A '14-year-old' medalist emerges: Archery's Kang Yeon-seo wins compound team bronze at the Asian Games [Okazaki on-site report]

*This content was translated by AI.

An athlete has stood on an Asian Games podium at the age of just 14. It is Kang Yeon-seo (Seongsa Middle School), the youngest archery national team member in history.

Born in November 2011, Kang Yeon-seo teamed up with her senior teammates to win a bronze medal against Taiwan in the women's compound team bronze medal match at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, held on the 30th at the Multi-purpose Plaza of Chuo Comprehensive Park in Okazaki, Japan.

Competing alongside Park Jeong-yoon (Changwon City Hall) and Park Ye-rin (Korea National Sport University), Kang Yeon-seo took the field as the team's second shooter and calmly contributed to the team's victory.

He [Note: Source uses masculine pronoun, likely a typo for 'She' given context of female athlete] became the youngest archery national team member by surpassing Kim Je-deok, who joined the men's recurve national team at age 17, and won a bronze medal in his first Asian Games appearance.

Earlier in the women's individual event, he [Note: Source uses masculine pronoun] also set an Asian Games record by shooting perfect scores (150 points) in consecutive matches in the Round of 32 and Round of 16.

On this day, South Korea, featuring Kang Yeon-seo, Park Jeong-yoon, and Park Ye-rin, defeated Taiwan 229-228 to claim the compound bronze medal.

South Korea took the early lead with a score of 60-59 in the first end after all six arrows scored perfect marks, but had to settle for a tie at 58-58 in the second end and actually fell behind 55-56 in the third end.

Taiwan's final arrow in the third end scored only an 8, providing an opportunity to widen the gap, but it was regrettable that five of the six arrows in the third end stopped at 9 points.

In the final fourth end, with the total score tied at 173-173, the outcome was decided in a truly dramatic fashion.

South Korea started with Park Yoon-jung's 10-point shot, but Kang Yeon-seo and Park Ye-rin each scored 9 points. In contrast, Taiwan led South Korea by one point with scores of 10-10-9.

Final turn. South Korea had Park Yoon-jung score 9, Kang Yeon-seo score 9, and Park Ye-rin score 10. Trailing by 27 points [Note: Source says '27-point disadvantage' which seems inconsistent with previous context of 1-point lead; translating literally], Taiwan recorded consecutive 9-point shots. If they scored a 10, it would be Taiwan's bronze medal; if a 9, the match would go to a shoot-off.

However, Taiwan's final arrow stopped at 8 points. Ultimately, the bronze medal match concluded with a dramatic South Korean victory of 229-228.

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*This content was translated by AI.