South Korea maintained its tally of one gold, one silver and two bronze medals, remaining 13th in the overall medal standings.
In men’s figure skating, Cha Jun-hwan delivered a solid free skate at the Milano Ice Skating Arena to finish 4th overall, marking the best Olympic result yet for a Korean male singles skater. Cha’s total score of 273.92 saw him narrowly miss the bronze medalist Shun Sato of Japan, who scored 274.90 by less than one point after a strong performance highlighted by a clean quad Salchow, though a fall on his quad toe loop brought a deduction.
Cha, who placed 15th at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics — then the best result by a South Korean man in the singles event — improved to fifth at the 2022 Beijing Games. He climbed one spot higher this time to set a new personal Olympic best.
Gold-medal favorite Ilia Malinin of the United States struggled under the pressure of his Olympic debut, delivering an uncharacteristically flawed performance and finishing eighth with 264.49 points.
With several medal contenders faltering, Kazakhstan’s Mikhail Shaidorov capitalized to claim a surprise gold medal with 291.58 points, securing his country’s first gold of the Games.
At Livigno Snow Park, Lee Chae-un competed in the men’s snowboard halfpipe final and finished 6th with 87.50 points. The 19-year-old landed signature tricks including the frontside triple cork 1620 but fell short of the medals against a deep field. His run showcased Korean progression in snowboarding disciplines.
Woo Su-bin, in South Korea’s first Olympic appearance in snowboard cross, was unable to advance to the 16-athlete round after a mid-race slip. She completed her heat despite the fall and won applause from the crowd.
South Korea’s women’s curling team defeated Britain 9-3 in its third round-robin match at the Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium in Cortina d’Ampezzo.
The team, skipped by Kim Eun-ji, bounced back from an opening 4-8 loss to the United States with consecutive wins over Italy (7-2) and Britain to improve to 2-1. South Korea moved into a tie for third place among the 10 teams in the standings.
In the round-robin format, the top four teams advance to the semifinals. Sweden leads at 3-0, followed by Switzerland. South Korea will face Denmark (1-2) and Japan (0-2) in its next two matches on Feb. 15.
Skeleton, Biathlon and Cross-Country: Jung posts second straight top-10 finish
In men’s skeleton at the Cortina Sliding Center, Jung Seung-gi clocked a combined time of 3:45.90 over four runs to finish 10th. After placing 10th in his Olympic debut at the 2022 Beijing Games, Jung secured another top-10 finish at his second Olympics.
Veteran Kim Ji-soo, competing in his first Olympic appearance since the 2018 PyeongChang Games, finished 16th with a four-run total of 3:48.11.
In women’s skeleton at the same venue, Hong Su-jung recorded a combined time of 1:57.33 over two runs to place 22nd among 25 competitors.
At the Anterselva Biathlon Arena, Choi Du-jin finished last in the men’s 10-kilometer sprint, crossing the line in 28:05.7 after missing three shots in the prone stage.
In cross-country skiing, Lee Jun-seo placed 73rd out of 113 athletes in the men’s 10km interval start free at the Tesero Cross-country Skiing Stadium, finishing in 24:25.4.
Norway’s Johannes Klæbo won the event in 20:36.2 to claim his third gold medal of the Games and the eighth Olympic gold of his career, tying the all-time Winter Olympic record.
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