SEOK Ji Hyun: “I want to show the world that I wasn’t a one-hit wonder” Antalya - Wednesday, June 12, 2013 SEOK Ji Hyun surprised the world and herself when she won the Shanghai World Cup last month and led her team to the compound women’s gold medal over the United States. As she prepares to compete at the Antalya World Cup, this Korean rising star told us about her experience and her ambitions to lead her team to be the best in the world. The Shanghai World Cup emphasised the new dominance of SEOK Ji Hyun, who won individual and team gold medals, plus the mixed team silver in the compound division. It was the first time that Korea, the dominant force in recurve archery, had sent compound teams to a World Cup event. The 23-year-old SEOK was already a familiar face on the compound circuit. She appeared on the international scene in 2009, when she won a World Championships team silver medal, and won individual titles at the Universiade and Asian Championships. She placed fifth at the 2011 World Championships, but her name disappeared from the international results in 2012, because Korea didn’t send compound athletes to the World Cup. SEOK continued to train and remained on her country’s national team. In 2013 Korea, with SEOK as its leader, is shaking up the compound hierarchy. Her World Cup medals could be a turning point in the history of the discipline. How did you start shooting compound, in a country known for its recurve tradition? I discovered archery when I was 12 years old upon recommendation of my school teacher. I started shooting a recurve bow. However, when I was 19 and a student at the university, I started to lose interest in the recurve bow and began to have an increased interest in the compound bow. That’s how I started. Another reason is that recurve archers are very competitive in Korea and it is very difficult to join the national team. I lacked confidence and skills, and accepted that it was too hard for me. Compound was my way to join a Korean national team. I was looking for challenges, and my experience in recurve helped a lot. How do you explain your own and your team’s recent progress? Even though we competed on the international compound circuit in the past, we just began training together as a team in January of this year. The Korean Archery Association gathered the compound national team at a National Training Centre in Jincheon, in the centre of the country, where we live and train as professional athletes. Even if the change happened a short time ago, the impact on performance was very big for us. This is the main reason for our success in Shanghai. Did you expect to win in Shanghai? I didn’t expect the individual gold medal. However, we did expect a team medal, and we thought it could be of any colour: gold, silver or bronze. What did it mean to defeat the number one team, the United States, in your first World Cup? What’s next? The United States is the best compound team in the world. It was a great challenge and an immense pleasure for us to beat them. It is a good start, but it is just a start. We defeated the United States only one time, it doesn’t mean that we will be able to do it every time. We have to focus on our own training and performance in order to go on winning. How do you train? I train under Korean coaches, six days a week, for a total of 9 or 10 hours a day (which includes a mid-day break). How do you see the future of your team? Everyone knows that the Korean recurve women’s team is the best in the world. In the future we would like to be the equivalent for compound: to be the top-class team in the world. It is our goal and it is within our reach. What are your personal goals for 2013? My main goal this season is the World Championships in Belek Antalya, which will be my third experience. My best result was the quarter-finals in 2011 and I want to do better this time and get into the final. Since I won the Shanghai World Cup, there is more pressure on me to do well, but at the same time I have more motivation. I want to prove Korea’s abilities in compound, and prove that winning in Shanghai wasn’t just one lucky time but that we really are among the best in the world. And outside of archery? I am not thinking about it, at the moment I am focusing a hundred percent on becoming a better archer! I don’t think of anything else other than archery. SEOK Ji Hyun (KOR) – Born 16 January 1990 1st Individual World Cup stage 1 – Shanghai 2013 1st Team World Cup stage 1 – Shanghai 2013 2nd Mixed Team World Cup stage 1 – Shanghai 2013 1st Team University Games – Shenzhen 2011 3rd Mixed Team World Championships – Turin 2011 5th Individual World Championships – Turin 2011 3rd Team World University Championships – Shenzhen 2010 2nd Individual World University Championships – Shenzhen 2010 1st Team Asian Championships – Bali 2009 1st Individual Asian Championships – Bali 2009 2nd Team World Championships – Ulsan 2009 1st Individual University Games – Belgrade 2009 World Archery Communication
Posted on: Fri, 14 Jun 2013 02:41:26 +0000
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