Event Summary
For the sixth Olympics in a row, the South Korean team came out as the clear victor, taking three out of the four gold medals in Athens. Korean archers set new world records in the women's individual (Park Sung-Hyun) and team (Park, Yun Mi-Jin, and Lee Sung-Jin) ranking rounds and the men's individual ranking round (Im Dong Hyun), though none of those scores counted as Olympic records because the ranking round was held before the opening ceremony. Olympic records were broken in both the men's and women's 36-arrow 1/16 and 1/8 rounds combined (by Chen Szu Yuan of Chinese Taipei and Yun of Korea), as well as in the men's 18-arrow match (by Park Kyung Mo of Korea) and 36-arrow finals rounds combined (by Tim Cuddihy of Australia).
| “ | This historic stadium has given me strength, because it is a great feeling to see the Acropolis next to you. | ” |
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—Wietse van Alten |
In the men's events, the Korean team shot 12 maximum scores of 10 to win the gold medal against Chinese Taipei 251-245. Losing by two points, the United States failed to fend of the Ukraine team to capture the bronze. The event causing the most upset however was the men's individual, the only event that the Korean team has never won and yet again failed to clinch. Defending champion Simon Fairweather was ousted from the competition in a first round loss due to blustery weather conditions. The wind caused some archers like Fairweather to make one-point shots, and its strength even caused others to miss their targets completely. The final matches of this event also saw competitors coming close in score, with Italian Marco Galiazzo beating the Japanese Hiroshi Yamamoto by only two points to win gold. Even closer still was the bronze medal match, in which Britain's Laurence Godfrey was outshot 112-113 by seventeen-year-old Australian Tim Cuddihy, who himself only managed to get into the semifinals by one point.
The woman's individual event fell easily to the Koreans; they have won this event continuously since the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles and swept all three medals at the 2000 Olympics. Though both gold and silver fell to Korean archers, Alison Williamson captured the bronze medal, giving Britain its first medal in archery since 1992. In the team event, the Korean women beat the Chinese team 241-240 to win the gold medal, making this their eleventh straight women's team championship win. Taiwan easily took the bronze medal over France.
Read more about this topic: Archery At The 2004 Summer Olympics
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