"When my mental state crumbled, I saw my mother in the stands." The 17-year-old boy who never gave up, a 'golden drama' [Aichi Nagoya AG]

*This content was translated by AI.

The journey to South Korea's first-ever gold medal in skateboarding history through the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games was nothing short of "a full-fledged drama."

Kang Jun-i (Yeongdeungpo High School), a 17-year-old born in 2008 who competed in the final, attempted the high-difficulty trick "Nollie 270 Heelflip Lipslide," but fell during both the first and second rounds.

After scoring zero points consecutively on the final stage, leaving only one last attempt, he even shed bitter tears.

Yet, Kang Jun-i chose to attempt the "same trick" in his third round that had caused him to fall twice before.

There was an option to challenge a less difficult trick, and he could have finished the Asian Games with zero points across all three attempts, but Kang Jun-i did not give up and challenged the high-difficulty trick once more.

Final total score: 180.85 points. Despite falling in both the first and second rounds, Kang Jun-i finally succeeded with the twice-failed trick and immediately rose to the top of the leaderboard.

This marked the moment South Korea wrote history with its first gold medal in skateboarding since the sport was officially added to the Asian Games program at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang (Indonesia) Games.

After the final, Kang Jun-i attended a "gold medalist press conference" at the Korean House in Nagoya, Japan, on the following day and revealed, "Actually, after failing in the first and second rounds, I really wanted to try other tricks."

He added, "However, since it's the trick I've practiced the most and succeeded with before, I pushed forward with that one. I knew it would yield many points if successful, so even though it wasn't stable, I still took the challenge."

In fact, after two failures, he reflected on his state of mind at the time, saying, "My mental state crumbled." What caught his eye then was his mother sitting in the stands, cheering for him.

Kang Jun-i said, "Before my third attempt, I looked into the stands and saw my mother. I resolved to repay her trust." His third challenge, which he did not abandon, resulted in a gold medal.

Just looking at his journey through that day's final makes it seem like a drama, but considering the poor skateboarding environment he has navigated domestically, its significance is even greater.

Although he quickly became a rising star after being introduced as a skateboarding prodigy on the past TV program "Discovery of Talent," it was not easy to even practice properly.

He said, "(In my former hometown) Yangsan had no training facilities. I took an overnight bus to Seoul on Fridays and returned on Sunday's last train. It was so difficult that I moved to Seoul, but even in Seoul, training facilities were insufficient, making proper practice hard."

That is why this Asian Games gold medal holds even greater meaning for him. Kang Jun-i stated, "I won the competition wearing the Taegeukgi for the first time. It still feels like a dream and is unbelievable." He also said, "Today (at the press conference), I only slept for 2-3 hours before coming out. After the competition ended, my body felt relaxed, and as it became time to sleep, I got nervous again and couldn't fall asleep. It seems I received over 100 congratulatory messages."

Already granted military service exemption at his high school age, he remarked, "I don't feel it yet. But when the time comes for me to join the army, I suppose I'll realize it." He added, "My biggest goal is to create difficult tricks and succeed in all of them at the LA Olympics two years from now, winning first place (gold medal)."

Kang Jun-i continued, "It's too young to talk about life. But after falling many times, I realized there are times when things don't go well and times when they do." He delivered a resonant message: "If you keep challenging yourself, you can eventually reach your goal."

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*This content was translated by AI.