Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei (楊勇緯) yesterday won Taiwan’s first gold medal at the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, defeating South Korea’s Lee Ha-rim 1-0 in the men’s 60kg category.
The gold medal was Taiwan’s 100th since it first participated in the Games in 1954. Yang is also the first Taiwanese to win a gold medal in men’s judo at the Games.
After defeating Lee, a teary-eyed Yang hugged his coach, Liu Wen-deng (劉文等).
Photo: Reuters
“I finally did it,” the world No. 7 judoka shouted.
Previously, Taiwan’s judo team had only collected four silvers in the Asian Games, all of which were won by women.
Yang’s gold medal match was his fourth showdown against world No. 3 Lee. Yang has won all of them.
Photo: CNA
Yang, who turns 26 on Thursday, won a bronze in the same category in the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta.
He faced an uphill battle to the final this year. During the quarter-final, he survived a nearly six-minute bout to crush Japanese Olympic medalist Hayato Kondo, who had defeated him in the final at the Tokyo Olympics.
During the semi-final, Yang secured his spot in the final by pinning Mongolian Enkhtaivan Ariunbold using a great inner rip and an arm lock triangle control maneuver in the final 84 seconds.
Photo courtesy of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee
Liu said that the gold medal is important to Yang, the nation and judo competitors in Taiwan.
“Training an athlete is not easy. We hope that this will inspire more people to practice judo,” Liu said.
After the Asian Games, Yang is to compete in tournaments to accumulate enough points to qualify and earn a top seed for next year’s Summer Olympics in Paris, Liu said.
Photo: CNA
Chen Hsin-ya (陳歆雅) yesterday won Taiwan’s first medal at this year’s Asian Games, winning bronze in the women’s individual taekwondo poomsae event, while 24-year-old Ma Yun-chung (馬允中) took silver in the men’s individual taekwondo poomsae.
Taiwan’s Chen Chi-ya (陳淇亞), 18, made it to the final in the 10m air rifle category, but ended her bid for a medal after finishing eighth.
Taiwan’s men’s artistic gymnastics team also won a bronze medal, while China and Japan won gold and a silver respectively.
Eleven-year-old Lin Yi-fan (林逸凡), Taiwan’s youngest-ever Asian Games athlete, qualified for the final of women’s park skateboarding.
SILICON VALLEY HUB: The office would showcase Taiwan’s strengths in semiconductors and artificial intelligence, and help Taiwanese start-ups connect with global opportunities Taiwan has established an office in Palo Alto, one of the principal cities of Silicon Valley in California, aimed at helping Taiwanese technology start-ups gain global visibility, the National Development Council said yesterday. The “Startup Island Taiwan Silicon Valley hub” at No. 299 California Avenue is focused on “supporting start-ups and innovators by providing professional consulting, co-working spaces, and community platforms,” the council said in a post on its Web site. The office is the second overseas start-up hub established by the council, after a similar site was set up in Tokyo in September last year. Representatives from Taiwanese start-ups, local businesses and
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
INDUSTRIAL CLUSTER: In Germany, the sector would be developed around Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s plant, and extend to Poland and the Czech Republic The Executive Yuan’s economic diplomacy task force has approved programs aimed at bolstering the nation’s chip diplomacy with Japan and European nations. The task force in its first meeting had its operational mechanism and organizational structure confirmed, with Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) the convener, and Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君) and Minister Without Portfolio Ma Yung-cheng (馬永成) the deputy conveners. Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) would be the convener of the task force’s strategy group in charge of policy planning for economic diplomacy. The meeting was attended by the heads of the National Development Council, the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the
RSS