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| Korean national ice sledge hockey team players pose with bronze medal during the medal ceremony of the PyeongChang Paralympics at Gangneung Hockey Center, Sunday. / Yonhap |
Host Korea finishes 16th with one gold, two bronze
By Baek Byung-yeul
The PyeongChang Paralympics ended its 10-day run with a closing ceremony Sunday.
With the hope of collapsing the boundaries of physical impairment, the PyeongChang Paralympics were held from March 9 to 18. Titled "We Move the World," The two-hour-long ceremony brought athletes competing in the Paralympics together and featured cultural performances emphasizing their passion. There was also an art performance from Beijing which will host the 2022 Winter Paralympics.
Many dignitaries attended the ceremony including President Moon Jae-in and his wife Kim Jung-sook, International Paralympic Committee (IPC) President Andrew Parsons and Lee Hee-beom, chief of the PyeongChang Organizing Committee for the 2018 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (POCOG).
The closing ceremony also featured top Paralympian awards with Korean doctor Whang Youn-dai presenting them to New Zealander para alpine skier Adam Hall and Finnish para Nordic skier Sini Pyy. The Whang Youn Dai Achievement Awards were established by the IPC at the 1988 Seoul Summer Paralympics and have been awarded to two athletes at the end of each Paralympic Games.
The PyeongChang Paralympics was the largest Winter Paralympics in Olympic history. During the competition for a total of 80 gold medals, 567 athletes from 49 countries produced their own dramas, exemplifying the spirit of the Games.
The PyeongChang Paralympics also witnessed success in ticket sales. The POCOG said more than 343,000 tickets were sold, surpassing 2014 Sochi Paralympics sales of 316,200 tickets. The organizing committee expects at least 6.6 billion won ($6.1 million) in revenue from the sales.
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| Para Nordic skier Sin Eui-hyun, right, looks at his daughter, left, waving to him as he completes the 10-kilometer cross country skiing open relay race at the PyeongChang Paralympics at the Alpensia Biathlon Centre in PyeongChang, Sunday. / Yonhap |
Host Korea sent a record 36-member delegation to PyeongChang. Competing in all six sports, Korea aimed for a top-10 finish but fell short of its expectation after claiming one gold and two bronze medals. However, it is still the country's best record at the Winter Paralympics. Before the PyeongChang Paralympics, Korea won two silver medals from the 2002 Salt Lake City Paralympics and the 2010 Vancouver Paralympics.
Para Nordic skier Sin Eui-hyun was the best performer winning two of the three medals.
The 37-year-old, who lost his legs in a car accident in 2006, claimed Korea's first medal at PyeongChang, winning bronze in the men's 15-kilometer sitting cross-country skiing, March 11.
He then claimed the host country's first Winter Paralympic gold medal after winning the men's 7.5km sitting cross-country skiing, Saturday.
During his race, Sin posted the second fastest record at the first intermediate stop at 0.71km. He then moved up to first place at the 2.41km point and kept his lead from there. Sin also carried his country's national flag at the closing ceremony.
The other bronze medal for Korea came in ice sledge hockey on Saturday. In the bronze medal match, Korea defeated Italy 1-0 with Jang Dong-shin scoring the winning goal off Jung Seung-hwan's pass in the final third period.
The wheelchair curling team also gained popularity for producing a series of great matches. Comprised of Seo Soon-seok, Bang Min-ja, Cha Jae-goan, Jung Seung-won and Lee Dong-ha, the wheelchair curling team remained fourth after losing to Canada in the bronze medal match Saturday. However, the team inspired a lot of local fans as they finished first in the preliminaries with nine wins and two losses after defeating curling power house countries.
The United States topped in gold medal standings with 13 gold, 15 silver and eight bronze medals. The Neutral Paralympic Athletes from Russia was second, with eight gold, 10 silver and six bronze medals.
North Korea also made its Winter Paralympics debut as two cross-country skiers were granted last-minute entries by the IPC. Unlike the PyeongChang Winter Olympics where the two Koreas marched together during the opening ceremony, there were no joint marches as the North Koreans had already returned home Thursday.
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| Fireworks explode at the PyeongChang Olympic Stadium during the closing ceremony for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Paralympics in Gangwon Province, Sunday. / Yonhap |
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