After becoming the first South Korean female gymnast to win a medal at the Olympic Games, Yeo Seo-jung (Jecheon City Hall) made history at the World Championships.
Yeo won the bronze medal in the women’s vault final at the 52nd World Artistic Gymnastics Championships at the Sportspalace in Antwerp, Belgium, on Sunday (Sept. 7) with an average score of 14.416 in the first and second periods to finish third out of eight competitors.
It was the first world championship medal for Korean women gymnasts on vault, their main event, since they made their debut at the 1979 World Championships in Fort Worth, Texas, USA.
The daughter of the original vault emperor, Yeo Hong-cheol, the executive director of the Korean Gymnastics Association (KGA) and a professor at Kyung Hee University, Yeo also set a new record as the first father and daughter to win a medal at the World Championships.
Yeo won a bronze medal on vault at the 1994 World Championships in Brisbane, Australia, and a silver medal on floor at the 1996 World Championships in Puerto Rico.
Previously, Yeo won bronze in the women’s vault final at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in 2021, becoming the first South Korean female gymnast to win an Olympic medal.
She also became the first father-daughter Olympic medalist, joining Professor Yeo, who won the men’s vault silver medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
Yeo’s medal at the world championships, held nine months ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympics, raised hopes of her winning a second consecutive Olympic medal.
Returning “gymnastics queen” Simone Biles (USA) won the silver medal with a score of 14.549. The gold medal went to Brazil’s Andrade Rebecca, who scored 14.750. 파워볼게임