges and cooperation with each other, and solve the current dilemma together, rather than continuing to blindly accuse and ridicule each other. The two sides should work together to confront the challenge of European and American teams and rewrite The Asian power in short track speed skating.