‘Women’s fencing Olympic first gold’ Kim Ji-yeon of fighting spirit, 14 year national retirement declaration “Pelvic injury worsening… Dear juniors, I hope they will be recognized more than me”
“14 years of national team, life in the athlete’s village is passing by like a kaleidoscope.”
‘Women’s first Olympic gold medalist in fencing’ Kim Ji-yeon (35, Seoul City Hall) announced her retirement from the national team.
After wearing her first Taegeuk mark in 2006 in her third year at Design High School in Busan, Kim Ji-yeon, who has been active as a national representative for 14 years since 2010, won a gold medal in the individual saber event at the 2012 London Olympics, a first for Korean women’s fencing and a first for Asian fencing. Acquired. In 2013, she won one silver and three bronze medals at the World Championships, including a bronze medal at the individual event at the World Championships in Budapest, and two gold medals (Incheon, Jakarta and Palembang), one silver and one bronze at the Asian Games.
With her unrivaled skills, outstanding beauty, and warm personality, Kim Ji-yeon has been loved by her fans, along with her nickname of ‘beautiful swordsman’. In 2021, after winning the bronze medal in the team event at the Tokyo Olympics with her best friends and juniors Ji-yeon Yun, Su-yeon Choi, and Ji-yeon Seo, she showed off her strength by collaborating with the gold medal in the team event at the Istanbul World Cup in Turkey last March. announced the news of his retirement from the national university.
The successful SK Grand Prix fencing competition on the 29th became Kim Ji-yeon’s farewell stage for the international competition. Kim Ji-yeon retired from her national team after her SK Grand Prix, and she announced plans to focus on her domestic competitions in the future. ㅋㅋㅋ벳
Her national team The reasons for her retirement announcement are her chronic injury and her desire to spend time with her family. In 2015 she suffered from excruciating left hip pain after a pelvic injury. Kim Ji-yeon, who has been centered as the captain of the women’s saber national team’s ‘eldest sister’ by demonstrating painkiller fighting spirit in a situation where cartilage is worn out due to the characteristics of one-sided movement and severe ‘foot fencing’ step training, suffered an Achilles tendon rupture injury just before the Tokyo Olympics. and wrote the history of the first Olympic team bronze medal in women’s saber history. Kim Ji-yeon decided to retire from the national team after much thought ahead of her Hangzhou Asian Games. She said, “She has a very bad pelvis. She told me to stop at the hospital. She said, ‘When you’ve achieved everything you want to achieve, stop it'”, she added. Jiyeon Kim said it was a “difficult decision I made after a lot of thought”. In November 2017, she married actor and gamecaster Lee Dong-jin, and Kim Ji-yeon, who continued her college life with the best support from her, said, “It’s been 7 years since her marriage, and now we’re starting to stick together,” she laughed. Her 14 years of her national team career, three Olympics, and a year-long trip back and forth between her athletes’ village and international competitions, she spent fully with her family. A thirty-five-year-old swordsman who led fencing Korea by winning gold medals in the individual event and bronze in the team event at the Olympics told fans about her long-awaited retirement from the national team.