Chang Hye-jin ( ko, 장혜진; or ; born 13 May 1987) is a South Korean former
recurve archer. A two-time Olympic gold medalist, Chang was the Olympic champion in both the women's individual and women's team events at
2016 Summer Olympics
The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...
in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
. She is also a former number one-ranked recurve archer, having headed the
World Archery Rankings The World Archery Rankings is a ranking system developed by the World Archery Federation for international competitive archery. It is calculated using a points system and published following major World Archery tournaments.
The ranking system was ...
between 2017 and 2019.
After being introduced to archery at the age of eleven, Chang made her international debut in 2008. She first qualified for the senior South Korean national team in 2010 and over the next nine years regularly represented her country at international competitions, winning team gold medals at the
World Archery Championships
The World Archery Championships are a series of competitions in Archery organised by the World Archery Federation (WA). The first competition held under that title took place in 1931.
Competition archery takes a wide variety of formats, but the ...
, the
World Cup finals, the
Asian Games
The Asian Games, also known as Asiad, is a continental multi-sport event held every four years among athletes from all over Asia. The Games were regulated by the Asian Games Federation (AGF) from the first Games in New Delhi, India, until t ...
, and the
Summer Universiade
The Universiade is an international multi-sport event, organized for university athletes by the International University Sports Federation (FISU). The name is a portmanteau of the words "University" and "Olympiad".
The Universiade is referred t ...
. She was additionally the women's individual runner-up at the
2017 World Championships. Chang retired from competitive archery in 2022.
Early life
Chang Hye-jin was born on 13 May 1987
in the city of
Daegu
Daegu (, , literally 'large hill', 대구광역시), formerly spelled Taegu and officially known as the Daegu Metropolitan City, is a city in South Korea.
It is the third-largest urban agglomeration in South Korea after Seoul and Busan; it is ...
.
She was first introduced to archery at the age of eleven and participated in her first national tournament two years later. She won her first tournament during her second year of high school in Daegu, and after studying at Daegu's
Keimyung University
Keimyung University (계명대학교, Gyemyeong Daehakgyo), abbreviated as KMU or Keimyung (啓明), is a private university located in Daegu, the fourth largest city in South Korea. The university takes roots from Jejungwon founded in 1899. Th ...
, joined the
Seoul
Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...
-based
LH team to shoot professionally.
As of August 2018 she remains a member of the LH team.
Career
2008–2014: Early career
Chang made her international debut in 2008 at the
World University Games
The Universiade is an international multi-sport event, organized for university athletes by the International University Sports Federation (FISU). The name is a portmanteau of the words "University" and "Olympiad".
The Universiade is referred t ...
held in Chinese Taipei.
The following year she was selected to compete in
Summer Universiade
The Universiade is an international multi-sport event, organized for university athletes by the International University Sports Federation (FISU). The name is a portmanteau of the words "University" and "Olympiad".
The Universiade is referred t ...
in
Belgrade
Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...
, winning gold medal in the women's team recurve event. She successfully qualified for the South Korean senior team in 2010, but in 2012 narrowly missed out on selection for that year's
Summer Olympics
The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The inau ...
in
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
, placing fourth in the national team trials in which the top three were chosen for Olympic competition.
Chang made her debut at the biennial
World Archery Championships
The World Archery Championships are a series of competitions in Archery organised by the World Archery Federation (WA). The first competition held under that title took place in 1931.
Competition archery takes a wide variety of formats, but the ...
in 2013, winning the women's team recurve title with
Ki Bo-bae
Ki Bo-bae (Hangul: 기보배; or ; born February 20, 1988) is a South Korean recurve archer and three-time Olympic gold medalist. She was the winner of the women's team and women's individual events at the 2012 Summer Olympics and of the wom ...
and
Yun Ok-hee
Yun Ok-hee (Korean: 윤옥희, Hanja: 尹玉姬, ; born 1 March 1985) is a South Korean archer, who won the gold medal in the team and a silver in the individual competition at the 2006 Asian Games and is a former world num ...
after defeating Belarus in a low-scoring final. Eleven months later she won two medals at the
2014 Asian Games
The 2014 Asian Games ( ko, 2014년 아시아 경기대회/2014년 아시안 게임, Icheon sip-sa nyeon Asia gyeonggi daehoe/Icheon sip-sa nyeon Asian Geim), officially known as the 17th Asian Games ( ko, 제17회 아시아 경기대회/제17회 ...
, reaching the gold medal match in both the
women's team and
women's individual recurve events. With teammates
Jung Dasomi
Jung Dasomi (Hangul: 정다소미; born 23 November 1990) is an archer from South Korea who specialises in recurve archery. Jung made a highly successful debut in international archery in 2011, winning medals at the World Archery Championships ...
and
Lee Tuk-young
Lee Tuk-young (Hangul: 이특영, born 2 December 1989) is a South Korean archer, who won the gold medal in the team competition at the 2006 Asian Games
6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and ...
she secured South Korea's fifth consecutive women's team title after a comfortable victory over China, but was outshot by Jung by seven
set points to three in the individual final.
2016: Olympic champion
In the spring of 2016 Chang won qualification for the South Korean Olympic team on her second attempt, joining the reigning Olympic champion
Ki Bo-bae
Ki Bo-bae (Hangul: 기보배; or ; born February 20, 1988) is a South Korean recurve archer and three-time Olympic gold medalist. She was the winner of the women's team and women's individual events at the 2012 Summer Olympics and of the wom ...
and the women's recurve world number one
Choi Mi-sun
Choi Mi-sun (; born 1 July 1996) is a South Korean professional recurve archer. She won gold medal in the women's team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
Career 2015: Instant success
Choi made her international debut in Ma ...
for the women's individual and women's team events in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
. Although the trio were widely expected to win their nation's eighth consecutive Olympic gold medal in the team competition, it was Choi and Ki who were tipped for success in the individual discipline after strong performances in the
2015 World Archery Championships
The 2015 World Archery Championships was the 48th edition of the event. It was held in Copenhagen, Denmark from 26 July to 2 August 2015 and was organised by World Archery Federation (formerly known as FITA). Qualification and elimination rounds ...
, with Chang later being described by ''Reuters'' as the "least-fancied" of the three Korean women.
At the Olympic Games in July Chang concluded the preliminary 72-arrow ranking round in second position, scoring 666 points from a maximum of 720. This gave her the number two seed for the
individual competition. With Choi and Ki also scoring highly to finish the round in first and third place respectively, a combined score of 1,998 points earned the trio the top seed for the
team competition.
Chang, Choi, and Ki were ultimately successful in maintaining South Korea's undefeated streak in the team event, which took place prior to the individual competition, overcoming the second-seeded Russian women to win their nation's eighth successive Olympic title.
As the number two seed in the individual event, Chang avoided facing either Ki or Choi until at least the semi-final stage.
Four wins in the first four rounds duly set up an all-South Korean semi-final against Ki in the last four, with Choi having been eliminated in the preceding quarter-final round. Although Ki was the favourite going into the match, Chang overcame a poor start to win by seven
set points to three and advance to the final.
Her opponent in the final was
Germany's Lisa Unruh
Lisa Unruh (born 12 April 1988) is a German athlete who competes in recurve archery.
Unruh represented Germany at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro winning the silver medal. Her Silver medal was the first individu ...
, who had unexpectedly reached the gold medal match after concluding the ranking round in twenty-first place.
Chang defeated Unruh by six set points to two, winning her a second Olympic gold medal
and becoming the eighth South Korean to be crowned as the women's Olympic individual archery champion. Her victory also marked South Korea's twenty-second Olympic gold medal in archery, surpassing
short track speed skating
Short-track speed skating is a form of competitive ice skating, ice speed skating. In competitions, multiple skaters (typically between four and six) skate on an oval ice track with a length of . The rink itself is long by wide, which is the s ...
as the nation's most successful Olympic sport.
Chang's achievements earned her the accolade of top female athlete at the 2016 Korea Woman Sports Awards.
2017–2018: World number one
Chang became the world's top female recurve archer in June 2017.
At the annual
Archery World Cup final in September she won two medals, achieving gold in the mixed team event alongside reigning men's world champion
Kim Woojin and bronze in the women's individual event. In October Chang partnered
Choi Mi-sun
Choi Mi-sun (; born 1 July 1996) is a South Korean professional recurve archer. She won gold medal in the women's team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
Career 2015: Instant success
Choi made her international debut in Ma ...
and
Kang Chae-young
Kang Chae-young (Hangul: 강채영, born 8 June 1996) is a South Korean archer competing in women's recurve events. She has won numerous medals in archery competitions.
Career
At the 2017 Summer Universiade held in Taipei, Taiwan, she won the ...
at the
2017 World Championships, helping secure South Korea's thirteenth World Championship gold medal in the women's team event after defeating host nation Mexico in the final.
She later finished as the runner-up in the women's individual event after losing to the Russian world number three
Ksenia Perova
Ksenia Vitalyevna Perova ( rus, Ксения Витальевна Перова, , ˈksʲenʲɪɪ̯ə pʲɪˈrovə; born 8 February 1989 in Lesnoy, Sverdlovsk Oblast) is a Russian female archer. At the 2012 Summer Olympics she competed for her ...
in the gold medal match.
Chang began 2018 strongly with victory in the first stage of the
Archery World Cup
The Archery World Cup is a competition, started in 2006, organized by the World Archery Federation, where the archers compete in four stages in four countries and the best eight archers of each category (from 2010, four archers during 2006-09) ad ...
in April, dropping just two points in the final against China's An Qixuan. Her win was notable for her precise shooting in the match's second set, where from a distance of she placed her three arrows within of one another inside the target's innermost ring, a feat lauded as one of the finest achievements recorded in a modern recurve competition.
Chang also progressed to the final of the World Cup's second stage held one month later, where she was again defeated by Ksenia Perova.
For the
2018 Asian Games
The 2018 Asian Games ( id, Pesta Olahraga Asia 2018 or ''Asian Games 2018''), officially known as the 18th Asian Games and also known as Jakarta-Palembang 2018 or Indonesia 2018, was a Asia, continental multi-sport event that was held from 18 A ...
held in August in
Jakarta
Jakarta (; , bew, Jakarte), officially the Special Capital Region of Jakarta ( id, Daerah Khusus Ibukota Jakarta) is the capital and largest city of Indonesia. Lying on the northwest coast of Java, the world's most populous island, Jakarta ...
, Chang competed alongside
Kang Chae-young
Kang Chae-young (Hangul: 강채영, born 8 June 1996) is a South Korean archer competing in women's recurve events. She has won numerous medals in archery competitions.
Career
At the 2017 Summer Universiade held in Taipei, Taiwan, she won the ...
,
Lee Eun-gyeong, and
Lee Woo-seok. Although she was praised for her consistency by the ''
Korea JoongAng Daily
''Korea JoongAng Daily'' is the English edition of the South Korean national daily newspaper ''JoongAng Ilbo''. The newspaper was first published on October 17, 2000, originally named as ''JoongAng Ilbo English Edition''. It mainly carries news a ...
'' after retaining her place in the national team for a fifth consecutive year, Chang delivered an uneven performance in her events and suffered quarter-final defeats in both the
women's individual and
mixed team events before winning gold in the
women's team event.
These results ran contrary to expectations of her winning gold in all three events and came amid wider South Korean sporting disappointments at the Games.
The ''Korea JoongAng Daily'' suggested that the pressure placed on her shoulders to succeed contributed to her inconsistent form, commenting that her "struggle seemed to be more mental than a lack of skill."
Chang was later eliminated from the World Cup's final stage in September by the eventual runner-up
Yasemin Anagoz
''Yasemin'' is a 1988 German-language film directed by Hark Bohm. The international co-production of Turkey and West Germany was chosen as West Germany's official submission to the 61st Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, but didn't ...
, but maintained her position as the World Archery Federation's number one-ranked female recurve archer at the end of the year.
2019–2022: Decline and retirement
In 2019 Chang partnered
Choi Mi-sun
Choi Mi-sun (; born 1 July 1996) is a South Korean professional recurve archer. She won gold medal in the women's team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
Career 2015: Instant success
Choi made her international debut in Ma ...
and
Kang Chae-young
Kang Chae-young (Hangul: 강채영, born 8 June 1996) is a South Korean archer competing in women's recurve events. She has won numerous medals in archery competitions.
Career
At the 2017 Summer Universiade held in Taipei, Taiwan, she won the ...
at the
World Championships
A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...
in June, achieving a silver medal in the women's team event after the trio lost to Taiwan in the final. By July of that year Chang had been identified by the magazine ''Bow International'' as having noticeably dipped in form since the beginning of 2018, and in September she was eliminated from the national selection process for the
2020 Summer Olympics
The , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July.
Tokyo was selected as the host city during the ...
after finishing outside the top 20 qualifiers. She was however afforded a second opportunity to qualify after the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...
forced the postponement of the Olympics until the following year. In March 2021 she was eliminated from contention for a second time.
In August 2022 Chang announced her retirement from competitive archery.
See also
*
Korean archery
The Korean Bow ( ko, 각궁, Gak-gung hanja: , or ''horn bow'') is a water buffalo horn-based composite reflex bow, standardized centuries ago from a variety of similar weapons in earlier use. Due to its long use by Koreans, it is also known as Gu ...
*
List of South Korean archers
South Korean archers have been dominant in modern competitive archery, particularly in the Olympic recurve discipline, since the 1980s, thanks to a mixture of public interest, domestic competition, coaching for children, innovative coaching metho ...
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chang, Hye-jin
Living people
1987 births
South Korean female archers
Asian Games medalists in archery
Archers at the 2014 Asian Games
Archers at the 2018 Asian Games
World Archery Championships medalists
Asian Games gold medalists for South Korea
Asian Games silver medalists for South Korea
Archers at the 2016 Summer Olympics
Olympic archers for South Korea
Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics
Olympic gold medalists for South Korea
Olympic medalists in archery
Medalists at the 2014 Asian Games
Medalists at the 2018 Asian Games
People from Uiseong County
Sportspeople from Daegu
Universiade medalists in archery
FISU World University Games gold medalists for South Korea
Medalists at the 2009 Summer Universiade