Yunji Kim Makes History with Five Medals, Leading Korea to Best-Ever Winter Paralympic Finish

Yunji Kim (19), the "star athlete" of Korean para sports, has become the first Korean athlete ever to win two gold medals at a single Winter Paralympics. Adding three silver medals, Kim has also set a new record for the most medals won by a Korean athlete in a single Olympic or Paralympic Games, with a total of five medals at one event, surpassing the previous record of four.

On March 15 (local time), Kim clinched the gold medal in the women's 20km sitting interval start cross-country skiing event at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Paralympics at the Tesero Cross-Country Stadium in Italy, finishing with a time of 58 minutes 23.3 seconds. This marked her second gold and fifth medal at these Games. Kim finished the competition with two gold and three silver medals.

On the 15th (local time), Yoonji Kim celebrated after securing the gold medal with a time of 58 minutes and 23.3 seconds in the women's 20km interval start cross-country skiing event at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Paralympics held at the Tesero Cross-Country Stadium in Italy. Photo by Yonhap News

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Kim is the first Korean athlete ever, across both the Olympics and Paralympics, to win five medals at a single Games.

The previous record was four medals. In the Olympics, Viktor Ahn (Korean name: Ahn Hyunsoo) won four medals (three gold, one bronze) at the 2006 Turin Games. In the Paralympics, Kang Seongguk secured four medals (two gold, two silver) in wheelchair athletics at the 1988 Seoul Paralympics, and Hong Seokman won four medals (one gold, three bronze) at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics.

Notably, unlike the earlier records, which included relay and other team events, all five of Kim's medals were earned in individual events.

On March 8, Kim won Korea's first ever women's gold medal in the Winter Paralympics in the 12.5km individual biathlon. She then took silver in the women's sitting sprint cross-country skiing on March 10, and added another silver in the women's 10km interval start on March 11 with a time of 26 minutes 51.6 seconds. By this point, with three medals, Kim had already become the Korean athlete with the most medals in Winter Paralympic history, but she did not stop there.

On March 13, she earned her third silver in the women's sitting biathlon sprint pursuit with a time of 11 minutes 41.6 seconds. On the final day of the Games, she claimed gold in her first attempt at the women's 20km cross-country skiing event, concluding her remarkable journey at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Paralympics.

Cross-country skiing is an event where athletes race on ski tracks set in snowy mountainous or open terrain, aiming to finish as quickly as possible. The day's competition was held in the interval start format, with athletes starting every 30 seconds and completing seven laps of a 2,852-meter course.

From the beginning, Kim took the lead, comfortably outpacing "legend" Oksana Masters of the United States, who had already won four gold medals at these Games. At the 6.0km mark, midway through the race, Masters briefly overtook Kim, but Kim regained the lead at the 9.0km mark. She maintained her lead to the end, beating out Germany's Anja Wicker (59 minutes 17.4 seconds) and Masters (59 minutes 34.5 seconds) to secure the gold medal.

With Kim's gold medal, Korea achieved its best-ever Winter Paralympic results at these Games, winning two gold, three silver, and one bronze medal.

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