Korea show improvement with sixth-place finish in men's 4x200 freestyle relay

Korea finished in sixth place in the men’s 4x200-meter freestyle relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics on Tuesday, marking the best result ever by a Korean team in one of the hardest swimming events of the Games.

Swimmers compete in the men's 4x200-meter freestyle relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics on Tuesday. [AP/YONHAP]

Korea finished in sixth place in the men’s 4x200-meter freestyle relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics on Tuesday, marking the best result ever by a Korean team in one of the hardest swimming events of the Games.

Korea’s Yang Jae-hoon, Lee Ho-joon, Kim Woo-min and Hwang Sun-woo combined for a time of 7:07.26, shaving 0.7 seconds off their qualifying time to take sixth at the Paris La Defense Arena in Paris. In an unconventional nine-team final — both Israel and Japan qualified after a dead heat in qualifying — Korea’s time was good enough to put them in the middle of the pack.

Great Britain took gold with a time of 6:59.43, defending their title from Tokyo 2020 by a clear second ahead of the United States in second. Australia took bronze, with China and France in fourth and fifth. Japan trailed 0.2 seconds behind Korea, with Germany and Israel taking the last two spots.

While not a medal, Tuesday’s result marks a significant improvement in Korean swimming, with the country’s best finish prior to the Paris Games being a 12th-place finish in 1988. They finished 13th at the Tokyo Games.

Korea has also seen some individual success in the pool in Paris, where Kim became the second Korean swimmer ever to medal at an Olympics with a third-place finish in the men’s 400-meter freestyle on Saturday.

Prior to Kim, only retired freestyle swimmer Park Tae-hwan had ever made it onto an Olympic podium.

Korea still have plenty of opportunities left in the pool. Lee Ju-ho will compete in the men’s 200-meter backstroke on Wednesday, before Lee Eun-ji in the women’s 200-meter backstroke and Ji Yu-chan in the men’s 50-meter freestyle both hit the pool on Thursday.

On Friday, Kim Seo-yeong will compete in the women’s 200-meter medley, with Korea also entering a team into the mixed 4x100 medley relay on the same day.

On Saturday, Korea will round off their schedule in the pool with the men’s 4x100 medley relay.

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]