[Olympics] Park Je-eon Pioneers Korea's First Nordic Combined Competition

44th Place in Large Hill Individual 10km, Up 3 Ranks from Pyeongchang

'Korea's first Nordic combined national representative' Park Je-eon is stopping his skis after landing a jump in the Nordic combined individual normal hill/10km event at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics held on the afternoon of the 9th at the National Ski Jumping Center in Zhangjiakou, China. Photo by Yonhap News

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Heeyoon] Park Je-eon (Pyeongchang County Office), a pioneer of Nordic combined in Korea, finished 44th in the large hill individual 10km event.

On the 15th, Park Je-eon crossed the finish line in 34 minutes 56.5 seconds in the Nordic combined individual large hill 10km cross-country skiing event held at the National Ski Jumping Center in Zhangjiakou, China, during the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

The Nordic combined event combines ski jumping and cross-country skiing. Rankings are determined by ski jumping, which then sets the starting order for the cross-country skiing. The final medalists are decided based on the cross-country skiing results.

In the earlier ski jumping round, Park Je-eon jumped 107.0 meters and scored a total of 67.9 points, placing 39th out of 48 competitors.

In the cross-country skiing, Park passed the 1km mark in 39th place but dropped to 44th at the 3.5km point. At the 5km mark, the gap between him and the leader was over 5 minutes, but Park continued his own race. He finished the race in 44th place, 7 minutes 43.2 seconds behind the winner.

Although he placed 44th out of 47 competitors, Park Je-eon set a personal best. Previously, at the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, he finished 47th out of 48 in the individual large hill 10km event, improving his ranking by three places compared to four years ago.

As the only Nordic combined athlete in Korea, Park Je-eon, who first challenged the Olympics in Pyeongchang, earned a difficult qualification for the Beijing Olympics by ranking within the top 30 out of 80 in the 2021 Continental Cup ranking points.

Originally a promising cross-country skier, Park Je-eon started ski jumping in 2009. His father, Park Ki-ho, who was a national cross-country representative at the 1984 Sarajevo and 1988 Calgary Olympics, personally encouraged his son to pursue Nordic combined. As the sole Korean representative, Park challenged the Beijing Winter Olympics following Pyeongchang. Although his ranking remained in the lower tier against the high global standards, he concluded his great challenge by setting his personal best Olympic result once again.

Meanwhile, the gold medal was won by Norway’s Jørgen Graabak, who recorded a time of 27 minutes 13.3 seconds. The silver medal also went to Norway’s Jens Lur?s Oftebro, and the bronze medal was awarded to Japan’s Watanabe Akito.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.